Tulsa Man Allegedly Strangles Wife, Hides Body Under Mattress

Detectives say Karla Gramajo-Cabrera was stuffed under a mattress near Mohawk Park after her husband, Willie Escobar, strangled her inside their Tulsa home and tried to move the body out of sight.

Tulsa police arrested Escobar, 40, on first-degree murder charges after Gramajo-Cabrera’s sister reported her missing and turned a domestic dispute into a homicide investigation. Homicide detectives, fugitive warrants detectives and the Domestic Violence Unit all got involved as officers began piecing together what happened to the 33-year-old mother.

Police say Escobar confessed that he killed Gramajo-Cabrera inside the couple’s home on Wednesday, April 8, 2026, after an argument in which she insulted him. He told detectives their 17-year-old son was asleep in another room when the killing happened. Investigators also said Escobar admitted placing her body in a vehicle before hiding it.

Phone data led detectives to the area of 7600 N. Pittsburgh Avenue near Mohawk Park, where they spent about two hours searching before finding the body under a mattress. Police have said the case fit a pattern they take seriously: domestic violence, a missing-person report, and suspicious behavior by the suspect. In this case, that mix pushed the investigation forward fast.

Escobar was taken into custody after detectives found Gramajo-Cabrera’s body and booked into the Tulsa County Jail. Police said the couple had three young children with them when detectives observed Escobar leaving the residence. Family-support pages say Gramajo-Cabrera left behind four children, ages 17 to 5, and say funeral and repatriation costs could total $18,000.

The case lands in a grim statewide context. Oklahoma’s Domestic Violence Fatality Review Board said the state recorded 122 domestic violence homicides in 2023, a record high and a 16% increase from the year before. That number has made missing-person calls tied to domestic violence feel urgent for investigators, and this case appears to have moved with that same alarm from the start.