Man accused of fatally shooting mom of 3 ‘wanted to scare’ her son, Texas cops say

A 19-year-old Texas man is accused of killing a mother of three in a drive-by shooting he says was intended to threaten her son, investigators say.

The victim was inside her home in Katy on the night of April 25, along with her two boys and adult son, when shots rang out from the street, according to Harris County court documents filed July 25.

Several .45-caliber rounds pierced the home, and the woman’s children found her dead in bed with a gunshot wound to the head, documents said.

The woman’s oldest son told investigators he had seen a red Chevrolet Silverado pickup truck driving around the area recently, and that he “got into a fight with some guys a couple years ago, one of whom drives a red truck,” the documents said.

Surveillance video captured the red truck parked near the victim’s home the night of April 25, documents read.

One person can be seen waiting in the driver’s seat while two others get out and walk toward the house. Gunfire is heard, then the two males run back to the truck, get in and drive away, according to the documents.

Roughly one week after the shooting, investigators found the truck in a high school parking lot, documents said.

Investigators showed the surveillance video to the school’s resource officer, who recognized the two figures running toward the truck, according to documents.

The 16-year-old driver told police he picked up the suspect, Giovanni Wilfredo Medrano, and a second individual the night of the shooting and that they forced him to drive to the victim’s house, adding that he kept silent because they “beat him and threatened to kill him and his family if he said anything,” documents said.

In a July 21 interview, Medrano told police he shot up the victim’s home with a .45-caliber handgun because he wanted to “scare her son,” who he said had “bullied him since he was in 9th grade,” according to the documents.

Medrano added that he didn’t intend to kill the man’s mother.

Medrano was arrested on a charge of murder and his bail was set at $500,000, court records show.

Katy is a suburb of Houston, roughly 30 miles west of the city’s downtown.

This story was originally published July 30, 2023 at 12:46 PM with the headline "Man accused of fatally shooting mom of 3 ‘wanted to scare’ her son, Texas cops say."