Man sentenced to 25 years for fatal stabbing

Eliazar Martinez-Rodriguez, a 35-year-old Oregon man, has been sentenced to 25 years in prison for stabbing a romantic rival, Jefferson Cates, through the heart. Prosecutors say the act was motivated by jealousy after finding out the victim was seeing the same woman as him.

Martinez-Rodriguez pleaded guilty to first-degree manslaughter for the June 2024 killing of 30-year-old Cates, as well as second-degree assault for a separate jailhouse attack. The incident occurred at the Crown Court apartments on Southeast 97th Avenue in Oregon City, where Martinez-Rodriguez had been seeing the woman. The woman and Cates returned to her apartment and encountered Martinez-Rodriguez. Cates was unnerved by Martinez-Rodriguez’s behavior and walked away. Martinez-Rodriguez later found Cates elsewhere in the apartment complex and attacked him.

Prosecutors say that Martinez-Rodriguez became enraged when he found out the woman had also allegedly been intimate with Cates. On June 22, 2024, the woman and Cates returned to her apartment and encountered Martinez-Rodriguez, who later attacked Cates elsewhere in the apartment complex. Witnesses reported hearing a “blood-curdling scream” while Cates was being stabbed.

Read Also: Woman shot dead by obsessed driver

During Martinez-Rodriguez’s sentencing hearing, Cates’ mother, Lynette Brunson, spoke about the impact of the killing on her family. She said, “I carry Jefferson’s ashes with me every day, but you carry his blood on your hands,” and explained that the violent manner of the killing has caused her to have recurring nightmares, high blood pressure, a stroke, and heart damage called takotsubo cardiomyopathy, also known as “broken-heart syndrome.” Brunson also said, “Because that is exactly what Mr. Martinez-Rodriguez has done, breaking not only my heart, but the hearts of everyone who knew and loved Jefferson.”

Martinez-Rodriguez was already on supervised release from federal prison at the time of the killing, having served a sentence for a firearms charge. He violated the terms of his release by leaving the Northwest Regional Re-Entry Center in Portland, where he had been ordered to live. In May, Martinez-Rodriguez also assaulted another inmate without provocation while being held at the Clackamas County Jail, striking the prisoner with a “barrage of 50 or 60 punches to the head and face,” leaving him flat on his back “with a bloody face and struggling to breathe.”

Martinez-Rodriguez received a total of 300 months in prison, with 230 months for the manslaughter conviction and 70 months for the assault.