Husband and wife charged in Candy Kitchen homicide investigation

A husband and wife were charged after a homicide in Candy Kitchen, a tiny Cibola County community where deputies said the suspects were armed and dangerous and where the killing rattled neighbors in a place with just 107 residents.

The killing happened April 18 sometime between 11 a.m. and noon. Sheriff Larry D. Diaz said deputies were investigating the Candy Kitchen-area homicide that same day, then asked the public for help finding David Thomas Byington and Tonia Sue Byington. Deputies said Tonia Sue Byington was taken into custody first, and David Thomas Byington later turned himself in on April 19. By April 22, both were in custody and murder charges had been filed.

David Thomas Byington faced an open count of murder, and deputies said he drove away in a Ford Ranger pickup truck. Law enforcement initially warned that both suspects should be considered armed and dangerous while they were still at large. The rapid turn from a manhunt to arrests underscored how quickly the case moved, but it did not answer the larger question of why the violence erupted in the first place.

Deputy April Salazar, the lead investigator, said statements from community members and from the suspects themselves indicated that the victim and David Byington had clashed before and did not get along. That suggested a history of personal conflict, not a random attack, as investigators worked through the events that led to the death in this rural stretch of western New Mexico. Candy Kitchen sits near Pinehill and the Ramah Navajo Indian Reservation, in a corridor many people travel between Gallup and Grants, making any violent crime there a matter of concern well beyond one household.

The case also hit a community that has seen serious violence before. A 2023 homicide in Candy Kitchen involving Edward Torres Jr. brought the same small place into the news in painful circumstances, and the new case again put pressure on local law enforcement to move quickly in an area where long response times can matter. For Cibola County residents, the arrests close one urgent chapter, but the court process and the full story behind the killing are still ahead.