The State of Arizona gave notice to the Arizona Supreme Court of its intent to move for a warrant of execution for Aaron Brian Gunches.
On Friday, the Arizona Attorney General’s Office filed a motion with the Court to establish a briefing schedule as part of the execution process. Gunches was sentenced to death for the 2002 murder of Ted Price.
In January 2023, the Arizona Attorney General’s Office filed in the Arizona Supreme Court a motion to withdraw a motion previously filed by the State for a warrant of execution of Gunches.
Gunches ended up on death row for fatally shooting his girlfriend’s ex-husband, Ted Price, in 2002. In 2003, Gunches was pulled over by the Arizona Department of Public Safety near the California border and shot a trooper twice. The trooper survived and bullet casings from the shooting scene matched the ones found near Price’s body. Gunches then pleaded guilty to kidnapping and killing Price and to the attempted murder of the DPS trooper.
Gunches filed his own motion requesting execution on November 25, 2022. However, in a January 4, 2023 filing, Gunches reversed his decision and requested his motion be withdrawn.
Attorney General Mark Brnovich, a Republican, sought a warrant of execution for Gunches after he initiated the proceedings himself.
After she took office, Attorney General Kris Mays, a Democrat, withdrew Brnovich’s warrant claiming “a thorough review of Arizona’s protocols and processes governing capital punishment” was needed in response to Governor Hobbs’ establishment of a Death Penalty Independent Review Commissioner.
Arizona resumed executions in 2022 after an eight-year pause was triggered by the botched execution of Joseph Wood.