HAGÅTÑA (The Guam Daily Post) — Curtis James Blas pleaded guilty to aggravated assault as a second-degree felony for his involvement in the 2017 homicide of Adam Messier.
Blas, 26, was scheduled to stand trial against a murder charge, but negotiations between attorneys before trial resulted in a plea agreement presented to Judge John Terlaje in the Superior Court of Guam Wednesday morning.
Blas agreed to plead guilty to aggravated assault as a second-degree felony and misdemeanor charges of disinterring a corpse and destroying evidence.
According to court documents, Blas was one of four men accused of killing Messier in 2017 and disposing of his body. Messier was reported missing shortly after his death until a woman provided information in 2021 to the Guam Police Department that Messier was killed.
The plea also set a range for Blas to serve between five and 10 years at the Department of Corrections for the charges.
Rationale
Before accepting the plea, Terlaje asked prosecutor Sean Brown if Messier’s family had been notified of the plea, to which Brown responded he had long conversations with Messier’s sister and wife.
Messier’s sister, Nicole Doak, who appeared via Zoom, confirmed her family was happy with Blas’ plea primarily because the disinterring a corpse and destroying evidence charges as misdemeanors were included with aggravated assault as a second-degree felony.
Terlaje then asked Brown for the rationale behind the plea, considering Blas would be pleading guilty to aggravated assault, which is several steps down from the murder charge brought against Blas in 2021.
Brown explained Blas was the least culpable of the four men involved in the death of Messier.
“Mr. Blas had a lesser involved role. … He was not really involved in the physical assault, … aside from striking Messier once,” Brown said, adding he was concerned considering the facts, if Blas went to trial for murder, the jury would come back with something “not just.”
Blas’ attorney Terrence Timblin agreed with Brown that Blas was the least culpable of the men involved.
Charging documents filed in October 2021 stated Blas’ father, the now-deceased Jason Alianza, was roommates with Messier at the Tumon Horizon Condominiums in Upper Tumon. He became upset with Messier after Messier threatened to report him to the landlord for using illicit drugs.
Alianza, Blas and Alianza’s brother Donovan Carriaga then allegedly beat Messier while another man, Brandon Flaherty, held Messier down. Carriaga also allegedly strangled Messier with a tie strap before they disposed of his body.
Court documents state Flaherty also allegedly hit Messier with a baseball bat, and Blas told officers that he saw Carriaga wrap a cord around Messier’s neck while Alianza continued to hit Messier until he was unconscious.
Co-defendants
With Blas’ guilty plea, Flaherty’s and Carriaga’s cases remain unresolved and are set to go to trial.
Brown told The Guam Daily Post following the hearing that the Office of the Attorney General is continuing negotiations with Flaherty and Carriaga but said it’s “more than likely” the pair will go to trial, as the prosecution is seeking a murder conviction.
In the hearing, Brown also requested Blas be sentenced after Flaherty’s and Carriaga’s cases are resolved. While Blas’ plea agreement does not involve cooperating against his co-defendants, pleading guilty means forfeiting his Fifth Amendment right to not incriminate himself, and Brown could compel Blas to testify at the trials.
Terlaje said he plans to bring Flaherty and Carriaga to trial “expeditiously.”
Curtis Blas appears in the Superior Court of Guam on Wednesday, Jan. 31, 2024.
