Rio Rancho woman charged in wife’s death

RIO RANCHO — A Rio Rancho woman is accused of killing her wife with a shotgun blast to the stomach during a fight outside their home Thursday evening.

Darlene Valencia-Dean, 45, is charged with an open count of murder in the death of 44-year-old Adelita Valencia-Dean.

Darlene Valencia-Dean is also charged with battery upon a health care worker and two counts of battery upon a peace officer after allegedly fighting first responders. She has been booked into the Sandoval County Detention Center.

Court records show Darlene Valencia- Dean had been accused of attacking her wife multiple times in recent years, including allegedly putting a knife to her throat in 2022. That case was dismissed when Adelita Valencia-Dean took back the accusations.

Rio Rancho police responded around 7:30 p.m. to the shooting in the 2300 block of Animas, just northwest of U.S. 528 and Riverside Drive, according to a criminal complaint filed in Sandoval Magistrate Court. Officers found Adelita Valencia-Dean lying on the side of the street. She died at a hospital.

Police said they detained Darlene Valencia- Dean, and she told them she took a bunch of pills to try to end her life and remembered firing the gun but not at her wife. She said, “She never meant to hurt her wife,” and kept asking officers about how she was doing.

Officers found a shotgun down the street from the couple’s home, which was in disarray and marked with holes from gunshots, according to the complaint. A neighbor told police it was the third time he had heard gunshots from the home in the past month.

Police said the neighbor told them that Adelita Valencia-Dean ran from the home yelling “help me” following the gunfire on Thursday. He said he saw Darlene Valencia- Dean chase her wife down the street with a shotgun in her hand.

The neighbor told police Adelita Valencia- Dean was hiding by a cluster mailbox when Darlene Valencia-Dean shot her in the stomach and she “dropped like a brick,” according to the complaint.

After being detained, police said, Darlene Valencia-Dean became irate and kicked one officer in the chest and spat on another officer and a security guard.