Authorities are searching for a Texas man who allegedly killed five neighbors, including an 8-year-old boy, after they asked him to stop firing off rounds in his yard. Francisco Oropeza, 38, fled after the shooting Friday night that left five people dead, including an 8-year-old boy. San Jacinto County Sheriff Greg Capers said investigators found clothes and a phone while combing a rural area that includes dense layers of forest, but tracking dogs lost the scent. Police recovered the AR-15-style rifle that Oropeza allegedly used in the shootings. “He could be anywhere now,” Capers said, the Associated Press reports.
The attack happened near Cleveland, north of Houston, on a street where neighbors often unwind by firing off guns. Capers said the victims were between the ages of 8 and 31; all were believed to be from Honduras. All were shot “from the neck up,” he said. The attack was the latest act of gun violence amid a record pace of mass shootings in the U.S. this year, some of which have involved semiautomatic rifles. Capers said there were 10 people in the house, including some who had moved in last week. The confrontation followed the neighbors' walking up to the fence and asking the suspect to stop shooting rounds, Capers said. The suspect responded by telling them that it was his property. The suspect then walked the front door of the complaining neighbors with the rifle. The shooting took place on a rural, pothole-riddled street where single-story homes sit on wide 1-acre lots and are surrounded by a thick canopy of trees. Across the U.S. since Jan. 1, there have been at least 18 shootings that left four or more people dead, according to a database maintained by The Associated Press and USA Today, in partnership with Northeastern University.