On January 23, 2022, 26-year-old Juan Carlos Villatoro was tragically shot and killed in the parking lot of the Ojos Locos restaurant in North Austin, Texas. The incident occurred shortly after 10:30 p.m., when a 911 call reported a shooting at the location. Upon arrival, police found Villatoro and another victim, 28-year-old Heliodoro Arias Flores, lying in the parking lot with gunshot wounds.
Villatoro was pronounced dead at the scene just before 11 p.m., while Flores was transported to a local hospital where he later succumbed to his injuries at 3:50 a.m. the following day.
Homicide investigators and crime scene technicians responded to the scene and began interviewing witnesses. Through their investigation, they identified 19-year-old Edgar Alejandro Barahona as a probable suspect. Barahona was located by the Lonestar Fugitive Task Force and arrested. He was charged with two counts of murder and booked into the Travis County Jail on a $1 million bond. The Travis County Medical Examiner's Office conducted autopsies on both Villatoro and Flores, determining that their official causes of death were gunshot wounds and the manner of death was homicide.
In April 2022, Barahona was indicted for the murders, and he was re-indicted on the same two counts in March 2024. On May 13, 2024, a Travis County jury convicted Barahona of two counts of murder. The following day, he was sentenced to 35 years in prison for each murder count, to be served concurrently. The case against Barahona was prepared by the Travis County District Attorney's Office, with the support of law enforcement partners who worked tirelessly to hold the defendant accountable and seek justice for the victims.
The tragic deaths of Juan Carlos Villatoro and Heliodoro Arias Flores marked the seventh and eighth homicides in Austin in 2022. The investigation and subsequent conviction of Edgar Alejandro Barahona brought some measure of closure to the victims' families, who hoped that the verdicts would bring peace and justice for their loved ones.
