Slaying suspect expected to arrive in Hidalgo County today
Updated: Slaying suspect expected to arrive in Hidalgo County today
Comments 3
March 22, 2011 1:35 PM
Naxiely Lopez
The Monitor
McALLEN — A loophole in the Mexican justice system made it possible for a man accused of pulling the trigger in the shooting death of a Mission man to be brought back to Hidalgo County to face murder charges after fleeing to Mexico more than two years ago.
Eduardo Leme de Oliveira, a Brazilian national, is expected to arrive at McAllen Miller International Airport Tuesday night, Sheriff Lupe Treviño said. He will be escorted by Hidalgo County Sheriffs deputies, who traveled to Los Angeles, Calif., where Oliviera was being detained by U.S. Marshals after being deported from Mexico, Sheriff Lupe Trevño said.
Investigators believe Oliveira, who is approximately 40 years old, was enlisted by two women to kill 42-year-old Juan Antonio Morales, a Mission man who was found shot to death inside his vehicle Oct. 12, 2008. Deputies think Morales was lured to a secluded place near the intersection of Mile 3 North and Schuerbach roads in Mission, where he was shot multiple times in the chest.
The murder victim’s common-law wife Julissa Gonzalez, 25, and her lover Enedelia Canales, 21, confessed to plotting Morales’ murder days after the shooting, Treviño said.
The women, who are currently serving murder sentences in connection with the case, claimed they asked Oliveira to pull the trigger because Morales was reportedly abusive and often threatened to take his and Gonzalez’ daughter. By the time authorities identified Oliveira, however, he had fled to Mexico.
Deputies believe the women met Oliveira at Don Felipe’s Taqueria — a taco stand north of Alton where they both worked — and convinced him to kill Morales as a favor to the women.
“Our investigation has not revealed he was paid in any way because if we could prove that, he would be up for capital murder,â€
