POCATELLO — A convicted murderer out on parole was recently arrested after police say he pistol-whipped a local man outside of a Pocatello apartment.

Esequiel Rodriguez De La Cruz Jr., 45, of Pocatello, has been charged with aggravated assault, aggravated battery, unlawful possession of a firearm by a convicted felon and concealment of evidence, all felonies, following the June 14 incident, court records show.

The investigation into De La Cruz unfolded around 5:15 p.m. on June 14 when a local man arrived at the Pocatello Police Department lobby at 911 N. Seventh Ave. to report De La Cruz had hit him in the back of the head with a black handgun on the 700 block of North Sixth Avenue, according to a police report contained within an affidavit of probable cause document the Idaho State Journal recently obtained.

The man told police that when he went to pick up his wife from De La Cruz’s apartment, De La Cruz confronted him, pulled out a black handgun and struck him on the head with it while the man was attempting to drive away in his truck, according to the affidavit.

The investigating officer observed the victim had a swollen red mark on the left side of his head, police said.

The officer later viewed security camera footage that showed De La Cruz run toward the victim’s truck, jump onto its running boards and strike the man — who had his hands up in the air — several times in the head with a black and silver handgun, police said.

De La Cruz can then be seen running down an alley near the 700 block of North Sixth Avenue as the man in the pickup flees the area quickly, according to police.

Officers canvassed the area and located an unsecured access leading into a crawl space of a garage off of North Sixth Avenue, said police, adding that a black Hi-Point .380 ACP handgun with one round in the chamber and seven in the magazine, was later recovered from the crawl space.

De La Cruz was brought in for questioning and admitted to possessing a black toy handgun during the incident, police said.

He was then arrested on the four felony charges and transported to the Bannock County Jail in Pocatello.

De La Cruz made his initial appearance in front of 6th District Magistrate Judge David Hooste on June 16, during which his bond was set at $250,000.

He is due back in court on June 26 for a preliminary hearing that will involve local prosecutors attempting to prove there is enough evidence against him to elevate the case from the magistrate to district court level for trial.

At 18 years old, De La Cruz pleaded guilty in April 1999 to two counts of second-degree murder in connection with a double homicide in Twin Falls, according to a 1999 article by The Associated Press.

De La Cruz admitted in court that he and another man entered a Twin Falls apartment on March 30, 1996, where two 19-year-olds were later found dead with multiple gunshot wounds.

De La Cruz was sentenced to a unified prison term of 30 years for the killings, court records show.

Though his sentence was to be satisfied on June 11, 2028, De La Cruz was released early on parole in October of last year.

If convicted of the four felony charges related to the incident on June 14, De La Cruz faces up to 30 years in prison and a fine of up to $70,000.