By Andy Sevilla
An Austin man who police say brutally beat a San Marcos woman that later died of her injuries began a 30-year sentence this month after striking a plea deal.
Jaime Beltran Granados, 23, accepted the 30-year sentence in July in exchange for a guilty plea days before his trial was scheduled to begin. Granados was facing up to life in prison had he been convicted.
District Judge Jack Robison accepted the plea deal Aug. 12, starting Granados’ prison term.
Granados has been in Hays County custody since April 25, four days after his victim was found badly beaten and left unconscious next to a dumpster near Yarrington Road in Kyle.
Last April authorities found Mary Katherine “Katie” Mayfield, then 34, unresponsive in the 3500 block of Yarrington Road, according to Granados’ arrest affidavit.
Investigators said Mayfield was lying near a dumpster with her face badly beaten, bleeding from her nose and mouth, and with her shirt pulled over her breast, court documents state. Mayfield’s purse and cell phone were missing.
Mayfield was transported to Brackenridge Hospital, where she remained in a coma before dying May 23, 2013.
Finding a suspect
Cell phone records led police to Granados in Austin, according to the affidavit.
Investigators obtained Mayfield’s cell phone records and tracked down who she had been speaking to leading up to the time of her assault.
One phone number in particular communicated with Mayfield multiple times the night before she was found unresponsive and into the time leading up to her attack, the affidavit said.
Authorities tracked that number to a Kyle man who told investigators he had purchased that phone for one of his employees who he identified as Granados. The Kyle man also told police Granados had borrowed his car for a few hours the same day Mayfield was found.
Investigators executed a search warrant at the Granados’ Austin residence, where Granados told police he had borrowed the Kyle man’s vehicle on April 21 – a vehicle matching the description of the car Mayfield was last seen getting into, the affidavit states.
Granados also fits the description provided by the victim’s boyfriend and another person who said they saw Mayfield get into a small gray Mazda Hatchback driven by a Hispanic male, according to the affidavit.
Granados told police he had not called anyone, except for a friend named Saul on April 21, the affidavit states; authorities pointed out in the court document that cell phone records show there were multiple calls between Mayfield and Granados. Phone records revealed Granados and Mayfield’s boyfriend were the last persons she spoke to, the affidavit states.
Granados told police he lost his phone, but could not say when he lost it.
Mayfield was found unresponsive at about 5:30 p.m. April 21. About 40 minutes earlier, Mayfield spoke with her boyfriend informing him that the man she was with ran out of gas and the two pulled off the road because there was a cop behind them, the affidavit states.
Police said Granados denied calling Mayfield, being with her or in the area. The affidavit for the arrest warrant was from Hays County Justice of the Peace Beth Smith.
About a week after Granados was arrested, the Austin Police Department found Granados fingerprints on a bottle that was left lying next to Mayfield’s body.
“This is obviously a direct contradiction to the words of Granados who denied stopping anywhere or being with anyone. This placed him at the crime scene where Mayfield was left,” the affidavit stated.
Granados, an undocumented Mexican, has an ICE (Immigration and Customs Enforcement) detainer.
The detainer signifies that the federal agency intends on assuming custody of the undocumented person once they are no longer under a law enforcement agency’s custody. The detainers are critical for ICE to identify and ultimately remove criminal undocumented persons, the federal agency’s website states.
