Posted on 06/19/2004 5:50:58 AM PDT by Max Combined
A Houston man was shooting at his estranged girlfriend Friday afternoon in a busy intersection, police said, when he killed her 16-month-old daughter. He then sped away with the woman's other child, a 2-year-old daughter, stopping only long enough to dump the body of the younger girl in a warehouse parking lot in northeast Houston, authorities said.
The 2-year-old girl, identified as Jasmine Battle, was later found unharmed at the Pasadena home of a friend of the accused gunman, Houston police said.
Police were still looking for Austin Eze Friday night and said he was last seen driving a red Ford Ranger pickup. He is described as a 43-year-old black man, 5-foot-8 to 5-foot-9 and 200 to 225 pounds. He was last seen wearing a green shirt and blue jeans. Police said he has an accent. A friend of Eze's said he is Jamaican. It was unknown if he is the father of the children.
The shooting took place at 1:45 p.m. outside a Texaco station at 9201 North Loop East near Wallisville Road. Eze shot at the children's mother several times, police said, then drove away with the children.
Minutes later, about a half mile from the station, bystanders found the younger child's body in a parking lot behind a warehouse on Mesa Road. The child was believed to have been shot to death when the man fired at the mother.
Eze then fled to Pasadena, police said, where he dropped the 2-year-old off about 2:30 p.m. with a friend who lives in the 900 block of Maple.
The friend, who would not identify himself to a reporter, told Pasadena police he had asked Eze earlier Friday to bring some tools over so he could work on his car. Eze arrived at the man's house with the 2-year-old, but said he did not have the tools he needed.
"He left the girl at the house and never returned," said Martin DeLeon, a Pasadena police spokesman.
When the man's girlfriend turned on the television to watch the 5 p.m. news, she saw that an Amber Alert had been issued for the girl, who was sitting right next to her.
The couple called Pasadena police, who held the girl at the house until Houston police arrived. She was taken to Texas Children's Hospital as a precaution, although she appeared to be uninjured, police said.
The man said Eze has lived in Houston for years. He also said Eze and his girlfriend had argued several times.
People waiting in traffic on Wallisville Road said they saw the man shoot the woman as she stopped traffic to plead for help.
"We were right by the Texaco when this woman held her arms up for cars to stop," said Kim Ward, 28.
Ward was in a pickup with her two children and another relative at the time.
"Then this man runs toward her and shoots her," Ward said. "I was hysterical. I didn't know what to say.
"I had never seen anything like that," Ward said.
Ward said the woman then ran to the Texaco station while the man fled in a car with the two children inside. Police said Eze had been driving a gold 1993 Grand Marquis, but changed vehicles later.
The 23-year-old woman, whom police have not identified, was taken to LBJ Hospital with a gunshot wound to her arm or leg. She was listed in good condition late Friday.
I'm glad if this had to happen, it did in Texas. No doubt, the man with receive the death penalty.
And there were lunatics in the Wild West?
"Eze arrived at the man's house with the 2-year-old, but said he did not have the tools [the man] needed."
He'd been busy doing other things!
Ahh...Just one of the the benefits of uncontrolled immigration and multiculturalism. I wonder if he is also "documentation deficient".
Not that we don't have enough home-grown violence, but one thing is for certain - If this vermin had never come from Jamaica, this specific event would have never happened. Another thing is certain. After he starts his state sponsored dirt nap, he won't kill again.
"I'm glad if this had to happen, it did in Texas. No doubt, the man with receive the death penalty"
Yup.. While "other" States are trying to get rid of the Death Penalty... Hell.. Us here in Texas, have put in an EXPRESS LANE..! Kill one of US.. You will die..! Straight to the front of the line..!! lol
Take it easy, Austin Eze
Don't let the sound of your own wheels
Drive you crazy
Lighten up while you still can
Don't even try to understand
Just find a place to make your stand
And take it Eze.
Sorry, I just had to.
Yes --- from the Russian immigrant who murdered many of his family, to the Mexicans who beheaded their nephews to this --- our immigration policies seem to favor the importation of the lowlives, criminals, and mentally ill.
Yea. Being on the edge os civilization you see all kind of things.
If it turns out he is an illegal alien you can expect Kofi the creep to show up and demand that he NOT face the death penalty.
If it turns out he is an illegal alien you can expect Kofi the creep to show up and demand that he NOT face the death penalty.
This was on the news last night.
Thank God he didn't kill Jasmine too.
Yep it's the Big Sleep for him. Too bad it will probably be a decade or so before he gets The Needle though. A decade in which the little girl should have been playing with dolls, or Tonka trucks, giggling and becoming a young lady.
I hate reading stories like this.
Anyone who kills a child deserves to be tortured to death.
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