Man beaten to death after crash
AUSTIN, Texas – Watching her battered brother lay on the pavement outside her home, struggling to breathe as he choked on his own blood, Margaret Morales couldn’t fathom why someone would beat him so badly.
It’s a question police were still trying to answer Wednesday, a day after an outraged mob kicked and punched David Morales to death as he tried to defend a friend whose car had apparently hit and injured a 2-year-old boy.
The driver was confronted by several people when he got out of the car to check on the child, Austin police Commander Harold Piatt said. When they attacked the driver, Morales got out of the car to protect him and was attacked as well. Police said no guns or knives were used.
The driver got away and is cooperating with investigators, who are not releasing his name. Police identified the child as Michael Hosea Jr.
There were conflicting accounts of how many people were in the area and whether the attack was linked to a nearby festival celebrating Juneteenth, which commemorates Texas slaves getting the word that they had been freed.
Police originally said 2,000 to 3,000 people were in the area but reduced the estimate to 20 late Wednesday. They also insisted the attack had nothing to do with the city-sponsored Juneteenth festival.
But Katherine White, a Morales family friend who lives at the complex, said hundreds who had been at the Juneteenth festival filled the parking lot and street.
Margaret Morales said a young boy came to her door to tell her that her brother was lying on the ground outside. She found him sprawled on the pavement 100 feet from her townhouse, gasping for air. Her sister and mother came running after hearing her screams, but police wouldn’t let any of them get close to him.
On Wednesday, the lawn outside Margaret Morales’ three-bedroom townhouse in east Austin was littered with potato chip bags and plastic foam cups that partygoers had left behind. She sat with her sister, Elizabeth, on her porch watching her 13-year-old son sob in the arms of two friends.
“I just want the people caught and brought to justice,” Elizabeth Morales said. “I want them to feel the same pain that they caused my brother.”
Margaret Morales said her brother, who was staying with her, was a painter who was on his way home from work. The driver, whom she knew only as Victor, picked him up and dropped him off every day, she said.
Police arrived one minute after receiving a 911 call, by which time the beating had stopped, department spokeswoman Toni Chovanetz said. But the Morales family complained that medical help was slow in coming.
David Morales arrived at the hospital about 35 minutes after the 911 call was received, said Warren Hassinger, Austin-Travis County Emergency Services spokesman.
Emergency officials said police ordered them to wait until the area was secure.
A preliminary autopsy listed blunt force trauma as the cause of death.