Man who killed pregnant girlfriend found guilty of manslaughter

A felon who killed his 27-year-old girlfriend and her unborn child during an argument at their San Jacinto home was convicted today of two counts of voluntary manslaughter.

Following two days of deliberations, a Banning jury returned with the manslaughter verdicts against Angel Martine McIntire, 29, of Beaumont, convicting him of the lesser offenses rather than first-degree murder and finding untrue special circumstance allegations that he took multiple lives.

Riverside County Superior Court Judge Francisco Navarro scheduled a sentencing hearing for May 17 at the Banning Justice Center. McIntire is being held without bail at the Smith Correctional Facility.

He was arrested in 2022 after a nearly two-year sheriff's investigation into the disappearance of Diana Perez Gonzalez.   

According to a trial brief filed by the District Attorney's Office, he and Gonzalez had a conflicted relationship that began in August 2018, roughly two years after she entered the United States from Mexico.   

The defendant and victim moved in together, but within a year, he became abusive, prompting Gonzalez, who was pregnant with their daughter, to obtain a restraining order against him and move out of their shared residence in December 2019.

The abuse inflicted on the woman culminated in a domestic violence conviction against McIntire. However, because the two had a baby together, they continued to communicate, ultimately resulting in her welcoming the defendant into her home in the 3000 block of Crooked Branch Way in the fall of 2020, the brief said.

"Diana was working at Taco Hut, and the defendant, who was unemployed, would watch their daughter,'' the narrative said. "It was during this time that Diana became pregnant with their second child."

That pregnancy fueled discord, and McIntire again turned physically abusive, according to court papers.

On Dec. 4, 2020, with Diana eight weeks pregnant, investigators theorize McIntire attacked her, inflicting fatal injuries, though the method remains unknown.

According to the brief, relying on mobile phone signal pings and social media activity, detectives were able to track McIntire's movements that day, which took him through Cherry Valley, Beaumont, Gilman Springs, Aguanga, Cahuilla, Palm Desert and back to his and Gonzalez's residence.

At one point during the circuit, he dropped his and the victim's daughter at his mother's home in Beaumont, telling her that he didn't know where the victim was, relaying the same information to Gonzalez's family over the following week, according to court papers.

One of her relatives finally reported her missing on Dec. 11, 2020, and detectives immediately suspected foul play. However, McIntire was adamant in statements to detectives that he had no clue of his girlfriend's whereabouts, suggesting she had returned to Mexico.

He told investigators he went on the circuitous drive to "think," the brief stated.

By October 2022, detectives gathered sufficient circumstantial evidence to obtain an arrest warrant.

"When he was told of the charges and the evidence against him, the defendant laughed and said, `I thought you would have the body,''' according to the brief.

The search for Gonzalez's remains is ongoing.   

Court records show that, along with domestic violence, the defendant has a prior conviction for illegal possession of a loaded firearm in public.