A 20-year-old from Jessup serving prison time in Hagerstown now faces first-degree murder and robbery charges stemming from a 2021 killing in Glen Burnie, court documents show.
Andy Daniel Aguilar-Amaya was indicted on three felonies and three firearm offenses in June, more than two-and-a-half years after Gene Martin was found dead in a Glen Burnie neighborhood along Marley Creek.
Martin, according to his obituary, was born in Florida and grew up in Southold, New York, a town on the northeastern tip of Long Island. On Oct. 11, 2021, Anne Arundel County Police found Martin shot in the street near his car, where he was pronounced dead. Known by loved ones as “Pookie,” Martin was 26.
Detectives discovered shell casings near Martin’s car and both they and the vehicle were seized as evidence. According to charging documents, investigators were also able to lift fingerprints matching Aguilar-Amaya’s from the interior and exterior of the car, a 2016 Acura sedan.
While the killing took place in 2021, detectives appear to have made a break in the case recently, though the timeline of their investigation was not clear in court filings.
According to charging documents, detectives interviewed three unnamed “cooperating suspects” who implicated four people, including Aguilar-Amaya, in Martin’s murder. They told authorities they heard one person “bragging about the homicide,” police said.
A detective wrote in charging papers that Aguilar-Amaya set up a meeting with Martin to buy drugs, but “actually intended to rob” him. “One of the credible sources of information,” told police when Martin arrived, Aguilar-Amaya brandished a handgun, pointed it and shot Martin twice “because he didn’t want Mr. Martin to retaliate against him for the robbery,” the detective wrote.
Aguilar-Amaya, who was 17 at the time of the shooting, then searched Martin’s vehicle, took the drugs and some cash, police said, before fleeing the scene.
Though charging documents mention three other people in reference to Martin’s murder, Aguilar-Amaya is the only one currently charged, court records show.
Aguilar-Amaya was convicted of first-degree assault and a handgun charge in Howard County from an incident that took place two months after Martin’s death, court records show. In August 2022, he was sentenced to prison at the Maryland Correctional Institution in Hagerstown.
When detectives interviewed Aguilar-Amaya in relation to the 2021 shooting, telling him they found evidence connecting him to the scene, he denied killing Martin and said his fingerprints might have been there because he had bought drugs from him.
Aguilar-Amaya “said he would discuss the case further only if he was charged,” police wrote, and “expressed fear” that he would spend the rest of his life in jail if charged with the murder.
On Monday, Aguilar-Amaya appeared in Anne Arundel Circuit Court, where his trial was scheduled to begin March 31, 2025. His next hearing will take place Jan. 28 before Anne Arundel Circuit Judge Pamela Alban, according to the Maryland Judiciary.
His public defender did not immediately return a request for comment.