Riverside Woman Convicted of Manslaughter in Indio Motel Shooting Death

Carla Sharese Flores, 35, and Ashley Brito, 27, were strangers who met at a bar in Indio before sharing a motel room that became a crime scene. Within 30 minutes of checking in on March 31, 2021, the group was smoking methamphetamine and taking other drugs. Shortly after, Brito was dead from a single gunshot wound to the chest. A Riverside County jury convicted Flores of voluntary manslaughter on March 24, 2026, rejecting the original murder charge but finding a firearms enhancement that exposes her to a prison term exceeding 15 years.

The verdict's central question was intent. Murder under California law requires malice aforethought, either a deliberate plan to kill or a conscious disregard for human life. Voluntary manslaughter applies when a sudden quarrel or heat of passion reduces that culpability to something short of murder. In a drug-fueled encounter among people who had known each other only hours, jurors apparently concluded the prosecution had proved Flores fired the shot but had not proved the deliberate mental state that murder demands.

The case rested heavily on a single eyewitness account. Adrian Audevez told investigators he heard the gunshot while plugging in his phone charger, looked up to see Brito collapse, and spotted Flores holding what appeared to be a black revolver. Frightened, he left the motel and later reported the incident to police. Surveillance footage gathered from around the property helped corroborate the prosecution's timeline, and the District Attorney's trial brief formed the spine of the case against Flores.

The firearms enhancement is the lever that makes this conviction consequential at sentencing. California law treats such findings seriously, and it is expected to push Flores's prison term well past the 15-year threshold even on the reduced charge.

Flores remains held without bail as the May 15 sentencing hearing approaches. That proceeding will determine how many years she serves for a killing that, by the jury's own logic, was not planned but was still undeniably her doing.