DALLAS (Diya TV) — Dallas County prosecutors will not seek the death penalty against Yordanis Cobos-Martinez, the man charged with capital murder in the killing and beheading of Indian motel manager Chandra Nagamallaiah, according to court records.
The decision removes capital punishment as a possible sentence in a case involving an attack that investigators say was captured on surveillance video, witnessed by Nagamallaiah’s wife and son and followed by Cobos-Martinez’s arrest near the scene.
Cobos-Martinez, 37, remains charged with capital murder in Nagamallaiah’s Sept. 10, 2025, killing. The Dallas County District Attorney’s Office filed formal notice in the 283rd Judicial District Court that prosecutors will not pursue a death sentence.
The publicly available filing does not state a reason for the decision.
If Cobos-Martinez is convicted of capital murder, he could still face life imprisonment without the possibility of parole. By declining to seek the death penalty, however, prosecutors have eliminated execution as a possible punishment in the case.
The decision comes despite the extensive evidence described by investigators and in court records surrounding Nagamallaiah’s killing.
Nagamallaiah, 50, was working at the Downtown Suites motel on Samuell Boulevard in Dallas when he approached Cobos-Martinez and another employee and told them not to use a broken washing machine, according to an arrest affidavit.
The other employee told investigators that Cobos-Martinez became angry because Nagamallaiah communicated the instruction through her as a translator rather than speaking directly to him.
Investigators say Cobos-Martinez then left the area, retrieved a machete and began attacking Nagamallaiah.
Nagamallaiah attempted to escape, running toward the motel office while screaming for help, police said. His wife and son were nearby.
Both tried to intervene.
Investigators said Nagamallaiah’s wife and son repeatedly attempted to stop the attack but were pushed away as the assault continued. A witness said Nagamallaiah’s son also attempted to defend his father with a baseball bat.
Police say Cobos-Martinez continued attacking Nagamallaiah until he was decapitated.
Cobos-Martinez then kicked Nagamallaiah’s severed head into the motel parking lot, picked it up and carried it to a dumpster.
The attack and portions of the events surrounding it were captured by the motel’s surveillance system, according to investigators.
The capital murder charge also involves allegations that property was taken from Nagamallaiah during the attack.
Investigators say Cobos-Martinez removed Nagamallaiah’s cellphone and motel key card from his pockets before continuing the assault. Police said those items were later recovered in Cobos-Martinez’s possession.
The indictment states that Cobos-Martinez caused Nagamallaiah’s death through stabbing, cutting and chopping and identifies multiple sharp weapons, including a machete, knife and axe, in connection with the killing and an alleged attempted robbery.
Under Texas law, an intentional murder committed in the course of certain other felonies, including robbery or attempted robbery, can qualify as capital murder.
Authorities encountered Cobos-Martinez shortly after the killing.
A Dallas Fire-Rescue crew saw a man matching his description leaving the area carrying a machete, according to investigators. Firefighters followed him until Dallas police officers arrived.
Police said Cobos-Martinez was taken into custody wearing clothing covered in blood. Investigators said he had a machete as well as Nagamallaiah’s cellphone and motel key card.
During a subsequent interview with detectives, investigators say Cobos-Martinez admitted to killing Nagamallaiah.
Cobos-Martinez has pleaded not guilty, and the allegations against him have not yet been proven at trial.
Cobos-Martinez was already a convicted felon with a yearslong criminal history spanning Florida, California and Texas before he was charged with Nagamallaiah’s killing. His record included a felony false-imprisonment conviction in California, a misdemeanor assault conviction in Texas, arrests and prosecutions involving grand theft of a motor vehicle and attempted carjacking, and an arrest as a fugitive from justice.
His encounters with law enforcement stretched back at least to February 2017, when he was arrested in Florida after authorities said he stole a Mercedes-Benz from Miami-Dade County. The vehicle later broke down along Interstate 95, where he was taken into custody and charged with felony grand theft of a motor vehicle. That charge was later dropped.
Four months later, Cobos-Martinez was arrested in South Lake Tahoe, California, after police said he attempted to take a 22-year-old woman’s BMW while she was still inside it. Police said Cobos-Martinez, who was naked at the time, opened the woman’s car door, pulled at her hair and clothing in an attempt to remove her and then climbed into the vehicle and attempted to drive away with her still inside. Bystanders intervened and pulled him from the car before police arrested him. He was charged with carjacking and false imprisonment.
Cobos-Martinez was released on bail in the California case and later left the state while the prosecution remained pending.
By 2018, he was in Texas, where he was arrested in Harris County on an indecency-with-a-child charge involving a 14-year-old girl. That charge was eventually dismissed for insufficient evidence and did not result in a conviction. While Cobos-Martinez was jailed awaiting trial, however, he was accused of punching a jailer in the jaw. He pleaded guilty to misdemeanor assault and was sentenced to one year in jail, receiving credit for the years he had already spent in custody.
Cobos-Martinez was subsequently extradited back to California to face the unresolved case stemming from the 2017 incident. A jury acquitted him of carjacking but convicted him of felony false imprisonment. He was placed on probation in August 2023 but later fled again, prosecutors said.
Cobos-Martinez later returned to Texas, where he was arrested as a fugitive from justice in connection with the California case. He eventually entered federal immigration custody and was held at the Bluebonnet Detention Center in Anson, Texas.
Cobos-Martinez was also in the United States illegally and subject to a final order of removal. Federal immigration authorities said he remained in the country because Cuba would not accept his return due to his criminal history. Despite his felony conviction, multi-state criminal record and final removal order, Cobos-Martinez was released from ICE custody under an order of supervision on Jan. 13, 2025.
By the time he was released from federal immigration detention, Cobos-Martinez was a convicted felon who had faced criminal cases in three states, had been convicted of felony false imprisonment and misdemeanor assault, had been arrested as a fugitive from justice and had been ordered removed from the United States.
Less than nine months after his release from ICE custody, Cobos-Martinez was arrested and charged with capital murder in the killing and beheading of Chandra Nagamallaiah.
ICE subsequently lodged another immigration detainer against him. He remains in custody as the capital murder case proceeds, but Dallas County prosecutors have now formally decided they will not seek the death penalty.
Nagamallaiah, known to relatives and friends as “Bob,” was originally from India and had moved to the United States in pursuit of a career in the hospitality industry.
He eventually settled in Texas and worked in motel management. Relatives remembered him as a devoted husband and father.
His son, who had recently graduated from high school at the time of his father’s death, was reportedly interested in pursuing hospitality management himself.
