Lori Ann Perez, a 47-year-old woman, was killed in the early morning hours of April 9, 2026, in west Phoenix, Arizona. The shooting unfolded around 12:45 a.m. near 106th Avenue and Heatherbrae Drive, in the area of 107th Avenue and Indian School Road. Phoenix police officers were called to the neighborhood after reports of shots being fired, and when they arrived, they found Perez inside a vehicle suffering from at least one gunshot wound. Phoenix Fire Department personnel responded, but Perez was pronounced dead at the scene.
The investigation quickly spread beyond the vehicle where Perez was found. Detectives from Phoenix police homicide and night squads began processing the area, while officers learned that Perez’s boyfriend, Richard Benjamin Charles, may have been involved. Charles, who was 46, lived nearby, and police focused on his residence as part of the investigation. Authorities treated him as a suspect or person of interest in Perez’s killing as they worked to determine what led up to the fatal shooting.
As the morning continued, police moved to serve a search warrant at Charles’ home. Special Assignments Unit officers went to the residence, and as they entered, Charles shot himself. Phoenix Fire Department crews were already on scene and pronounced him dead there. Because Charles died from a self-inflicted gunshot wound, no arrest was made, and the case was described by local reporting as an apparent murder-suicide.
The shooting left the neighborhood shaken as police worked two scenes: the area where Perez was found in the vehicle and the nearby home connected to Charles. Residents described seeing a heavy police presence, including SWAT teams, a mobile command unit, crime scene personnel, patrol officers, and yellow tape blocking parts of the neighborhood. One nearby school and community center were reportedly placed under a shelter-in-place order during police activity, though officials did not publicly confirm whether that order was directly tied to the shooting investigation.
As of the available reports, authorities have not announced any additional suspects, arrests, charges, trials, or convictions. The central suspect, Richard Benjamin Charles, died during the police response, leaving investigators to piece together the circumstances surrounding Perez’s death through the evidence collected from the shooting scene, the vehicle, and Charles’ nearby residence.
