Gang member convicted in 2004 Days Inn slaying

The Days Inn at 6100 Richmond Highway

A Woodbridge man was convicted Nov. 1 of killing a 19-year-old man during a gang dispute at a motel on Richmond Highway in 2004, the Fairfax County Police announced today.

Cory Wilkins, 35, was convicted of first degree murder and use of a firearm in the commission of a murder in connection to the shooting death of Cristian Aranzana-Vasquez in April 2004.

Wilkins had long been a suspect in Aranzana-Vasquez’s killing, but had managed to escape prosecution. Police reopened the case in 2013 and were able to find new evidence against Wilkins, police said. Wilkins was indicted by a multi-jurisdictional grand jury on July 16, 2015 arrested by police the same day.

Cory Wilkins

According to news reports from the time of the murder, Wilkins and Aranzana-Vasquez were members of separate gangs who had rented rooms at the Days Inn at 6100 Richmond Highway. Aranzana-Vasquez, who was from the Beacon Hill area, was shot in the chest during a fight between the groups in the parking lot.

Wilkins fled the area after the killing. Two other men, Wilfredo Guzman and Donnie Barnes, were convicted in 2004 of gang-related charges in connection to Aranzana-Vasquez’s killing.

In late 2006, Wilkins was located in Tennessee and  was extradited back to Fairfax in 2007, according to Don Gotthardt, a Fairfax Police spokesman. Prosecutors, however, choose not to purse the murder charge against Wilkins after witnesses refused to cooperate in the case, Gotthardt said.

Wilkins will be sentenced on Feb. 24, 2017. The jury at his trial recommended a sentence of 22 years in prison for the murder and three years for the firearm charge, according to police.