CLEVELAND, Texas -- Dispatch records and audio recordings appear to conflict with a southeast Texas sheriff captain's claim that deputies were too busy to respond to a call from a home where four people were later found shot to death.
San Jacinto County sheriff's deputies didn't reach the home near the southeast Texas town of Cleveland until seven hours after a phone call from a woman, reporting that she was concerned about her son's behavior.
Records obtained by the Houston Chronicle show that four hours passed during that period without significant police activity before deputies responded to a wreck. In an audio recording, sheriff's Capt. Carl Jones tells a dispatcher not to make a welfare check.
Authorities say Oliver Bills Jr. fatally shot his girlfriend, her 4-year-old daughter and his adopted mother before killing himself in November.
