A Phoenix man is in handcuffs after police say he went on a deadly spree, murdering two men and wounding another over the course of two weeks in January. 37-year-old Richard Anthony Rodriguez faces a slew of felony charges, including murder, reported by AZFamily.com.
According to investigators, the string of violence began near a storage facility at 43rd and Dunlap avenues on Jan. 11, where David Gene Aguirre, 55, was allegedly run over by his own pickup truck, which Rodriguez is accused of stealing, just before noon. A witness at the scene claimed Aguirre yelled for someone to call 911 as he thought "they were stealing his stuff" before being struck, in an incident initially treated as a hit-and-run according to a separate AZFamily.com report.
The violent streak continued on Jan. 23, when police got a call about a shooting on Vista Avenue. A man, who was shot in the chest, later identified his shooter as "Kiki," which turned out to be an alias for Rodriguez. Then, on Feb. 2, a man was found shot in the head and dead inside his apartment at an advanced state of decomposition, per police reports. Through connecting the dots, which included a woman's testimony, Rodriguez was tied to both murder scenes.
A woman involved in both cases informed detectives that she witnessed Rodriguez running over Aguirre and fatally shooting the man in the apartment, where she claimed to be in a bedroom during the homicide. Neighbors corroborated seeing Rodriguez and the woman at the apartment, soon after the gunshot was heard some days before. The man who survived the shooting on Vista Avenue further nailed down the identification, confirming it was Rodriguez who shot him, as stated by AZFamily.com.
As of now, Rodriguez stays booked into jail, refusing to answer any questions thrown his way by the police, while the exact charges the woman may face remain undisclosed. Phoenix police urge anyone with information regarding these incidents to step forward and encourage the use of Silent Witness for anonymous tips.
