Investigators matched shell casings from Manton Avenue to a handgun found after a Route 95 stop.
PROVIDENCE, R.I. — Ballistics, gunshot residue and DNA evidence helped prosecutors secure two consecutive life sentences for Luis Sepulveda in the fatal shooting of Angel Rodriguez after a 2023 Mother’s Day party in Providence.
The April 10 sentence followed a murder trial focused not only on what witnesses saw in a garage on Manton Avenue, but also on what police recovered afterward. Sepulveda, 55, was ordered to serve two life terms at the Adult Correctional Institutions, plus 10 years without parole as a habitual offender, after a jury convicted him of first-degree murder and firearm offenses.
The shooting happened late May 14, 2023, after Sepulveda and Rodriguez had spent part of Mother’s Day at the same family gathering. Prosecutors said the men argued earlier, then moved past the dispute. Later, a fight started in the garage. Witness testimony placed Sepulveda there with a gun he pulled from a bag. Attorney General Peter F. Neronha later said the case was one of those that occur when a person prohibited from owning and carrying a firearm gets one anyway. He said Rodriguez’s death left his family, friends and community changed forever.
Providence police responded to the Manton Avenue home at about 11:04 p.m. Officers found Rodriguez on the ground with a gunshot wound to the chest. CPR began at the scene before rescue crews took him to Rhode Island Hospital, where he was pronounced dead at 11:36 p.m. The time markers became part of the state’s timeline: a family party, a garage fight, three shots described by prosecutors, a wounded man on the ground and a suspect no longer at the home when officers arrived.
Investigators said the physical evidence followed Sepulveda away from the party. Rhode Island State Police troopers stopped a gray minivan on Route 95 South and took him into custody. Inside the driver’s door, troopers found a handgun. At Manton Avenue, police recovered five shell casings. Testing showed the casings had been fired from the handgun found in the vehicle. Prosecutors also said a primer gunshot residue test confirmed residue on Sepulveda’s hands, and a Rhode Island Department of Health DNA analysis found evidence of his DNA on the firearm.
Those findings supported witness accounts that Sepulveda fired two shots into the air before shooting Rodriguez once in the chest. The state also presented statements that Sepulveda admitted to firing the gun, while the defense record described in public releases did not erase the forensic link between the weapon and the scene. The case left some details outside public view, including the full cause of the earlier dispute and what each person in the garage did in the moments before the fatal shot. The jury still found the state had proved murder beyond a reasonable doubt.
The verdict came Oct. 23, 2025, after seven days of testimony before Superior Court Justice Kristin E. Rodgers. Jurors convicted Sepulveda of first-degree murder, discharge of a firearm resulting in death, carrying a pistol without a license, possession of a firearm by a prohibited person, assault with a dangerous weapon, using a firearm during a violent crime and possessing a large-capacity feeding device. The convictions showed that jurors accepted both the killing charge and the separate firearm counts tied to possession and use of the gun.
At sentencing, the punishment moved beyond the murder count. Rodgers imposed two consecutive life sentences, meaning the life terms run one after the other. She also found Sepulveda to be a habitual offender and added a 10-year non-parolable sentence to run after the life terms. Prosecutor Daniel C. Hopkins said Sepulveda illegally possessed a gun, traveled from North Carolina to Rhode Island with it, brought it into a Mother’s Day family celebration and killed another family member. Hopkins said Sepulveda should spend the rest of his life behind bars.
The hearing also gave Rodriguez’s relatives a chance to describe the impact of the shooting. Some wore necklaces holding Rodriguez’s photo as they listened and spoke. One family member said the killing had ruined lives, not only affected them. Another said Rodriguez cared deeply about his family and friends. “Angel was just a strong soul,” the speaker said. The same statement said Sepulveda had taken away Rodriguez’s chance to become a father, something relatives said he had wanted.
Providence Police Colonel Oscar L. Perez said officers and prosecutors worked to bring justice in a difficult case. Neronha thanked the Providence Police Department for its collaboration and said the sentence could not bring Rodriguez back, but he hoped it gave some measure of peace to those who cared for him. The prosecution was handled by Special Assistant Attorneys General Daniel C. Hopkins and Edward G. Mullaney, with Detective Alicia Hersperger leading the investigation for Providence police.
Luis Sepulveda remains sentenced at the Adult Correctional Institutions under the double life order and added 10-year term. The trial record now stands on witness testimony, the recovered handgun, the shell casings, residue testing, DNA analysis and the jury’s finding that the state proved the charges.
Author note: Last updated May 5, 2026.