Leoncio Larranaga, a 33-year-old male whose ethnicity has not been publicly specified in the sources available, was fatally shot in Phoenix, Arizona, on the evening of April 9, 2014. Police records and later summaries describe how officers were dispatched to an area near the intersection of Bethany Home Road and 33rd Avenue after reports of gunfire in the neighborhood. When they arrived, they found Larranaga inside a Chrysler 300, gravely wounded from multiple gunshot injuries.
The shooting occurred at about 7:15 p.m. that Thursday evening, a time when traffic and activity in the area would still have been relatively busy. According to information attributed to Phoenix Police Department spokesperson Sgt. Tommy Thompson, officers discovered Larranaga seated in the vehicle, which had come to a stop near the intersection. The severity of his wounds was immediately apparent, and emergency medical personnel rushed him from the scene to a local hospital. Despite those efforts, he died a short time later from the injuries he had sustained in the attack.
In the days after the killing, Phoenix police publicly appealed for help from the community, asking for information that might identify the individuals responsible for the shooting. Reports note that investigators believed more than one person was involved and that they were looking for any witnesses who might have seen the Chrysler 300 before or after the shots were fired, or who might have observed suspicious activity in the vicinity of Bethany Home Road and 33rd Avenue around the time of the crime.
Available public records and case summaries characterize Larranaga’s death as a homicide by gunfire and list it among unsolved or cold cases associated with the Phoenix Police Department, which continues to be identified as the lead agency. As of the most recent information accessible in news and case-tracking databases, authorities have not announced any arrests in connection with the shooting, nor have they publicly named specific suspects. The case remains open, and law enforcement has continued to encourage anyone with knowledge about the circumstances of the shooting or those involved to come forward so that the investigation can move toward accountability and justice for Larranaga and those who knew him.
