Suspect on the lam makes family uneasy
Posted on 01/25/2003 3:44:16 AM PST by MeekOneGOP
Suspect on the lam makes family uneasy
01/25/2003
The Gomez family spent the day Friday in its SUV and the night in a motel. The family is afraid to return to its Far North Dallas home.
Jorge Gomez, 29, shot and killed two intruders Thursday morning after they kicked down the door and shot him in the shoulder. A third person, possibly a teenager, escaped in a black Cadillac. The same car may have followed Mr. Gomez's wife, Gaby, home the previous night after she picked up their children at the family's stereo business, Mr. and Mrs. Gomez said.
Mr. Gomez said he's worried about his family's future but knows he defended himself, his wife and children the only way he could.
"What can I do? It was my family," Mr. Gomez said. "I would do anything to protect them. ... I'm a little bit scared. I don't know who these people are."
Police said Mr. Gomez probably would not face criminal charges, although the case will be referred to a Dallas County grand jury.
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Mrs. Gomez and their three children - ages 3, 2, and 8 months - spent Friday playing, sleeping and eating inside the SUV, and Mr. Gomez was careful to keep an eye on them.
"We're scared," Mrs. Gomez said as her youngest slept and the other two ate the unusual treat of fast food for lunch. "We'll be fine."
The Gomezes say they will live indefinitely in a motel until they feel comfortable going home or the third person is caught. They fear he might return to their apartment on Knoll Trail Drive near the Dallas North Tollway. Their home also reminds them of death and that they - not the intruders - could have died.
The man who died inside the apartment was identified Friday as 28-year-old Alex Quinones of Dallas. The intruder who died outside was identified as Carlos Ivan Boya, 23.
Mr. Quinones was most recently arrested by Dallas police on a kidnapping charge after he kicked down the door of a residence and dragged his ex-wife by her hair to his blue Jaguar.
In 1992, Mr. Quinones was found guilty of unauthorized use of a motor vehicle. His probation was revoked in 1993, and he was sentenced to 10 years in prison. He pleaded guilty in 1992 to a possession of marijuana charge. On the day of the shooting, Mr. Quinones was free on $15,000 bail on the kidnapping charge.
Mr. Boya had no previous criminal citations, state records show.
Dallas homicide Sgt. Ross Salverino said Friday that police were searching for the third suspect. He also said investigators were looking into whether the men could be connected to other crimes.
A teenager knocked on a side door of the apartment about 9 a.m. and asked for "Juan," Mr. Gomez said. As he was telling the boy he had the wrong apartment, two men approached. He saw one had a gun, so he shut and locked the door, which opened into his children's bedroom.
As he ran to the master bedroom for his own gun, one of the men shot through the door and kicked it in. The bullet struck Mr. Gomez in the left shoulder.
"My wife and kids were in the [master] bedroom. My wife tried to go out, but I yelled, 'Go inside the room. Go inside the room. Take the kids.' "
Mrs. Gomez said she huddled with the children in a corner of the bedroom as she listened to the gunshots.
Her husband said he grabbed the gun and fired until he ran out of bullets. He said Mr. Quinones fell to the floor, and Mr. Boya briefly tried to help him before running out the door.
Mr. Gomez said he put another clip in the gun and followed. The man was face down in the grass when Mr. Gomez came outside.
He and his wife said they saw a black Cadillac - possibly the same one that followed Mrs. Gomez - drive away with the third suspect behind the wheel. Mr. Gomez tried to shoot the tires and get a license plate number but was unsuccessful, his wife said.
The family had planned to buy a house in the area but now may return to Roma in South Texas instead, Mr. Gomez said. They have lived in Dallas for four years.
The couple's 8-month-old daughter and 2-year-old son don't understand what happened, but their oldest daughter is scared, her father said.
"She asked, 'Who killed you, Poppy?' " Mr. Gomez said inside his stereo business, keeping constant watch on his family in the SUV outside. "I say, 'Nobody killed me, mi hija.' I try to tell her it's fine."
E-mail jemily@dallasnews.com
Excerpt:
"We're scared," Mrs. Gomez said as her youngest slept and the other two ate the unusual treat of fast food for lunch. "We'll be fine."
The Gomezes say they will live indefinitely in a motel until they feel comfortable going home or the third person is caught. They fear he might return to their apartment on Knoll Trail Drive near the Dallas North Tollway. Their home also reminds them of death and that they – not the intruders – could have died.
The man who died inside the apartment was identified Friday as 28-year-old Alex Quinones of Dallas. The intruder who died outside was identified as Carlos Ivan Boya, 23.
Mr. Quinones was most recently arrested by Dallas police on a kidnapping charge after he kicked down the door of a residence and dragged his ex-wife by her hair to his blue Jaguar.
In 1992, Mr. Quinones was found guilty of unauthorized use of a motor vehicle. His probation was revoked in 1993, and he was sentenced to 10 years in prison. He pleaded guilty in 1992 to a possession of marijuana charge. On the day of the shooting, Mr. Quinones was free on $15,000 bail on the kidnapping charge.
< snip >
A teenager knocked on a side door of the apartment about 9 a.m. and asked for "Juan," Mr. Gomez said. As he was telling the boy he had the wrong apartment, two men approached. He saw one had a gun, so he shut and locked the door, which opened into his children's bedroom.
As he ran to the master bedroom for his own gun, one of the men shot through the door and kicked it in. The bullet struck Mr. Gomez in the left shoulder.
"My wife and kids were in the [master] bedroom. My wife tried to go out, but I yelled, 'Go inside the room. Go inside the room. Take the kids.' "
Mrs. Gomez said she huddled with the children in a corner of the bedroom as she listened to the gunshots.
Her husband said he grabbed the gun and fired until he ran out of bullets. He said Mr. Quinones fell to the floor, and Mr. Boya briefly tried to help him before running out the door.
Mr. Gomez said he put another clip in the gun and followed. The man was face down in the grass when Mr. Gomez came outside.
Please let me know if you want ON or OFF my Texas ping list!. . .don't be shy.
No, you don't HAVE to be a Texan to get on this list!
01/25/2003
The large photograph that appeared in Friday's paper - the trade argot is "centerpiece art" - gave rise to a lot of discussion by virtue of having had a dead person in it.
The picture was taken outside a Far North Dallas home, where a resident had shot and killed two intruders who tried to break in early Thursday. One of the apparent burglars died in the apartment, and the other collapsed and died outside.
A photographer for The Dallas Morning News captured what is actually a fairly routine crime-scene scenario. A Dallas Police Department spokesman stands in the front yard, addressing the knot of reporters gathered there. A couple of uniformed officers stand in the background. Over the spokesman's left shoulder, in the distance, the body of the second burglar lies facedown next to a sidewalk.
In this case, the medical examiner's representatives had not yet arrived to record their observations, so the body had not yet been covered with the discreet sheet that is usually draped over corpses in news photographs.
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People are surely pretty used to seeing news pictures or film footage of covered-up bodies being wheeled away on gurneys, but a photo of an uncovered dead guy in the spot where he fell is certainly a departure from the norm.
And it caused a lot of debate, both inside the newsroom and out, which I think is probably a useful thing. Some found the photo shocking, not because it was gory or graphic (it wasn't), but because it so starkly depicted the discordant reality of violent death in an otherwise ordinary setting.
I wasn't especially shocked, but then, I have been to crime scenes. They usually involve a lot of standing around and waiting for somebody to tell you what's going on.
That isn't to say I didn't go a little rubber-kneed the first few times I saw a body not at a funeral home. It is the realization - that person is actually dead - that shakes you up a little, and that I think struck a lot of people who saw Friday's photograph.
The News, as well as television stations that ran footage of the scene, took some heat over the decision to show the body.
 Editors for DallasNews.com, the web site of The Dallas Morning News, decided Friday to crop the body out of the photo before posting it online. Saturday, the paper's decision to run this photo with the dead person in it has become the focus of much discussion. (JOHN F. RHODES / DMN) |
"If that's 'cutting edge' journalism, then I'm out!" one irate reader e-mailed several members of our staff. Even one editor in our newsroom said he "couldn't stand to look" at the photograph because he knew the person lying in the background was dead.
Others, though, said they saw little departure from the now-routine shrouded-corpse-on-the-gurney photos. Some said they're more distressed by graphic written descriptions of crimes or injuries. Some are so hard-boiled they could probably look at autopsy pictures over their morning oatmeal. Everybody's threshold for the offensive or the prurient is different.
Perhaps I am out of line with the prevailing sentiment, but in truth I would have been a lot less comfortable had the photo shown an innocent victim of an accident or a homicide.
A picture of a lone shoe at the scene of a plane crash can make me weepy. Photos of hollow-eyed kids and even skinny dogs in the streets of cities wrecked by war and poverty sometimes haunt my imagination. Even the grainy battlefield pictures of slain Civil War soldiers convey a terrible sense of loss and tragedy after nearly a century and a half.
But, to me, a distant and not particularly graphic picture of a dead burglar - albeit an unconvicted one - isn't especially unsettling.
I'm not saying burglars deserve to be shot. But I do think this particular photo offers a grim, realistic glimpse of the damage crime and criminals create in our city every day.
In this case, the photo showed what any Far North Dallas passer-by would have seen.
It's not a photo from Tel Aviv or the West Bank. It's not a war zone or a dangerous, rundown neighborhood plagued by street gangs and crack houses.
It's an ordinary apartment house with a tree by the front walk, with two cars and a tricycle visible in the open garage.
Except for the police officers in the yard and the dead guy in the flower bed, it's a home and a neighborhood where any of us might live.
And that, maybe, is the part that's really so shocking.
He did a public service. Help the guy and his family get resettled ASAP.
Sorry for the extra ping. Thought you might want to see this.
Hope it's not offensive to any of ya'll...
Crime-scene photo unsettling to some - photo of
dead home intruder killed by home owner in Dallas
At least 9 0f 10 Democrats think Clinton is a genius. I am not really trying to start any trouble with someone I consider to be one of the pillers of FR, just trying to sneak in one little point.LOL ! Cool, FRiend. 'Pillar', huh? Thanks.
I once sent a FReep mail to someone and made the comment that I supposed that I was probably considered one of the "Bush-bots" on FR. He said that he didn't consider me a "Bush-bot", but rather a Bush "advocate". I believe that was the word he used...
I suppose when it comes to President Bush, some might consider me a bit overzealous. With all the folks (both 'RATS and GOPs) that keep on underestimating him, I guess somebody has to do it, lol...
There, is that a little better? lol...
Thanks. I appreciate your viewpoint...
Does Texas need an early middle age Electrical Engineer, with all his own hair?
What is this "probably" sh!+ ?????
I love this... I think 80% of all crime is committed by these guys they keep turning out on the streets...
The guy "most recently" was arrested for kidnapping!!!!
Only in the sense that the perp wasted his life being a scum. This should be a warning to the younger folks, don't follow the path he did.
That he was killed bothers me not at all. That's the way it should be.
In the Peoples Republic of California
this family would be declared "terrorists."
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