Cisneros Sentenced For Connection To Christmas Day Stabbing

A prison sentence has been handed down for the stepfather of the man who police say stabbed 20-year-old Buck Garner to death in Ammon on Christmas Day.

Police said 46-year-old Adan Cisneros accompained his step-son, Joey Chavez, and 5 other men to a house in Ammon on Christmas Day, 2011. The Garner family was emotional today as Cisneros was sentenced, but they were comforted by one woman who is no stranger to the lasting effects of a murder in the family.

“One day your world’s normal and then the next day it’s changed forever,” said Carol Dodge. “All of our lives are changed, there’s all sorts of victims in a situation like this.”

In 1996, Carol’s 18-year-old daughter Angie was raped and murdered in her Idaho Falls apartment. Today, Carol comforts Lisa Garner, Buck’s mom. They’re sisters at heart — two mothers who know the pain of loss.

“It’s that balance between the charge of aggravated assault and the notion that you were there to provide a stabilizing force,” said Bonneville County Judge Dane Watkins Jr.

Tuesday morning in court, Watkins Jr. said Adan Cisneros should have been the adult and stood up to stop what was brewing on Christmas Day. Instead, he went with his stepson, Joseph Chavez, to the Ammon home where 20-year-old Buck Garner was killed. The sentence for aggravated assault will cost Cisneros 5 years in prison and an additional 3 years for a drug charge.

“Adan should have been the adult in this situation,” said Dodge, outside the courtroom on Tuesday.

Attorneys repeatedly mentioned the old adage, “Hindsight is 20/20.” Indeed, for the victims in this case, pain is the new normal. Buck’s little brother, Jake, spoke in court today.

“I’ve had friends go and do something stupid before and I’ve stood in front of them in the door and said you’re not going to go,” said Jake Garner. “(Cisneros) still let Joey leave the house with a butcher knife you know?”