Boy burglar beat on corpse, police say

ALBUQUERQUE (KRQE) - A teen boy broke into a mortuary and beat up a corpse this week, according to police and prosecutors who are stuck for a motive and a crime more serious than burglary.

Albuquerque police arrested Dominic Goodmoney, 17, Sunday night near Reflections Funeral & Life Celebrations. He was covered in blood, digging into his own cuts and banging his head against a building, police reported.

A knife was found nearby.

On Wednesday he appeared in court charged with aggravated burglary while armed, criminal damage to property, tampering with evidence and larceny. In addition to beating the female corpse he also made a mess of the mortuary, police said.

However Goodmoney is unlikely to face any charge for what was described as blunt-force trauma to the face of the dead women.

"There's a gap in New Mexico law that doesn't cover the actual harm done to the corpse," Pat Davis, spokesman for the Bernalillo County District Attorney, said. "Unfortunately, New Mexico law doesn't have a charge for tampering with a corpse at this stage of the process."

"I think that's something that none of us realized."

It is not known why Goodmoney picked the funeral home and that corpse, Davis added.

"We're going to wait on the APD investigation to tell us that," he told KRQE News 13. "Certainly there's not any indication he had any connections to the location or the body."

Goodmoney remains in custody at the Bernalillo County Juvenile Detention Center. He will undergo a mental evaluation before prosecutors file any charges.

Davis said that because of this crime the DA's office will ask the Legislature to make corpse mutilation a felony.