Carrboro, North Carolina

From the Durham Herald-Sun of December 20, 2005

Two men wounded in home invasion

Two men were hospitalized -- one with critical injuries, the other with a serious wound -- after a home invasion led to a double shooting late Monday night.

A woman, her two young children, her boyfriend and her boyfriend's brother were in the apartment when two men entered the residence, according to Carrboro Police Capt. Joel Booker.

Both someone in the apartment and one of the intruders fired shots, Booker said. One of the intruders was shot in the head while the boyfriend's brother was shot in the abdomen.

Investigators believe six shots were fired.

The incident was still under investigation by the Police Department as of Tuesday afternoon and Booker would not release the names or ages of anyone involved.

Police were called to the scene after the gunfire was reported, and they found the apartment residents in a car leaving the complex, apparently on their way to seek medical attention for the boyfriend's brother.

The man was bleeding from gunshot wounds to the abdomen and lying in the back of the car while the children, the mother and the boyfriend were in the front seat, Booker said.

At the apartment, police found one of the intruders lying on the floor with a gunshot wound to the head. He was taken to the hospital and was in critical condition Tuesday, according to police.

The second intruder was not found, and Booker said police are still working to determine his identity.

While a motive for the intrusion and shooting was not known, Booker stressed this was not a random incident.
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He added that if self-defense was the motive, as it appears, then the man who shot the intruder would not face charges.

From the Durham Herald-Sun of December 27, 2005

Intruder who was shot in head dies

A man who was shot in the head after reportedly forcing his way into a home at the Estes Park Apartments has died from his wound.

Meanwhile, Carrboro police investigators continue to piece together exactly what happened, while they believe the incident was related to a domestic dispute, Lt. Cornell Lamb said Tuesday.

Police haven't been able to locate any relatives of the dead man, Lamb said.

They have his name -- Hosea Garcia Perizo, age 21 -- and his last known address -- 1322 Ivy St. in Durham. Lamb said the man also had gone by the name Jose Gomez Rodriguez.

Lamb added that Perizo was affiliated with the Latino Kings gang, but he said the department does not consider the incident to be gang-related.

The department still is not releasing the names of others involved, including an adult man who also was shot and now is in stable condition, as Lamb said police still were concerned those people could be in danger.

"Because of the circumstances involved here, and the safety of these people, we want to keep their names out of it," he said.

Police first got involved in those circumstances after midnight on Dec. 20, when they were called to the apartments at 306 Estes Drive in Carrboro.

It appears now that Perizo and at least two other people knocked on the door of one of the apartments, and a man there started to let them in, thinking they were acquaintances, Lamb said. But the scene quickly turned violent, as Perizo and the others tried to push past the man and several gunshots were fired.

Perizo was hit in the head, and one of the men in the apartment was hit in the abdomen. Perizo died Thursday at UNC Hospitals, while the other man has improved to stable condition, Lamb said.

The man with the abdomen wound was the brother of the boyfriend of a woman staying at the apartment, he said. Along with those three adults, there were two young children at the apartment during the incident.

As investigators see it so far, the story is that the woman had moved away from her previous boyfriend because of domestic abuse she suffered, Lamb said. She and that previous boyfriend were the parents of the two children at the apartment.

Perizo apparently came looking for the group. He wasn't the ex-boyfriend of the woman, but police are looking into whether he was an associate of that boyfriend, Lamb said.

The lieutenant said all the people at the apartment were Hispanic, although he said he didn't know facts such as whether they were recent immigrants or from what countries they may have come.

During an interview Tuesday, Lamb declined to reveal other details, such as exactly who shot whom, or exactly how many people forced their way into the apartment. All the weapons were handguns, and there was more than one gun involved, he said.

The residents in the apartment did call 911 after the shootings, but there was an initial language barrier, and the residents then loaded the injured brother in a car to seek treatment. A Carrboro police officer who speaks Spanish has been assisting the investigation, along with a Chapel Hill officer who speaks the language, and the Family Violence Prevention Center is involved as well, Lamb said.