Suspect in killing of 5 Texas neighbours caught after 4-day manhunt
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Mexican national Francisco Oropesa had been deported from the US four times since 2009.
PHOTO: NYTIMES
CLEVELAND, Texas - Police on Tuesday captured a man suspected of shooting and killing five Texas neighbours and leading multiple agencies on a four-day manhunt, after a tip led them to a home in a nearby town where he was caught hiding beneath laundry, officials said.
The bloodshed erupted on Friday night after the neighbours asked the suspect to stop firing his semi-automatic rifle in his yard because it kept their baby awake. Instead, the man reloaded and entered the next-door home, officials said.
The suspect has been identified as Francisco Oropesa, 38, a Mexican national who immigration officials say had been deported from the United States four times since 2009.
San Jacinto County Sheriff Greg Capers told reporters Oropesa was caught after multiple law enforcement agencies responded to a tip.
“He is behind bars, and he will live out his life behind bars for killing those five,” the sheriff said, adding that Oropesa would be held on US$5 million (S$6.7 million) bail for five counts of murder.
The victims were killed in the town of Cleveland, and Oropesa was arrested in the town of Cut and Shoot, roughly 27km due west. Both are about 80km north of Houston.
The arrest came as the Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) said it was working with law enforcement agencies nationwide and in Mexico in an expanded manhunt.
As at Sunday, the suspect’s trail had grown cold, but multiple agencies rapidly mobilised, joining the sheriff’s department and the FBI, upon receiving the tip.
Officers from the US Marshals Service, the Texas Department of Public Safety and the US Border Patrol Tactical Unit carried out the arrest about an hour and 15 minutes after receiving the tip, said FBI assistant special agent in charge Jimmy Paul.
Sheriff Capers said most of the victims were shot in the head. All were from Honduras and living at the address, but were not all family members, the sheriff said.
The victims were identified as Ms Sonia Argentina Guzman, 25; Ms Diana Velazquez Alvarado, 21; Ms Julisa Molina Rivera, 31; Mr Jose Jonathan Casarez, 18; and Daniel Enrique Laso, eight. REUTERS
