Man gets 35 years for 2022 double murder in North Austin
TRAVIS COUNTY, Texas - The man charged in a North Austin double murder in 2022 has been convicted and sentenced.
22-year-old Edgar Alejandro Barahona was convicted by a Travis County jury on May 13 for the fatal shootings of Juan Carlos Loarca-Villatoro and Heliodoro Arias-Flores.
Barahona was sentenced to 35 years for each murder count and will serve them concurrently, meaning Barahona will serve both sentences simultaneously.
On January 24, 2022, the Austin Police Department arrested Barahona and charged him with first-degree murder. He was initially indicted on April 20, 2022, and on March 27, he was re-indicted on the same two counts of murder.
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The shooting happened just after 10:30 p.m. on January 23, 2022 in between two restaurants in the 7500 block of North I-35 Service Road, in the southbound direction, just near Highway 183.
The Austin Police Department says officers responded to a shoot stab hot shot call and when they arrived they found a person who had apparently been shot. That person, later identified in court paperwork as Loarca-Villatoro, was pronounced dead at the scene just before 11 p.m.
Officers were notified of another victim who was transported to Dell Seton with a gunshot wound to his torso and in critical condition. That person died from his injuries just before 4 a.m. and was later identified as Arias-Flores, according to court paperwork.
Court paperwork says that combined witness testimony led APD to a Facebook profile of the suspected shooter, an Alex Barahona, who was positively identified later as Edgar Alejandro Barahona.
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One of the witnesses APD interviewed stated he was sitting inside his car in the parking lot and heard a gunshot nearby. When he looked in the direction of the shot, he saw a man in a red jacket "standing in a shooting position and making a shooting motion with his right arm extended," says court paperwork.
The witness told police there was no one else in the parking lot besides Barahona, Loarca-Villatoro, and Arias-Flores, and said that he recognized the shooter because he saw him inside the bar before wearing the same red jacket. The witness also stated he saw Barahona get into a white Honda sedan which left the scene.
The witness also stated that he had known Barahona as Alex for about two years and confirmed his identity when presented with a photo of Barahona, court paperwork says.
