Defendant in 2021 Shooting Drops Plea Deal, will Stand Trial

One of six people charged in what police say was a gang-related shooting in East Wenatchee last year is changing his plea.

Attorneys for 17-year-old Angel Eduardo Montes announced this week that he would not be taking the plea deal he'd agreed to, but would instead be going to trial.

Montes is reversing course after accepting the deal about three weeks ago.

He was 16 at the time of the shooting in June of last year but is now charged as an adult with first-degree assault and first-degree robbery.

Montes is the youngest of the six defendants in the case, who all have in the coming months in Douglas County.

The five others are adults. They are Jorge Reyes, 25; Armando Valdez Godina, 36; Juan Arturo Bolaños, 28; Justino Omar Brito, 24; and Gustavo Piña Gaona, 19.

Montes is the youngest of the six defendants in the case, who all have in the coming months in Douglas County.

He also faces assault charges is the robbery and beating of a 15-year-old boy on June 2 of last year.

It was after that crime that Montes was present at a June 5 encounter in which another suspect fired a shot into an SUV, injuring one person in the leg

Police say the father of the June 2 victim was in the SUV and was likely there intending to pay revenge.