Cristian Gabriel Montes, 35, a male from Balch Springs, was celebrating a milestone for his young children when violence found him. Just after midnight on July 27, 2025, officers were called to a home on the 3900 block of Peachtree Road, where they found Cristian Gabriel Montes with gunshot wounds as the family gathering for his son’s baptism and his daughter’s birthday dissolved into chaos. He was transported to Baylor University Medical Center, where he was pronounced dead.
According to an arrest affidavit referenced by local reporters, the trouble began earlier in the evening when a 19-year-old relative was seen firing a handgun near a parked vehicle. When Cristian Gabriel Montes confronted him, a verbal dispute spiraled into a fistfight, and the younger man drew a firearm. Medical staff later documented at least two gunshot wounds to the upper chest and back, details that investigators noted could indicate shots fired as Cristian Gabriel Montes turned or fell.
Police identified the shooter as 19-year-old Leonardo Asis Campos Torres, a relative who, after being read his rights, admitted to firing the shots but claimed he acted in self-defense. Witnesses at the party pointed to him as the gunman, and he was arrested at the scene on a murder charge. Coverage of the case showed a bruised and bloodied booking photo of the teenager circulating as the investigation continued. Records indicate he later bonded out of the Dallas County Jail while the case moved forward.
Detectives recovered multiple spent shell casings near a Chevrolet Tahoe as they pieced together the final minutes of the celebration that became a crime scene. Family and friends remembered Cristian Gabriel Montes, 35, as a devoted father whose last moments were spent singing to his daughter before the confrontation erupted—an image that now anchors their calls for accountability as the legal process unfolds.
