Suspect charged in Valentine’s Day killing of Harris County teen

Mariah Alissay Alatorre’s mother traced her daughter’s phone to an urgent care clinic, then waited months for answers about where the 17-year-old was shot and why the case seemed to stall. More than two months after the Valentine’s Day killing, Harris County homicide detectives charged Enrique Aguilar with murder and his brother, Romeo Aguilar, with possession of a prohibited weapon.

Both brothers were arrested by the District 1 Crime Reduction Unit and the Violent Criminals Apprehension Team and booked into the Harris County Jail. No bond was set for Enrique Aguilar at the time of the report, and he was due back in court the next morning.

The original account placed the shooting at a house party on Dagg Road in the Pearland area, just south of Beltway 8 between Highway 288 and Highway 35. Investigators said about 300 people were gathered around 12:30 a.m. when Houston police arrived on a disturbance call and gunfire erupted as officers approached, sending people fleeing in all directions. That chaos helped explain why the case took time to sort out, but it did not answer the family’s central question: where was Mariah shot.

Later court records said authorities now believe the shooting happened at a home on Milroy Lane in unincorporated Harris County, not on Dagg Road. ABC13 reported the case was transferred from the Houston Police Department to the Harris County Sheriff’s Office after that location discrepancy was corrected. Court documents also say video evidence allegedly shows Enrique Aguilar and another male waving firearms and pointing them toward Mariah and others before the shooting. Prosecutors told a judge the group later left the party and stopped near the urgent care clinic where the shooting is now believed to have occurred.

Court records reported by ABC13 say Alatorre was shot several times in the arm and stomach. She was taken to an emergency room and then transferred to HCA Houston Healthcare Northwest, where she was pronounced dead. At a hearing, the judge questioned an accidental-shooting explanation for the killing.

Yady Alatorre had said “nothing makes sense” and said she had been trying to reach her daughter after tracing Mariah’s phone to the clinic. She said Mariah had been looking forward to celebrating her upcoming graduation. An obituary identified her as Mariah Alissay Alatorre, 17, and remembered her as a beloved daughter, sister, granddaughter and friend; it listed her parents as Yadyralia Alatorre and Jaime Davila Jr.

ABC13 said the case was among at least eight teen shootings in the Houston area since early February, and the fourth to be fatal, underscoring how often investigators are still forced to rebuild violent scenes after the initial headlines fade.