In the early morning hours of a mid-June day in Cayce, South Carolina, the life of Jose L. Gonzalez, a 42-year-old man, was tragically cut short. On June 14, 2021, officers from the Cayce Department of Public Safety responded to a 911 call about an unconscious man in a vehicle on Groover Circle. Upon their arrival at the mobile home community, they found Gonzalez inside a car, having sustained a single gunshot wound.
He was pronounced dead at the scene.
The investigation into the death of Jose Gonzalez quickly led authorities to identify a suspect. Four days after the discovery of Gonzalez's body, the Cayce Department of Public Safety announced that they were searching for 33-year-old Alberto Benitez Osorio-Mendoza. A warrant was issued for his arrest on the charge of murder. At the time he was identified as a suspect, Osorio-Mendoza was described as a Hispanic male, approximately 5-foot-7-inches tall and heavyset. He was last seen wearing blue jeans, a light blue shirt, and work boots.
Law enforcement officials believed that Osorio-Mendoza had ties to Texas and Chiapas, Mexico. The Cayce investigators, in their efforts to locate him, worked with the Lexington County Fugitive Task Force, the U.S. Marshal's Office, and the South Carolina Law Enforcement Division's Immigration Enforcement Unit. Despite these efforts, there have been no publicly available updates regarding the arrest of Alberto Benitez Osorio-Mendoza in connection with the murder of Jose L. Gonzalez. The case remains a somber reminder of a life lost to violence, with the alleged perpetrator yet to be brought to justice.
