There are more than 1,700 miles separating Dillon County from New Mexico’s capital city, but officials in both communities have been side-by-side for nearly a year in the wake of a brutal cross-country crime spree that took the lives of first responders in both.

A South Carolina man pleaded guilty Friday to charges that he gunned down a New Mexico state police officer who had stopped to help him, marking a turning point in a case that had been set for trial later this year.

Federal Prosecutors are considering the death penalty in the case against South Carolina man who is accused of killing New Mexico State Police Officer Justin Hare. Jaremy Smith, 33, of Marion, South Carolina,