A Howard County man was convicted Wednesday of second-degree murder in connection with a highway shooting last year that killed a 20-year-old passenger and wounded two other people on Interstate 70 in Frederick County. Jeffrey Josue Diaz was found guilty of second-degree murder, five counts of attempted second-degree murder and six counts of using a firearm in the commission of a violent crime.
Investigators linked the shooting to a physical altercation Diaz had with another man at the Frederick Fairgrounds. CBS News reported that a security guard said Diaz left the fairgrounds with a bleeding cut on his forehead.
The conviction announcement said Diaz fired multiple rounds from a Dodge Ram into a GMC Sierra carrying the other man and five others. CBS News reported that Diaz was in the Ram’s rear driver’s-side seat and that at least 10 rounds were fired around 11:40 p.m., as the vehicles approached the Mount Airy exit on eastbound I-70.
One Passenger Was Killed; Two Others Were Injured
Eduardo Alexander Alvarado Urrea, 20, was shot in the chest and upper back while riding in the Sierra’s middle front seat. He was pronounced dead at a nearby gas station after the vehicle pulled over, according to CBS News. The driver was shot in the upper shoulder and taken to a hospital, and another passenger was cut on the face by broken glass. The group called 911 after stopping.
The Baltimore Banner also reported that one person died and two were injured as the group traveled east on I-70 after leaving an event at the fairgrounds. The Banner identified Urrea, of Silver Spring, as the person pronounced dead at the scene and reported that the Sierra’s driver, whose identity had not been released, was taken to a trauma center with gunshot injuries.
Arrests and Conflicting Dates
Diaz, 24, and Francisco Javier Sanchez-Juarez, 28, both of Howard County, were taken into custody without incident on June 29, 2025, according to Daily Voice. The outlet reported that the shooting occurred around 11:55 p.m. near eastbound I-70 and Maryland Route 27 in Mount Airy, and that both men were charged with first-degree murder and multiple firearm-related offenses before being held without bond at the Frederick County Detention Center.
A separate posting attributed to the Maryland State Police states that two men were arrested and charged with murder in connection to the I-70 shooting on May 21, 2026 — a date that does not match the June 2025 arrest timeline reported by Daily Voice. The discrepancy between the two accounts has not been resolved in the available records.
Diaz was charged in the June 14, 2025, shooting on eastbound I-70 in Frederick County and was ultimately convicted of second-degree murder, five counts of attempted second-degree murder and six firearm counts following the trial. The case remains part of the broader fallout from the fairgrounds altercation that investigators say set the deadly chain of events on the highway into motion.
Sentencing and a Separate Interstate Shooting
The Maryland State Commission on Criminal Sentencing Policy says the state’s sentencing guidelines are voluntary and judges may impose sentences outside them. That guidance does not establish what sentence Diaz received. In a separate incident, Maryland State Police said a road-rage shooting on I-95 in Howard County on August 12, 2024, left the victims uninjured. That incident differed in date and location from the fatal I-70 shooting.
