8 March 26th-april 1st, 2026 phoenixnewtimes.com PHOENIX NEW TIMES | NEWS | FEATURE | FOOD & DRINK | ARTS & CULTURE | MUSIC | CONCERTS | CANNABIS | What happened at Club DWNTWN According to the lawsuit, Montoya was waiting in line outside the club with two friends when a security guard denied them entry around 2:20 a.m. The suit says Montoya “questioned” why he wasn’t allowed in, at which point Recor — who had been checking IDs — “forcefully removed” Montoya and a friend from the line. “Thereafter, multiple scuffles broke out between Rafael, other patrons and security guards, lasting for several minutes,” the suit says. Bystanders filmed much of the inci- dent and its aftermath. The suit notes that Dominguez and Goldsmith, who were working private security for the venue, were standing just feet away from the fight. They failed to intervene until Montoya was limp on the ground. “This wasn’t a quick tussle that only lasted a short period of time, not allowing law enforcement to take action,” said Fucetola. “This was a serious incident in which they observed blood, they observed fighting, they observed people getting hurt. And for over two minutes — not a mere five seconds, ten seconds — for over two minutes this went on, and that’s captured by all the video while these offi- cers did absolutely nothing.” Footage shows the officers approaching and standing next to Montoya after he fell. Other clips show them turning Montoya on his side and stopping other patrons from providing medical aid. They then “dragged Rafael off the street by his shirt and feet,” the lawsuit says, “contorting his body with blatant disregard to his visibly unrespon- sive and fragile condition.” The lawsuit claims that the two offi- cers knew or should have known that “Club DWNTWN had a reputation and history of its security personnel using excessive, dangerous, or disproportionate force against patrons.” The suit also blames the city for not properly training them to intervene and de-escalate the situation. Notably, the Republic reported that an internal police investigation cleared both officers of wrongdoing, except for not turning on their body-worn cameras. The suit also says that Club DWNTWN and Blanco Protection Agency knew or should have known that Recor “had a history of violent, criminal, and/or otherwise dangerous conduct rendering him unfit to serve as a security guard” and that he was “prohibited or otherwise disqualified from working as a licensed security guard under Arizona law.” Indeed, there is no listed license for Recor in the DPS database, and the Republic reported that he has multiple felony charges in Arizona and Florida going back to 2004, including “weapons charges, assaults, burglary, identity theft and possession of illegal drugs.” Last year, Blanco Protection Agency founder Manny Blanco told the Republic that he trained Recor but that Recor was not one of his employees. “I would say he has good enough expe- rience to not do stuff like that,” Blanco told the paper last April. Montoya’s death was ruled a homicide. Though Phoenix police submitted the case to the office of Maricopa County Attorney Rachel Mitchell, her office originally declined to prosecute Recor, whose iden- tity prosecutors refused to release for months. But after the Republic identified discrepancies in the police version of events and video documentation of the fight, Mitchell’s office announced it would take another look at the case, asking police to also investigate the possible forgery of Recor’s security guard license. Rafael Montoya died three days after a Club DWNTWN security guard punched him in March 2025. (Clarissa Sosin) Still Seeking Justice from p 6
