East Texas teenager charged with murder in killings of parents and siblings

NASH, Texas (AP) — Authorities in east Texas have jailed an 18-year-old man on capital murder charges in the shootings of his parents, sister and brother.

Police in the small town of Nash say officers responding to a report that a man had harmed his family and was threatening to kill himself on Tuesday found Cesar Olalde barricaded inside a home. They were told that multiple people were dead inside.

Olalde later called police, saying “he had pulled the trigger, and shot his family,” according to a probable cause affidavit by Nash Police Officer Craig Buster.

The officers persuaded Olalde to surrender and then found the bodies of his parents, Reuben Olalde and Aida Garcia, older sister Lisbet Olalde and younger brother Oliver Olalde in a bathroom.

“It appeared as if the victims had been shot at various places in the residence and drug to the bathroom,” according to the affidavit. “Multiple spent cartridge casings” were found on the floor of the home, and there was “blood spatter on multiple surfaces,” it said.

The affidavit said a co-worker of Lisbet Olalde had gone to the home because the woman had failed to arrive at work and, with a family member, forced his way inside where he was confronted by Cesar Olalde, who pointed a firearm at him.

The co-worker told police that Olalde said “he had killed his family because they were cannibals, and they were going to eat him,” the affidavit states.

Bowie County court records show Olalde was ordered held on $10 million bond. His listed defense attorney did not immediately return a request for comment Thursday.

Nash is a town of about 3,800 on the western edge of Texarkana near the Arkansas state line.

As of May 24, there have been at least 25 mass killing incidents in the U.S. so far in 2023, leaving at least 127 people dead, not including perpetrators who died, according to a database maintained by The Associated Press and USA Today in partnership with Northeastern University. That puts the country on a faster pace for mass killing incidents than in any other year since at least 2006, according to the database, which defines a mass killing as an incident in which four or more people are killed, not including the perpetrator, within a 24-hour period.

There have been at least 556 incidents in all since 2006 in the U.S., according to the database, leaving at least 2,892 people dead.

Family mass killings — in which four or more people were killed, not including the perpetrator — have also been an all-too-common tragedy across the country. They’ve happened nearly every 3 1/2 weeks for the last two decades on average, according to the database.