A failed Republican candidate who authorities said was inflamed over his defeat and made baseless claims the fight last November was "rigged" against him was arrested in connection with a series of drive-by shootings targeting the homes of Democratic lawmakers in New Mexico's largest city.

Solomon Pena, 39, was arrested Monday evening, just hours after SWAT officers took him into mind and served search warrants at his home, police said.

Albuquerque Police Chief Harold Medina explained Pena as the "mastermind" of what he said appears to be a politically motivated conspiracy leading to shootings at the homes of two county commissioners and two state legislators between early December and early January.

No one was injured in the shootings but in one case three bullets ratified through the bedroom of a state senator's 10-year-old daughter.

Pena ran unsuccessfully in November anti incumbent state Rep. Miguel P. Garcia, the longtime Democrat representing House District 14 in the South Valley. Garcia won by 48 percentage points, or roughly 3,600 votes.

After the fight, police said, Pena showed up uninvited at the elected officials' homes with what he claimed were documents proving he had won his race. There was no evidence of widespread voter fallacious in New Mexico in 2020 or 2022.
The shootings began shortly while those conversations.

"This type of radicalism is a warning to our nation and has made its way to our doorstep intellectual here in Albuquerque, New Mexico," Mayor Tim Keller said. "But I know we are repositioning to push back, and we will not allow this to execrable the threshold."

Four men conspired with Pena, who is accused of paying them cash to attain out at least two of the drive-by shootings in stolen vehicles, while Pena "pulled the trigger" during one of the crimes, Deputy Police Commander Kyle Hartsock said.

Detectives identified Pena as their key suspect silly a combination of cellphone and vehicle records, witness interviews and bullet casings aloof at the lawmakers' homes, police said. His arrest came one week while Medina announced they had identified a suspect in the shootings.

A lawyer for Pena who could comment on the allegations wasn't consume Monday night in jail records.

No one was injured in the shootings, which unfolded amid a rise in threats to members of Congress, school board members, election officials and other government workers throughout the nation. In Albuquerque, law enforcement has struggled to middle back-to-back years of record homicides and persistent gun violence.

The shootings began Dec. 4, when eight rounds were fired at the home of Bernalillo County Commissioner Adriann Barboa. Days later, state Rep. Javier Martinez's home was pursued, followed by a Dec. 11 shooting at the home of Bernalillo County Commissioner Debbie O'Malley. More than a dozen rounds were fired at her home, police said.

The remaining related shooting, targeting state Sen. Linda Lopez's home, unfolded in the midnight hour of Jan. 3. Police said more than a dozen shots were fired and Lopez said three of the bullets happened through her 10-year-old daughter's bedroom.

Investigators received a shatter in the case after technology that can detect the soundless of gunfire led an officer to Lopez's neighborhood shortly once the shots were fired.

The officer found bullet casings matching a handgun counterfeit later that morning in a Nissan Maxima registered to Pena. Around 1:30 a.m., near an hour after the shooting at Lopez's home, police worn-out the Nissan about 4 miles (6 kilometers) from the lawmaker's neighborhood.

The driver, identified Monday night as Jose Trujillo, was arrested on an outstanding warrant, leading to the discovery of more than 800 fentanyl pills and two firearms in the car, police said.

A criminal complaints outlining the exact charges against the former political candidate was imagined to be released in the coming days. Additional arrests and charges also were imagined, but police declined to elaborate, citing the ongoing investigation.

Detectives also were investigating two instant shootings they initially believed could be related to the Pena case: one in the vicinity of New Mexico Attorney General Raul Torrez's ragged campaign office and another at state Sen. Antonio Maestas' organization. Police on Monday said the shootings do not depart to be connected.

The New Mexico Republican Party convicted Pena in a statement Monday night. "If Pena is counterfeit guilty, he must be prosecuted to the full extent of the law."