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A Silver Spring man wanted in the killing of a Long Branch variety-store owner in May of last year was sentenced to 20 years in prison Friday for the armed robbery of a convenience store in Queen Anne's County, according to a press release.

Julio Nelson Paredes, 44, of an unknown address, received the maximum possible sentence in U.S. District Court in Baltimore for holding up customers and employees at the Tienda Ramirez grocery store in Templeville on Aug. 7, 2008 with several other men and taking more than $500 in cash and personal items, according to his plea agreement.

Queen Anne's County Police arrested Paredes and Rogelio Claros Alfaro, 35, and Manuel Claros, 22, both of Silver Spring; and William Ortiz Lazaro, 30, of Hyattsville in Templeville the same day of the robbery, according to the press release from the Office of the State's Attorney for the District of Maryland. Police found cash, cell phones and loaded shotguns and handguns belonging to customers of the store in the car with the men when they were arrested, according to the release.

The other men have pleaded guilty in U.S. District Court on related robbery charges and are awaiting sentencing, according to the release.

Shortly after his arrest, police said they used DNA evidence to link Paredes to the unsolved murder of 53-year-old Hyattsville resident Jorge Villatoro, who was killed during a daytime May 2008 robbery at the Variedades Jenny store he owned at 618 University Blvd. A warrant for Paredes's arrest has been filed in Montgomery County, according to online judicial records. He will be charged with first-degree murder and carjacking, according to the court records.

County police say two men walked into Variedades Jenny, which was named for Villatoro's daughter, about 4 p.m. May 27 while Villatoro was there managing the shop. One of the men, believed to be Paredes, fatally shot him.

The two men separated, and Paredes fled to a neighboring 7-Eleven store, where he carjacked a Comcast cable van to get away, according to county police. The van was recovered nearby in the 8400 block of 12th Avenue in Hyattsville shortly after the incident.

DNA from a hat recovered at the scene of the shooting in Long Branch matched a sample taken from Paredes, according to county police. In addition, the shotgun shells used in the Templeville incident matched the shells that killed Villatoro, police said.

Paredes' lawyer, Greenbelt-based William Brennan, declined to comment on his client.