The FBI appeared no closer to apprehending the assailant after nearly two days of searching with a team that has grown to hundreds of people as officers knocked on doors, the governor offered a $50,000 reward, and the widening manhunt for a Texas gunman who fatally shot five neighbours continued coming up empty on Sunday.
“I can tell you right now, we have zero leads,” James Smith, the FBI special agent in charge, told reporters while again asking the public for tips in the rural town of Cleveland, where the shooting took place just before midnight Friday.
The scope of the hunt for the shooter in the Houston area has expanded. According to reports, by Sunday night, more than 200 police officers from various jurisdictions were looking for Francisco Oropeza, with many of them knocking on doors in quest of any information that would help them locate the 38-year-old culprit. The FBI and local authorities both contributed to the reward fund, bringing the sum up to $80,000 for any information regarding Oropeza’s whereabouts.
Oropeza, who reportedly fled the neighbourhood on foot on Friday night, is thought to be armed and dangerous. Sheriff of San Jacinto County Greg Capers stated that officials had expanded the search area beyond the shooting’s scene. The incident took place after the suspect’s neighbours begged him to cease firing shots in his yard at odd hours of the night because a baby was attempting to fall asleep.
Wilson Garcia, the father of the infant, spoke at a vigil on Sunday in Cleveland about the terrifying attempts his friends and family made inside his home that evening to flee, hide, and protect the children after Oropeza approached the house and started firing, killing his wife first at the front door.
Another of Garcia’s children, 9-year-old Daniel Enrique Laso, was also killed. Garcia said he and two other people had gone to “respectfully” ask Oropeza to shoot his gun farther away from the house on a street where residents say it is not uncommon for neighbours to unwind by firing off guns.
Garcia said he walked away and called the police when Oropeza refused. It was 10 to 20 minutes later, he said he saw Oropeza loading his AR-style rifle while running toward the house.
“I told my wife, ‘Get inside. This man has loaded his weapon,'” Garcia said. “My wife told me to go inside because, ‘He won’t fire at me. I’m a woman.'”
Authorities have said at least five other people who were in the house at the time were uninjured.
During the early hours of the search, investigators found clothes and a phone while combing an area that includes dense layers of the forest, but tracking dogs lost the scent, Capers said.
Authorities were able to identify Oropeza by an identity card issued by Mexican authorities to citizens who reside outside the country, as well as the doorbell camera footage. He said police have also interviewed the suspect’s wife multiple times.
Police recovered the AR-15-style rifle that they said Oropeza used in the shootings. Authorities were not sure if Oropeza was carrying another weapon after others were found in his home.
Capers said he hoped the reward money would motivate people to provide information and that there were plans to put up billboards in Spanish to spread the word.
“We’re looking for closure for this family,” Capers said.
By Sunday, police crime scene tape was removed from around the victims’ home, where some people stopped by to leave flowers.
In the neighbourhood, an FBI agent, Texas Department of Public Safety troopers and other officers were seen going door to door. One trooper stopped a red truck and asked to look inside before letting the driver continue on his way.
Veronica Pineda, 34, who lives across the street from the suspect’s home, said authorities asked if they could search her property to see if he might be hiding there. She said she was fearful that the gunman had not yet been captured.
“It is kind of scary,” she said. “You never know where he can be.”
Pineda said she didn’t know Oropeza well but occasionally saw him, his wife and his son ride their horses on the street. She said the family had lived there for about five or six years and that neighbours have called authorities in the past to complain about people firing guns.
According to authorities, the victims were between the ages of 9 and 31 years old and were all believed to have been shot from the neck up. All were believed to be from Honduras.
Enrique Reina, Honduras’ secretary of foreign affairs and international cooperation, said on Twitter that the Honduran Consulate in Houston was contacting the families in connection with the repatriation of remains as well as U.S. authorities to keep apprised of the investigation.
The FBI in Houston said in a tweet on Sunday that it was referring to the suspect as Oropesa, not Oropeza, to “better reflect his identity in law enforcement systems.” His family lists their name as Oropeza on a sign outside their yard, as well as in public records. Authorities had also previously stated that Garcia’s son was 8 years old, but the father and school officials said Sunday that the third grader was 9.
A total of three children found covered in blood in the home were taken to a hospital but found to be uninjured, Capers said. He said they were staying with family members.
FBI spokesperson Christina Garza said investigators do not believe those at the home were members of a single family. In addition to the young boy, the other victims were identified as Sonia Argentina Guzman, 25; Diana Velazquez Alvarado, 21; Julisa Molina Rivera, 31; and Jose Jonathan Casarez, 18.
Garcia said they had called police five times between the time they asked Oropeza to shoot farther away and when the gunman entered their home. Capers said police got there as fast as they could and that he had three officers covering 700 square miles (1,800 square kilometres).
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from Widening manhunt for Texas gunman slowed by 'zero leads'
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