Two men will go to prison. They took part in the 2023 shooting death of a 19-year-old Laredo man. Two other men charged in the case are still waiting for court dates.
Ruben Ray Tobias Sr. pleaded guilty to murder on June 30. A judge gave him 10 years in prison. He gets credit for the time he already spent in jail. The plea deal also wiped out his court costs and lawyer fees.
Ivan Oziel Mendez took a different deal. He was first charged with murder and with messing with evidence. He pleaded guilty only to the evidence charge. In return, the murder charge against him got dropped, along with other pending cases. A judge sentenced him to 8 years in prison.
This case goes back to a killing that shook Laredo almost three years ago. It was the seventh homicide in the city that year.
The victim, Jose Roberto Obregon, was 19 years old. He was shot on Dec. 11, 2023, near Arcadia Loop and Lowry Road in the Quail Creek neighborhood. Police got calls about shots fired just before 10 p.m. Officers who were already close by rushed in fast.
They found Obregon on Arcadia Loop with gunshot wounds. He was rushed to a hospital. He died there.
Police say four men took part in the killing. Along with Tobias Sr. and Mendez, officers arrested Ruben Ray Tobias Jr. and Jose Gustavo Dominguez.
Officers stopped a pickup truck trying to leave the area. They popped one of its tires to make it stop. Tobias Sr. and Dominguez were inside. Police say they found shell casings and a gun in the truck.
Tobias Jr. and Mendez tried to run away on foot. U.S. Border Patrol agents caught them and handed them over to Laredo police. All four men were taken in for questioning that night.
Laredo police spokesman Joe Baeza said no clear motive had come up. He was speaking to reporters at the time. "Right now there's not much on the side of motive that's clear to us at this point," Baeza said. "There isn't anything that was apparent to us being drug-, cartel- or gang-related at this point. Right now it's still pretty up in the air on what may be the cause."
Baeza said police pulled more shell casings from the scene. They also got video of the shooting. He thanked Border Patrol for help finding the two men who ran.
The two other men charged in the case are still fighting their cases in court.
Tobias Jr., now 20, faces murder charges. He also faces aggravated robbery, a robbery charge with a weapon or a hurt victim. And he faces a charge for messing with evidence. He skipped his own jury selection on June 22. A judge issued a no-bond warrant for his arrest the next day.
After that warrant went out, Tobias Jr. ran across the border to Nuevo Laredo, Mexico. Mexican police and U.S. agents worked together. They grabbed him on July 4. Agents handed him over to U.S. custody at the Juarez-Lincoln International Bridge. Webb County Sheriff Martin Cuellar thanked his Cyber Crimes Unit. He also thanked other agencies for tracking Tobias Jr. down. Deputies booked Tobias Jr. into the Webb County Jail that same day.
He had a pretrial hearing on July 28. This came after prosecutors filed new charges against him in the case.
Dominguez still faces a murder charge too. Prosecutors filed new charges against him this summer as well. His lawyers now want the court to move old rulings and bond terms to the new case file.
Both remaining cases sit in the 341st District Court in Webb County. No trial date has been set for either man.
Murder in Texas can bring 5 to 99 years, or even life in prison. Prosecutors can offer a deal. They lower a charge or a sentence if a suspect pleads guilty. That is what happened with Tobias Sr. and Mendez.
The two guilty pleas close one part of this case. It has dragged on for almost three years. Two more men still face murder charges. The full story of that December night in Quail Creek is not finished yet.
