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Second arrest made related to viral video of woman firing gun outside of car, BCSO says

Given the totality of the evidence, Salazar said he fully expects his detectives will be making more arrests.

SAN ANTONIO — A just released court document offers a window into the investigation into what Sheriff Javier Salazar has called a "drunken act of stupidity" in late August.

22-year-old Genesis Rodriguez was arrested last month, while Julia Castillo Gonzalez was arrested Friday. 

The affidavit for an arrest warrant against Rodriguez, accusing her of deadly conduct with a firearm, details the evidence detectives and data analysts were able to gather related to a viral video on social media.

The video clip on Instagram, which investigators said is an account belonging to Rodriguez, shows an arm sticking out of the open window of a car, while the person is randomly firing shots into a residential neighborhood, while the car travels down the road.

While discussing a motive for the random, violent attack Salazar said "I think from what we can gather, these folks had been drinking throughout the night and this was just a drunken act of stupidity. That's the only way I can put it. Just out drinking and had a gun and just decided it was a good idea to drive through a neighborhood shooting in the dead of night." 

The affidavit details how the investigation began as Wednesday was turning into Thursday in far west Bexar County in the Westcreek area off Talley Road.

At nine minutes before midnight, BCSO received complaints about shots being heard on Westcreek View Street.  

The next morning, nearby on Skyline Mesa, a parent getting their child ready for school called again, complaining that they found a bullet hole in the wall near their son's bed and a projectile on the floor.  In a Friday night briefing, Sheriff Salazar said he was relieved to report the boy was not injured in the random attack.

Investigators said they recovered seven shell casings at the scene, but a bigger clue came from a neighbor, who apparently followed the car that was firing the shots.

Detectives said that witness gave them a license plate to a black Chrysler 300 and while they were looking into the history of that car, investigators became aware of the online video. 

The affidavit said detectives entered an image of the shooter from that video in an online data management system called VeriPic and came up with a match for Rodriguez. The affidavit relates investigators also identified a second woman seen in the video, but that person has not yet been charged.

Salazar said investigators found and seized the Chrysler, which reportedly belongs to a friend of Rodriguez. "We have found evidence in that car that the shooting did take place.  I don't know exactly what evidence was found, but we do have some evidence a shooting took place in that car," Salazar said.

Salazar did not detail how Rodriguez or the Chrysler might be connected to a house in east San Antonio, but while Salazar was conducting his briefing, he said detectives were executing a related search warrant in the 4400 block of North Hein Road.

Processing personnel were seen coming from the home with large bags of evidence seized during the search, and BCSO did provide images of some of the material they recovered, which includes weapons and ammunition magazines.

Salazar said investigators have found no link between Rodriguez and the people whose home was shot up. 

Because of the random nature of the flying bullets, Salazar said his people were very happy to make an arrest.

"We fully expect to make others. Our organized crime group did a really good job working with CID, tracking down these suspects and kudos to our civilian analysts as well. They did a great job in getting these people identified and getting this person into custody sooner rather than later," Salazar said.

On Friday, Julia Castillo Gonzalez was arrested for Deadly Conduct with a Firearm, 3rd degree felony. 

"We do have some other folks identified.  At this point it's too soon to say what other charges may be applied.  I fully expect there may be some other folks going to jail in connection with this case," Salazar said. 

The Sheriff went on to urge anyone with information to speak up.

"In fact I would suggest those people call us right now.  They know who they are. We know who they are. They can give us a call at 210-335-6000 and we would love to hear from any other folks who were associated with this," Salazar said, adding "If I were in their shoes I  would much rather be a witness than a co-defendant and so I would suggest that they give us a call sooner rather than later." 

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