Man kills five in Texas after family complains of shooting

CLEVELAND, Texas (AP) — At a home near Houston, a man took out a rifle and started shooting neighbors, killing an 8-year-old boy and four others after his family asked him to stop shooting in the yard. bottom. They were trying to sleep, officials said Saturday.

San Jacinto County Sheriff Greg Capers said authorities were searching for 38-year-old Francisco Oropeza after a shooting occurred in the town of Cleveland, about 45 miles (72 km) north of Houston. He said Oropeza used an AR-style rifle in the attack that occurred just before midnight on Friday.

“All his rounds were headed up from the neck, so it was basically head,” Capers told the Associated Press.

The attack is the latest act in the record-breaking mass shootings in the United States so far this year, some of which also involved semi-automatic weapons.

A school in Nashville, a bank in Kentucky, a dance hall in Southern California, and a small Texas town now in a one-story house.

By late Saturday morning, Capers said authorities were using scent-tracking dogs and overhead drones to search for Oropeza.

Capers said there were 10 people in the house, some of whom had just moved in earlier in the week, and no one else was injured. He said he was found lying over two children in his bedroom.

Two victims, a man and a woman, were found at the front door, and the murdered child was in the front room. Capers said three “bloody” children were found in the home and taken to hospital but were ruled unharmed.

“The Honduran women who lay over these children were doing it to protect their children,” Capers said.

The confrontation happened after the family approached the fence and asked the suspect to stop firing, Capers said. According to Capers, the suspect replied that it was his property and that one of the homes obtained a video of the suspect walking to the front door with a rifle.

Three of the victims were female and one was male. Their names have not been released. Capers said the victims were between the ages of 8 and about 40.

Capers said his agent visited Oropeza’s home at least once and spoke to him about “shooting his gun in the garden”. It wasn’t.

Capers said the new arrivals at home had moved in from Houston earlier in the week, but wasn’t sure if they planned to stay there.

There have been at least 18 shootings across the United States since January 1, with at least four deaths, according to a database maintained by the Associated Press and USA Today in partnership with Northeastern University. Violence can be driven by a variety of motives, including murder, suicide, and domestic violence. gang retaliation; school shootings and workplace revenge;

Texas has faced multiple mass shootings in recent years, including last year’s attack at Robb Elementary School in Uvalde. A racist attack at a Walmart in El Paso in 2019. A gunman opened fire on a church in the small town of Sutherland Springs in 2017.

Republican leaders in Texas have rejected calls for new gun control, including this year over protests by families whose children were killed in Uvalde.

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Weber reported from Austin, Texas. Associated Press writer Ken Miller contributed to this report.