Seven people are in police custody, six of whom face murder charges, after being linked to a fatal shooting in South Dallas last week.
Five adults and two juveniles, aged 14 and 16, were arrested by Dallas police on Saturday. With the exception of 26-year-old Alexis Rosales, who was booked for violating probation, all have been charged with the murder of 33-year-old Jose Garnados-Cerritos.
The victim was found in a pickup truck in the 400 block of Alcorn Avenue, which is Council Member Tennell Atkins’ District 8, at approximately 8:30 p.m. on May 19, according to a news release from the Dallas Police Department.
Garnados-Cerritos was one of four people inside the truck, with a 12-year-old boy in the passenger seat also sustaining gunshot wounds. He is currently in stable condition at a nearby hospital. The driver of the vehicle and another juvenile passenger were uninjured.
DPD detectives learned that the shooting actually occurred in the 600 block of Jonelle Avenue, which is in District 5, represented by DX‘s Crime Boss of the Month, Council Member Jaime Resendez. The driver of the truck then left the scene and stopped at the Alcorn Avenue location to summon police.
The adult suspects facing murder charges are 21-year-old Valerie Davalos, 19-year-old Kimberly Mejia, and Guillermo Alvarez and John Marquez, who are both 18.
So far, only Mejia and Alvarez have appeared in Dallas County jail records. Mejia has been issued a bond — $200,000 for murder and $150,000 for serious bodily injury to a child.
Meanwhile, Alvarez, who was booked on an additional charge of unlawful disclosure or promotion of intimate visual material, was issued a total bond of $205,000.
As of May 29, Dallas had logged 87 murders, according to data from the City’s crime analytics dashboard, and violent crime continues to be a problem in certain parts of Dallas.
Moreover, black and Hispanic males represent 68 of the 87 victims of murders recorded in Dallas this year. There is a broader trend of black and Hispanic people being disproportionately affected by violent crime in Dallas, as regularly covered in The Dallas Express.
DPD has been laboring against a significant staffing shortage. Just 3,000 officers are fielded despite a City report calling for closer to 4,000. Meanwhile, certain parts of the city are putting up stubbornly high crime figures. For instance, crime in Downtown Dallas regularly outpaces the downtown area of Fort Worth, which is patrolled by a specialized police unit and private security guards.
Further stretching its resources thin, DPD has been budgeted only $654 million this fiscal year, with Dallas City Council members choosing to spend less taxpayer money on public safety than other high-crime jurisdictions.