Inset: Robert Aparicio (Bexar County Sheriff”s Office). Background: The intersection where a fatal stabbing occurred in San Antonio, Tex. (Google Maps).
Authorities in Texas have apprehended a man following an almost yearlong investigation into a deadly stabbing incident, police from the Lone Star State have confirmed.
Robert Adrian Aparicio, aged 34, has been charged with first-degree murder, as indicated by court documents from Bexar County.
The tragic event took place on January 12, outside a home on Montezuma Street, located in the western part of San Antonio. Officers from the San Antonio Police Department arrived at the scene to discover 39-year-old Christopher Renteria lying on the street, bleeding from several stab wounds to his chest and body. Renteria was immediately transported to a nearby hospital where he battled for his life.
Initially, the suspect in the stabbing faced an aggravated assault charge, law enforcement officials noted.
However, on May 26, Renteria tragically succumbed to his injuries, and his death was officially classified as a homicide. Consequently, the charge was elevated.
As the investigation progressed, detectives finally identified a suspect.
While being transported to the hospital, Renteria told a police officer that a man named “Robert” had stabbed him, according to an affidavit obtained by San Antonio-based ABC affiliate KSAT.
But that name was nearly all law enforcement could ascertain from the victim himself, police say. Soon after being admitted to the hospital, Renteria went into cardiac arrest. That cardiac arrest led to a significant brain injury that subsequently barred the victim from further communicating “in any way,” according to the affidavit.
Still, there were other sources of evidence.
At the scene of the crime, two witnesses said they had witnessed the stabbing. Both witnesses appeared to buoy what Renteria had said — saying someone named “Rob” or “Robert” was the assailant.
In relaying their version of events, the witnesses told a detective the attacker stabbed the victim “over an argument involving a pair of hair clippers” that had been stolen from Renteria.
As the argument became violent, Renteria allegedly smashed out the driver’s side window of Aparicio’s red Ford Ranger.
Then, the defendant allegedly went to his truck, grabbed a knife, and chased Renteria down until he stumbled and fell in the street.
After the fall, Aparicio took the opportunity to use the knife and stabbed the victim over and over, according to law enforcement. After the stabbing, the defendant fled in the red truck, police allege.
Surveillance cameras in the vicinity caught the incident and the aftermath, according to the police department. Those videos identified the alleged killer and showed his clothes in detail, the affidavit claims. And, perhaps most fortuitously for investigators, one of the videos contains audio of one of the witnesses reading aloud the majority of the Minnesota license plate affixed to the Ford Ranger.
On Nov. 20, a detective obtained a photograph of a man matching the suspect’s description, police claim. In that image, the man is allegedly seen wearing many of the same articles of clothing from the day of the stabbing, while loading tree limbs into the bed of the red truck.
Police then identified the apartment complex where the landscaping had occurred, contacted the general manager of the complex, and obtained information about the man in the photograph, according to the affidavit. As it turns out, the man responded to a Craigslist ad and law enforcement soon had the tree-trimmer’s phone number.
After that, investigators determined the number belonged to Aparicio, according to the affidavit.
On Nov. 21, the two witnesses from the night in question allegedly identified the defendant in a photo display.
On Thursday, he was arrested during the early morning hours.
Aparicio is currently being detained in the Bexar County Jail on $350,000 bond.
