Note: Official numbers for 2010 have not yet been released. This page will be updated with the correct numbers soon.
Girlfriend’s body found in trunk after fatal shootout
HALTOM CITY – Police are investigating a chase that spanned three cities and ended with officers killing the suspect and finding his girlfriend dead in the trunk of his car.
Eric Frias, 24, was had recently lost his job and had a terrible fight with his girlfriend. However, no one – not even his family – said they could imagine what would happen next.
The chase ended just before 7 p.m. Thursday night when three Haltom City police officers open fired on Frias, who officers said had pointed a weapon at them.
It begin an hour earlier, just outside a junkyard where Johnny Gallegos heard gunfire outside his shop.
“We found her shoes right here and the bullets – all five of them – on the ground,” he said.
The woman shot was Frias’ 22-year-old girlfriend, Martha Martinez. Gallegos said he watched someone putting her body into a car as he called 911.
“What I witnessed from there was a body being lifted and dragged around the car, opened the passenger’s rear door, shuts that door and gets in the vehicle [and] starts it,” he said.
It was around that time that Frias’ father, Oscar, received a frightening message from his son.
“I receive a text message at 6:05 p.m. that he had killed his girl and he was going to kill himself,” he said.
Not knowing if the text was a joke, he soon realized it was serious when he learned the same text message also went out to Martinez’s family too.
“He’s not that kind of person, not a violent person,” Frias’ father said.
The couple was living at his father’s home and had been dating for six months. The couple had gotten into a fight earlier in the week. Investigators have not said if that had anything to do with the violent attack.
The three Haltom City officers involved in the shooting have been placed on leave pending the outcome of the investigation.
Frias’ father said he wanted people to know his son’s organs have been donated to help other families.
E-mail ccivale@wfaa.com
_________________________________________
Man, 20, sentenced to 40 years for death of fiancee’s 2-year-old son
Posted Saturday, Mar. 26, 2011
By Melody McDonald
FORT WORTH — A 20-year-old convicted sex offender is headed back to prison for fatally injuring his fiancee’s 2-year-old son last year.
Ryan Durham, who was initially charged with capital murder in the death of Robert Philbin, reached a deal with prosecutors Thursday and received a 40-year sentence in exchange for pleading guilty to the lesser charge of serious bodily injury to a child. If he had gone to trial and been convicted, Durham could have been sentenced to life without parole.
He has to serve at least half his sentence before he is eligible for parole.
“This type of crime is always difficult to understand, but it is our hope that Robert’s family has some closure and this is one step toward healing,” prosecutor Alana Minton said.
Officials have said Durham had been caring for Robert on Feb. 10, 2010, while the child’s mother and stepgrandfather were at work. At some point, Durham phoned the mother and stepgrandfather and also called 911 after the child “started breathing heavily” and became worse. The child was taken to Cook Children’s Medical Center in Fort Worth, where he died the next day.
Durham initially told investigators that he heard the child fall twice from a toilet inside their home in the 3900 block of Spencer Street in north Fort Worth, but the boy’s injuries were not consistent with that story. The Tarrant County medical examiner later ruled that Robert died from a blunt-force head injury and ruled his death a homicide.
Durham was a paroled sex offender who had been sentenced to four years’ incarceration in September 2003 for indecency with a 7-year-old girl and a 6-year-old boy.
Melody McDonald, 817-390-7386
_____________________________________________
Fort Worth police still seeking three men wanted in 2010 killings
Posted Friday, Feb. 04, 2011
By Deanna Boyd
FORT WORTH — Cassandra Muniz doesn’t wonder who killed her mother — she wonders why.
Since that Sept. 12 afternoon, when she found her mother, Jeannette Sanchez Reyes, strangled inside her Fort Worth home, Muniz said, she has believed in her heart that her stepfather was responsible.
Reaching the same conclusion, homicide Detective Shane Drake obtained a murder warrant for Raul Jaime Reyes, 40.
But almost five months later, Reyes still eludes capture.
“It’s something that’s always in my head,” said Muniz, 21.
“Is he around here looking at me? Is he laughing at me? That’s what I think of every day when I go out.”
Reyes is one of three Fort Worth murder suspects with 2010 warrants still out.
The Fort Worth police fugitive unit is also seeking a fourth man wanted in connection with a Nov. 28 aggravated assault but deemed a “person of interest” in a fatal shooting the next day.
The fugitive unit cleared 2,422 of the 3,067 felony and misdemeanor warrants from last year. But Sgt. R.D. Abbott, supervisor of the fugitive unit, said finding murder suspects can be especially challenging. That’s because of the serious consequences the suspects know they face and the lengths they’re willing to go to keep their freedom.
Abbott said that with homicides and other serious crimes, fugitive officers usually begin researching a potential suspect’s background, addresses, vehicles and work history before detectives have even obtained a warrant.
“You have to be quick,” Abbott said. “The evidence is going to disappear. You need to catch them as fast as you can to make a solid case.”
When dealing with Hispanic suspects, Abbott says, officers quickly try to determine whether the person has ties to Mexico. He said suspects who flee to Mexico create additional challenges for fugitive officers, who must then involve federal authorities and depend on Mexican authorities to pick up any suspect whose location can be determined.
“They’re not going to go looking for him,” Abbott said. “We have to tell them he’s in this little town.”
Even if suspects stay in the country, Abbott said, relatives will sometimes help them elude capture.
“They’ll fund them, give them some money to get them out of the city, get them out of state,” Abbott said. “Nobody will cooperate with us. They’ll say, ‘I haven’t seen him,’ and we know they’ve seen him.”
The more time that passes, the less often tips roll in about a suspect’s whereabouts, Abbott said.
Muniz said she believes that her stepfather is still in Fort Worth.
“None of us would suspect he would do something like that,” Muniz said. “She was good woman. She was a wonderful mom, a sister, a grandmother, a daughter. … I’m going to miss her smile and laugh. I still can’t understand why he did it. I can’t wait for them to catch him to ask him that.”
The four men being sought in connection with 2010 homicides are:
Raul Jaime Reyes, accused of strangling his wife, Jeannette Reyes, with a ligature in the bedroom of their home in the 3200 block of James Avenue. Reyes had been planning to leave her husband of almost 11 years.
Missing from her home were a large amount of cash and her white Mitsubishi Montero with Texas license plate 658 WRM that has still not been found. Anyone with information about the car or Reyes’ whereabouts is asked to call fugitive officer Tom McLaughlin at 817-944-7500.
Miguel Angel Alcala, 44, accused of fatally shooting his wife, Cecilia Alcala, during an argument in which he accused her of having an affair. Police say the couple had been riding in the 1800 block of South Ayers Avenue in a Chevrolet Suburban, accompanied by Cecilia Alcala’s son, when Miguel Alcala pulled out a handgun and shot at his wife.
Cecilia Alcala ran from the truck but was followed by her husband, who fired several more times at her despite the son’s efforts to stop him, investigators say. Cecilia Alcala died in a grassy area on the side of the road. Her husband fled alone in the Suburban, which was abandoned at the Alcala home, according to homicide Detective Matthew Barron. Anyone with information about where to find Miguel Alcala is asked to call fugitive officer E. Tamayo at 817-925-5349.
Iran Deon Harris, 23, the second suspect in a Nov. 10 shooting outside a duplex that left Deshunn Plummer dead. Police say Plummer was among a group at the duplex in the 3100 block of Avenue L who argued with a second group over gang and drug activity in the neighborhood. At least two fistfights broke out, police say, before people on both sides pulled out handguns and began firing. Plummer, who was shot in the abdomen, died a short time later at a Fort Worth hospital. That same month, police arrested Jozavier Zance Baker on a murder warrant. Anyone with information about Harris’ location is asked to call fugitive officer M.C. Haley at 817-507-7449.
Francisco Martinez, 25, who had been deemed “a person of interest” in the Nov. 29 fatal shooting of Edward Abrego. However, he is being sought on a warrant and is accused of engaging in organized criminal activity/aggravated assault with a deadly weapon in connection with a shooting the day before Abrego’s slaying. Gang Detective Z. Petrovic said Abrego and a 23-year-old man had gone to Martinez’s home the night of Nov. 28 because Martinez had not paid Abrego for a gun.
When Martinez would not come out, Abrego reportedly damaged some property outside the residence, prompting Martinez to emerge with a gun. Petrovic said Martinez tried to shoot at Abrego, but the gun misfired, and he then fired at the 23-year-old man, hitting him in the leg. Abrego and the injured man then fled, Petrovic said.
The next afternoon, according to homicide Detective Michel Carroll, Abrego was standing in his front yard in the 1200 block of East Fogg Street when someone in a passing car shot him in the chest.
He was taken to a hospital, where he died. Martinez, a documented gang member, has “Sur 13” tattooed on his right forearm and the name “Gabby Martinez” on his neck.
Anyone with information about his location is asked to call Tom McLaughlin at 817-944-7500.
Deanna Boyd, 817-390-7655
________________________________________
Fort Worth police say man kills estranged wife, then himself
by CASEY NORTON
WFAA
Posted on May 4, 2010 at 8:05 PM
Updated Tuesday, May 4 at 10:57 PM
FORT WORTH — The end of a marriage appears to have led to the end of two lives on Tuesday.
Police think John Hurd, who killed himself in the parking lot of a Fort Worth grocery store, was also responsible for killing his estranged wife just a few minutes earlier.
The suicide happened just before lunchtime at the Woodcreek Village shopping center on the northwest corner of Loop 820 and Bridge Street.
Japriese Platt was found shot and killed in her car less than a mile away. Witnesses watched as her sport utility vehicle crashed into a utility pole on the East Loop 820 service road.
When they ran to help, they found the woman had suffered an obvious gunshot wound.
Family members said Platt’s divorce was to have been finalized this week, and the estranged couple had agreed to meet one last time.
“From then on, it didn’t go his way,” said Kay Platt, the woman’s aunt. “And so when she left, that was the last anybody seen her alive, because he drove up beside her and shot her in the head.”
The woman’s family said the marriage had always been rocky, and Japriese Platt was looking beyond the divorce and a return to nursing school to support her two children.
A woman contacted at Hurd’s address in Arlington said she did not want to speak on camera.
E-mail cnorton@wfaa.com
____________________________________________
Before attack, teen said kids’ father was behaving oddly
Posted Wednesday, Sep. 29, 2010
By Deanna Boyd
FORT WORTH — Three weeks ago, 19-year-old Christy Jenkins recounted for police the strange behavior of James Cody Sparks, the father of her two young daughters.
Sparks, 23, who she said had been diagnosed with bipolar disorder, had begun saying strange things during two weeks she had stayed with him. She described how he had ordered her into his house Sept. 6 and then dragged her inside when she refused.
And how he had placed his hands around her neck, pushing her down onto the bed while telling her that the angels were ready for her and that he was going to send her to them, according to a Fort Worth police report.
That scared Jenkins, relatives said. Although she initially told police that she didn’t want to file a complaint against Sparks, they said, at their urging, she later indicated to police that she had changed her mind.
On Monday night, however, Jenkins, who was living with her grandmother, returned to Sparks’ home in the 300 block of Chandler Drive to pick up some medical information so she could take one of her daughters to the doctor. There, according to Sgt. Chad Mahaffey, they argued, and Sparks stabbed Jenkins several times.
Jenkins died Tuesday morning. Relatives said her throat had been sliced and some of her fingers almost cut off.
“They couldn’t get her to quit bleeding,” said Mary Johnson, Jenkins’ aunt.
Sparks, who fled his home before officers arrived, was arrested Monday night on suspicion of aggravated assault. Officers found him in a vehicle being driven by his grandmother on north Interstate 35W.
Because of Jenkins’ death, he now faces a murder charge, police said.
Sparks was in the Mansfield Jail on Tuesday night with bail set at $250,000.
Sparks’ 67-year-old grandmother, Haroldleen Downing, was also arrested, accused of giving investigators false information about her grandson’s location. She was released from jail after posting $2,000 bail.
Tarrant County court records show that Sparks has convictions for assault, aggravated assault and driving while intoxicated.
In October 2008, he was sentenced to 75 days in jail for cutting Jenkins’ arm with a razor. According to a police report, Sparks cut her left arm, saying, “You want to feel something,” and then licked the blood from her arm.
Johnson said Sparks had wanted Jenkins to bring their daughters — ages 14 months and 2 months — with her Monday night, but a relative advised against it because one child was asleep and the other was taking a bath.
She said relatives have since learned that Sparks reportedly told someone that he intended to harm the children as well.
“Luckily the kids weren’t there,” Johnson said. “She was a good mother. She loved her kids. She was just young and got in a bad situation.”
Deanna Boyd, 817-390-7655
______________________________________________________________________________________________
Arlington officer died trying to protect child, police say
Posted Wednesday, Dec. 29, 2010
By Susan Schrock
Editor’s note: This report has been updated from the original to correct that Barnes Samuel Nettles was arrested in September on warrants accusing him of assaulting Kimberly Carter’s sister and mother, not Carter.
ARLINGTON — A rookie police officer was fatally shot as she apparently tried to protect an 11-year-old from an armed man who burst into an apartment as the officer was taking a domestic assault report, police officials said Wednesday.
Jillian Michelle Smith, 24, an Arlington native, was killed Tuesday night within 20 minutes of responding to a lower priority call from a woman who wanted to report the assault, officials said.
The assault suspect had left the apartment but returned while Smith was inside taking the report, Arlington police spokeswoman Tiara Ellis Richard said at a news conference Wednesday.
Also killed were Kimberly Deshay Carter, 29, and her ex-boyfriend, Barnes Samuel Nettles, 38.
After shooting Smith, Nettles apparently went into a back bedroom and shot Carter, Richard said.
He then returned to the living room and shot himself, Richard said. In the meantime, the child, identified as Carter’s daughter, fled.
Richard said that the description of what likely happened inside the apartment was based on a preliminary investigation and that the order of events would be pinned down more specifically after reports by the medical examiner, ballistics and other information.
In Mobile, Ala., Nettles’ relatives called the shooting a selfish act and said they didn’t realize that Nettles and Carter were still in contact.
“We are at a loss right now. We’re just sorry for the relatives of both victims. It was selfish,” said Nettles’ cousin Andrew Johnson.
In September, Nettles was arrested in Arlington and charged with assaulting Carter’s mother and sister, Richard said. Court documents show that he was free on $5,000 bond.
He was a registered sex offender in Arlington for an offense that occurred in Washington state, Richard said.
“Last we heard, they weren’t together anymore,” Johnson said. “We didn’t know they had problems.”
Smith, the second Arlington officer to die in the line of duty this year, joined the department in February and graduated from the Arlington Police Academy in August. She completed her field training Dec. 13, said Richard, the police spokeswoman.
Officials said it is not unusual for a lone officer to respond to a Priority 3 call.
Early Wednesday, officials removed bodies from the unit at the Arbrook Park apartments, near Interstate 20 and Collins Street. Shortly before 9 a.m., officers pulled down the crime scene tape and left the area without commenting.
The incident began when Smith responded to a call about a domestic assault at the complex, which is in the 4600 block of Nandina Drive, Richard said.
Within 20 minutes, police received a 911 call about a shooting.
“When they responded, they discovered there were three deceased inside the apartment,” Richard said. “One of these was the officer who had responded earlier.”
Officers could be seen searching people and cars as they left the complex in the pouring rain late Tuesday.
Nettles recently moved from Washington state to Arlington for work, his cousin Kim Nettles said. His four sons from a previous marriage were staying with their grandmother in Washington during the school holiday, Kim Nettles said.
“It is so shocking to us. Everything seemed OK. You never know what is going on inside, though,” she said.
On Wednesday morning, two neighbors at the apartment complex said that they were stunned not only by the violence, but by the fact that they never heard gunshots.
Jacob Peters, who lives on the second floor of the unit, said he was listening to music Tuesday night when he heard voices arguing.
“It sounded like a man and a woman’s voice,” Peters said. “Then I heard footsteps like kids playing and running up and down the stairs. I almost opened my door and told them to cool it.”
About an hour later, police knocked on his door and asked if he heard any gunshots, he said.
“They said an officer was shot and killed,” he said. “I couldn’t believe it.”
According to court documents, local defense attorney Abe Factor was appointed to represent Nettles in September after he indicated he could not afford a lawyer.
Nettles stated in court documents that he was an unemployed sheet metal worker, who was supporting himself and three sons, ages 18, 14 and 11.
He listed his gross monthly income as $1,340 from “odd jobs” and stated that he also received food stamps, and Medicaid and had filed for (child) support.
Arlington police said that Smith became interested in police work in the sixth grade while participating in the DARE program.
A 2005 graduate of Seguin High School, Smith received a bachelor’s degree in criminology from the University of Texas at Arlington in August 2009, Richard said.
Smith is the eighth Arlington officer to die in the line of duty in the department’s history.
In January, Arlington officer Craig Story died when his police motorcycle and a school bus collided during a traffic stop on South Cooper Street. The 34-year-old officer’s motorcycle caught fire in the crash.
Arlington police Sgt. Dace Clifton said: “Anytime an officer is lost in the line of duty, it’s difficult. We do have a strong police family. Police officers know the job they do is dangerous. They come together to support each other in times like this.”
Arlington Mayor Robert Cluck said Tuesday night that he learned of the fatal shooting from Police Chief Theron Bowman.
“He said, ‘I’ve got some bad news,'” Cluck said. “An officer has been killed.”
“Do you know him?” Cluck asked. “It’s not a him. It’s a her” was the chief’s reply, Cluck said.
“Domestic violence is the most dangerous thing for a police officer to intervene,” Cluck said. “Everybody’s angry and fighting. I suspect the officer didn’t know what she was getting into.”
Susan Schrock, 817-390-7639
Staff writers Alex Branch, Melody McDonald and Chance Welch contributed to this report.
Tarrant County Domestic Violence Deaths 