State’s Highest Court Sides with Plaintiff’s Experts
June 2025
After an 8-day trial, a Chatham County jury returned a more than $5 million verdict following the murder-for-hire plot of a man in Garden City in 2017.
In August 2017, Eliud Montoya was murdered in Garden City.
Montoya’s family sued his employer’s parent company, Davey Tree Expert Company, for their role in Montoya’s death.
Three men, Pablo Rangel-Rubio, Juan Rangel-Rubio and Higinio Perez-Bravo, are currently serving prison sentences for what prosecutors have called a murder-for-hire plot in Montoya’s killing. Montoya found out the men were hiring undocumented workers and taking money from their paychecks while working for a company owned by Davey Tree.
Montoya had reported this information to his employer.
The jury ultimately decided Davey Tree was negligent in their investigation of Montoya’s whistleblower complaint. Jurors deliberated for more than five hours.
Attorneys for the Montoya family are Bart Turner, Kathryn Pinckney, Brent Savage, Jr, and Carolyn Spellman.
