Family ID's "troubled" Army vet as gunman in Houston rampage
HOUSTON -- The family of a "troubled" Army veteran from California says he was the gunman who killed one person and injured several others in a shooting rampage at a Houston auto detail shop.
Family members identified 25-year-old Dionisio Garza III of Rancho Cucamonga, California, as the man who opened fire Sunday, killing 56-year-old Eugene Linscomb, a customer at the shop who had arrived moments earlier. Sources also identified Garza as the shooting suspect to CBS Los Angeles.
Garza was killed about an hour later by a SWAT officer.
Police have not released the suspect's name and say they don't know a motive for the shooting.
But Garza's family told KPRC TV in Houston that "something snapped" in him following two tours in Afghanistan.
Garza's family said his condition worsened in the weeks before he traveled to Houston to visit an Army friend.
According to military service verification information obtained by 48 Hours Crimesider, Garza enlisted in the Army in Los Angeles in 2009. He trained at Fort Benning, Georgia, and was stationed in Vicenza, Italy from 2009 to 2011 and then in Fort Bliss, Texas from 2011 to January 2014, when he was discharged. He was deployed twice to Afghanistan, from December 2009 to November 2010 and from December 2012 to August 2013.
The Sergeant received numerous awards and medals including two stars for the Afghanistan campaign.
An Army spokeswoman said details about Garza's discharge isn't publicly available.