By Clare Fonstein, Brett Coomer, Dylan McGuinness
Source Houston Chronicle
A longtime tenant facing eviction started several fires at his southwest Houston housing complex early Sunday and then shot at residents as they fled the blazes, killing three before authorities fatally shot him, police said.
The gunman, a man possibly in his 50s, lay in wait around 1 a.m. in the 8000 block of Dunlap as residents of the multiroom, one-story rental facility escaped the fire, authorities said.
"It is not a good morning in Houston," Police Chief Troy Finner said. "This suspect unfortunately, very sadly and very evilly set fire to several residences, laid wait for those residents to come out and fired upon them."
Firefighters had to take cover as they arrived to fight the blaze amid the mass shooting. Police spotted the shooter, dressed in all black with a shotgun, and killed him, authorities said.
While it is not clear if the suspect fired at fire or police officials, investigators found a spent casing near his body, police said. The officer who shot him was placed on administrative leave, per the department's protocol, and both the department and the Harris County district attorney's office will investigate.
Officials have not publicly identified the shooter, but the building's owner, Tony Mercurio, said he was a nine-year tenant who had not caused prior problems.
The Harris County Appraisal District lists the property at 8021 Dunlap as a mixed residential-commercial structure appraised at $295,000. Built in 1955, the 3,663-square-foot structure has been reconfigured as connected apartments.
The owners said Cravinthe shooter had stopped paying rent in the last few months. They had asked him to leave the property, though they had not filed eviction proceedings. Mercurio stopped by Saturday morning to get the keys, and he said the tenant Cravin handed them over without an issue. He told Mercurio he had a few more boxes to pack up and then he would leave.
Mercurio, a Houston attorney who rents out the property on the side, said he was asleep late Saturday night when he got a call from a tenant saying there was a fire. He rushed over from his house, about two minutes away, to find a crime scene walled off by police.
"We lost so many good people here," Mercurio said.
The shooter had a criminal history, including aggravated assault with a deadly weapon in 1997. He had not been arrested since a drug charge in 2008, according to public records.
Two victims thought to be in their 60s died at the scene and one victim in his 40s died at the hospital. Another person was taken to the hospital with a gunshot wound in his arm.
Among the victims was the building's property manager, who had worked with Mercurio since 1989, he said. He described the man, Donald Lee Hall, as "a wonderful, wonderful guy" who was well-liked by residents.
"He'd give you the shirt off his back, that's the kind of guy he was," Mercurio said. "I was known as his uncle."
One neighbor said the shooter had colon cancer, was behind on his rent and didn't have a job.
"Something must have just hit him in the last couple of days really hard to where he just didn't care," neighbor Robin Ahrens said. "And that's why he did what he did. ... Nothing else you can really do when you are at that point."
Ahrens, who has lived in the complex 15 years in the quietquite, industrial area, was getting ready for work when he heard what he thought were fireworks.
"I'm just fortunate that I didn't go outside because he probably would have shot me too," Ahrens said.
Distraught residents searched for their friends, belongings and pets in the aftermath.
"Nobody knows where the dog is," Ahrens said of one resident's dog. "We don't know if he got burned up in the fire or if he just left and died somewhere."
Mercurio said it is his dog, a German shepherd named Duke, but it was living with the property manager who was killed during the violence.
They found Duke at a local shelter later Sunday with a damaged paw.
___
(c)2022 the Houston Chronicle
Visit the Houston Chronicle at www.chron.com
Distributed by Tribune Content Agency, LLC.
