September 22, 2026 - 11:05 am

Metropolitan police relied on ballistics evidence and surveillance video to make an arrest in a deadly shooting nearly three months ago in a neighborhood near downtown Las Vegas.

Robert Soto, 22, was booked Monday into the Clark County Detention Center on one count each of murder with a deadly weapon and carrying a concealed weapon without a permit, according to a Metropolitan Police Department release.

The shooting was reported at 12:45 a.m. on June 27 via a ShotSpotter notification in the area of North 15th Street and Mesquite Avenue, police said at the time. The victim, identified by the Clark County coroner’s office as Uriel Dominguez-Lopez, 59, was found on the sidewalk in front of a residence in the 300 block of North 15th. He died at the scene.

The coroner’s office said Dominguez-Lopez died of gunshot wounds to the torso and ruled his death a homicide.

An arrest report for Soto indicates surveillance video in the area where Dominguez-Lopez was shot captured images of a Mercedes linked to Soto that was in the area before leaving around the time the victim was slain.

There was no known connection between Dominguez-Lopez and Soto detailed in the report. Police said they secured social media messages involving Soto in which firearms were being discussed. Soto allegedly told acquaintances in the messages that the first homeless, Mexican or light-skinned person he saw was “Getting boomed,” police said in the report.

Police said Soto stored the Mercedes at a storage facility shortly after the killing. The vehicle was then sold to CarMax in August and when police searched it, they found a 9 mm cartridge in the vehicle. The head stamp on the cartridge matched one of the cartridge cases found near the victim’s body. Further forensic analysis indicated that the live cartridge found in the Mercedes was cycled through the same firearm as spent cartridges found at the crime scene.

Soto appeared in court Tuesday, where he was ordered held without bail.

Contact Glenn Puit at gpuit@reviewjournal.com. Digital content producer Tony Garcia contributed to this report.