LOS ANGELES (SONNA) — A shooter stood over a 16-year-old mother clutching her 10-month-old baby and shot and killed them in a brazen attack in a central California farming community that left six dead, a sheriff said Tuesday.
Tulare County Sheriff Mike Boudreaux said the teenager was fleeing the violence early Monday when the killers caught up to her outside the home in Goshen, a central California community of about 3,000 residents in the agricultural San Joaquin Valley and shot the young mother and her child “assassination-style.”
The other four victims ranged from 19 to 72 years old, including a grandmother who was shot as she slept. Their autopsies are expected to be completed later in the week.
Authorities said they were searching for two suspects and offered a $10,000 reward for information leading to their arrests.
“None of this was by accident,” Boudreaux said during a news conference Tuesday. “It was deliberate, intentional and horrific.”
Boudreaux walked back his earlier comments to reporters that the attack was likely a cartel hit, saying that investigators are also looking into whether it was gang violence.
“I am not eliminating that possibility,” the sheriff said. “These people were clearly shot in the head, and they were also shot in places where the shooter would know that a quick death would occur … This is also similar to high-ranking gang affiliation and the style of executions that they commit.”
Law enforcement is familiar with the home, the sheriff said, citing gang activity there that “has routinely occurred in the past” without giving any specifics.
The sheriff’s department on Tuesday identified the victims as: Rosa Parraz, 72; Eladio Parraz, Jr., 52; Jennifer Analla, 49; Marcos Parraz, 19; Alissa Parraz, 16; and Nycholas Parraz, 10 months.
Boudreaux said “there was no reason” for the shooters to kill the young mother and her child.
Source: AP