{"id":107928,"date":"2015-12-02T20:55:38","date_gmt":"2015-12-03T03:55:38","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/pre-trial-date-set-for-man-suspected-of-killing-durango-native\/"},"modified":"2015-12-02T20:55:38","modified_gmt":"2015-12-03T03:55:38","slug":"pre-trial-date-set-for-man-suspected-of-killing-durango-native","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/pre-trial-date-set-for-man-suspected-of-killing-durango-native\/","title":{"rendered":"Pre-trial date set for man suspected of killing Durango native"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

\"Stallings\"
Stallings<\/span><\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<\/p>

A pre-trial conference date has been set for a Farmington man accused of murdering Karen Cugnini, a Durango native who was living in Flora Vista, in October.<\/p>\n

Rick Stallings, 50, will appear in Aztec Magistrate Court before Judge John A. Dean on March 21. There, if Stallings changes his not guilty plea, a plea agreement could be reached. Otherwise, Dean will schedule a jury trial.<\/p>\n

Stallings was arrested on Oct. 6 on multiple charges related to the shooting death of Cugnini, 69, who was found dead in her Flora Vista home from a single gunshot wound on Oct. 1.<\/p>\n

Investigators found a .22 caliber shell, as well as numerous items stolen from Cugnini\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s home, including a Ford pickup, which was later tied to Stallings. When police tracked the Farmington man down, a standoff occurred, which required the use of a SWAT team and flash grenades.<\/p>\n

At an arraignment in October, The Daily Times of Farmington reported friends and associates of Stallings said he admitted to killing Cugnini, and had several items of the 69-year old woman in his possession, including a ring, necklace, bracelet and credit card.<\/p>\n

Stallings was arrested on suspicion of first-degree murder, aggravated burglary (armed with a deadly weapon), larceny over $20,000, tampering with evidence, larceny of a firearm, unlawful taking of a motor vehicle, possession of a firearm by a felon, disposing of stolen property (firearm), identity theft and three counts of theft of credit cards.<\/p>\n

Cugnini has long ties in the Durango area, with the family known as an old-time cattle ranching family. She graduated Durango High School in 1964, and went on to own a business in Silverton for several years. The Daily Times reported Cugnini moved to Flora Vista in 2008, to care for her disabled granddaughter.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Farmington man accused in Aztec<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":107929,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[5736,5735],"tags":[133,13,131],"naviga_topic":[],"class_list":["post-107928","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-local-news","category-news","tag-courts","tag-frontpage-lead","tag-homicide"],"acf":[],"author_name":"dh_admin","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/107928","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=107928"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/107928\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/107929"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=107928"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=107928"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=107928"},{"taxonomy":"naviga_topic","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/naviga_topic?post=107928"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}