Local police are investigating the death of a woman whose body was pulled from a burning condo on Monday.
The female victim, 55-year-old Regina Phillips, was discovered with a gunshot wound to her head after firefighters located her in the blaze and took her to safety. “A person of interest” has reportedly been taken into custody on “unrelated charges,” according to a press release from the Duncanville Police Department. Relatives noted that the person arrested was Phillips’ boyfriend, per NBC 5 DFW.
The fire broke out in Phillips’ home in the 600 block of Oriole Boulevard at around 6 a.m. The day before, police were dispatched to the residence after receiving reports of a verbal disturbance. No charges were filed that day, per NBC 5.
Phillips was a longtime employee of Child Protective Services. The investigation into her death is ongoing.
In Dallas, family violence crimes are more or less on pace with the number logged last year — 4,687 as of May 6 compared to 4,790 clocked over the same period in 2023, according to the City of Dallas’ crime analytics dashboard. Nine of these reported incidents were homicides, 561 were aggravated assaults, and 62 were sex offenses.
Domestic violence affects approximately 1 in 3 Texans, per the Texas Advocacy Project.
According to City data on violent crime victims, women and girls represent 71.9% of family crime victims — their median age being 31. Of the 4,687 offenses logged, 2,274 of the victims were black, and 1,717 were Hispanic.
Since a class-action lawsuit was filed against the City of Dallas in 1987, DPD has a Domestic Violence Taskforce dedicated to such incidents. The team is composed of a sergeant, a crime analyst, a civilian counselor, and detectives.
Nevertheless, DPD has struggled to respond to crime due to a critical staffing shortage. Although a City report previously recommended a force of roughly 4,000 officers, only around 3,000 are fielded. Moreover, the Dallas City Council approved a budget of $654 million for DPD, which was considerably less than what other high-crime municipalities allocated to their police departments this fiscal year.