Man charged with murder after shooting, killing woman on North Side, San Antonio police say

A man accused of shooting and killing a woman he knew on the North Side earlier this week is charged with murder, according to San Antonio police.

Enrique Lara, 55, was arrested in Piedras Negras, Mexico on March 1 after authorities determined he left the country shortly after the incident.

Officers were called to the 100 block of Interpark Boulevard around 1:15 p.m. Monday. That’s when they found a woman, 51-year-old Maria Virginia Hernandez, was unresponsive with gunshot wounds.

Despite life-saving efforts from first responders, she was pronounced dead at the scene.

According to an arrest affidavit, Hernandez was working at the location where she was found and was picked up by Lara, who was driving a dark-colored pickup truck.

As Hernandez got out and walked away from the vehicle, Lara began to shoot from inside through the passenger window in her direction, police said.

Officials said Hernandez was struck by the gunfire several times, leading to her death.

Authorities continued their investigation and were able to identify Lara’s vehicle and its location. Lara was later arrested.

He is currently being held in the Bexar County Jail, and his bond is set at $250,000.00

More on KSAT:

San Antonio police investigating deadly shooting on North SideMan in custody after fatal shooting on North Side, SAPD says

CPS Energy spent hundreds of thousands of dollars on housing costs for current and former executives, records show

CPS Energy in recent years has spent hundreds of thousands of dollars on housing costs for current and former executives of the public utility, records obtained by the KSAT 12 Defenders.

The often five-figure benefit, described by CPS Energy officials as a “transitional housing payment” for executives hired by the company from outside of San Antonio, has gone to multiple staff members who had relatively short tenures with the utility. The payments for individual CPS Energy executives far outpace similar benefits paid to executives at other large public entities in San Antonio.

CPS Energy officials have repeatedly refused requests to answer questions on camera about the practice. Interim President & CEO Rudy Garza was physically shielded by other utility officials while the Defenders attempted to ask him about the topic following a recent Municipal Utilities Committee meeting.

CPS Energy paid $213,920.49 in housing costs for eight of its executives since 2015, financial records show. Four of those executives are no longer with the utility.

Two of them, former Chief Information Officer Karen Kirwan and former Chief Financial Officer and Treasurer Delores Lenzy-Jones, were paid a combined $102,064.59, even though their tenures lasted less than two years.

Kirwan, who left the utility in late 2018, was given $57,458.20 for housing costs, records show. A man at her San Antonio-area home declined to comment last month and referred all of our questions about the payment back to CPS Energy, even though Kirwan is no longer employed there.

Lenzy-Jones was given $44,606.39 for housing costs, but ultimately left the utility in 2020 and is now CFO for an Austin park system, records show. She did not respond to an email seeking comment for this story.

Another former CPS Energy CFO & Treasurer, Edward Fleming Jr., was given nearly $22,000 for housing costs. Cynthia Triplett, the utility’s former senior security director, was given nearly $20,000 for housing costs, records show.

Four current CPS Energy executives, including its Chief Information Officer, two vice-presidents and a senior director, have been given housing payments ranging from $7,646.62 to $31,906.96, records show.

“That’s up there. Yeah, that’s up there. I mean it’s something that they should have to explain,” said District 1 City Councilman Mario Bravo.

“If you try to hire an executive from outside the city, you want them to move here. This is moving expenses, this is a place to live until you can find a place to live,” said Bravo, who added that the utility needs to put a maximum cap in place, if it has not done so already.

“I’ve seen much higher, but I think we still need to look at what is an appropriate cap for San Antonio,” said Bravo, recalling the story of a faculty member at a University of Texas postgraduate school who was given a forgivable loan of hundreds of thousands of dollars.

“What’s the maximum that they should be hitting? And maybe, maybe there should be a lower maximum. That way it incentivizes whoever it is to find a place to live sooner so that they’re not going over these limits,” said Bravo.

Bravo has led the charge to have an outside audit of CPS Energy conducted.

Municipal Utilities Committee members, including Bravo, were briefed late last month by CPS Energy officials on the next steps in the process.

Bravo said he is satisfied with the utility’s approach, as CPS Energy’s board manages the request for proposals to ultimately review several areas of the utility’s inner workings.

“It prevents CPS Energy staff from being able to put their thumb on the scales,” said Bravo.

How do other public entities handle housing costs for executives?

The City of Bryan, which runs the public, albeit smaller, power company Bryan Texas Utilities, does not cover housing costs for utility executives or any employees of the city, an official told the Defenders.

College Station Utilities does not pay for housing or transitional housing expenses for its employees, but has covered $1,004.88 in lodging for out-of-state moving expenses since the start of 2015, its administration manager said in an email.

The City of San Antonio, which has a workforce nearly four times the size of CPS Energy, does offer to cover housing costs for some executive level positions. That figure, however, is typically capped at $16,000, a city Human Resources official confirmed.

Bexar County, which also has a significantly larger workforce than CPS Energy, has offered to cover housing costs just once in the past decade, a spokeswoman confirmed.

These payments are capped at $6,000 and require prior approval from the county manager, the spokeswoman said.

CPS Energy Interim President, CEO dodges questions from KSAT 12 Defenders

Garza, who spoke during the two-hour Municipal Utilities Committee meeting on Feb. 22, repeatedly declined to answer questions about the housing payments for executives as he left city council chambers.

“I think, I think we’ve given you the information,” said Garza as he walked out of chambers.

A group of CPS Energy officials, including Chief Legal Officer Shanna Ramirez, moved between Garza and the Defenders before a handler for Garza told us the interim CEO had another meeting.

The Defenders had to also request that a utility spokeswoman stop touching this reporter after she twice put her hand on his arm while he walked alongside Garza.

Hours later, while a KSAT reporter was taking part in an interview on another topic at CPS Energy headquarters, corporate communication staffers told him this would be KSAT’s only chance to ask about the housing costs.

“You’re going to have the opportunity to get her on camera now or he’s (Dillon) going to have the opportunity to get a statement,” a CPS spokeswoman said.

The KSAT reporter, who was not familiar with the topic of executive housing costs, declined to take part in the interview and told the utility officials the request was not acceptable.

The release of CPS Energy executive housing financial records comes months after a Defenders investigation found a former executive had racked over $53,000 in charges on his corporate credit card in a single year.

Fred Bonewell, who previously served as CPS Energy’s chief safety & security officer before being promoted to Chief Operations Officer in June, often charged multiple meals a day on his corporate card and used the card to pay for group dinners that routinely ranged in price from $300 to more than $700, financial records show.

Bonewell resigned in October, days after the Defenders exposed past ethics and corporate purchasing complaints against him.

Read more:

‘Ratepayer scandal:’ $700 steak dinners, 100+ brunch trips and the downfall of a CPS Energy executiveCPS Energy attempting to block information on natural gas purchases from latest winter stormFinal paycheck for Paula Gold-Williams topped $1 million, CPS Energy records show

Record inflation now even harder for small businesses

As if last year wasn’t already hard enough on small businesses during the pandemic, inflation has jumped to 7.5% from 6.2% last November, the highest level in 40 years.

Contending with higher costs and often thin profit margins, “There’s just no room for the small business to swallow that,” said Stephanie Scheller, founder and CEO of Grow Disrupt, which offers events, programs and resources for small business owners.

“I don’t know any that have had to shut doors, but I know quite a few that have had to get additional loans because they didn’t react quickly enough,” Scheller said.

She said many business owners are increasingly anxious about passing on the higher costs to their customers and clients, while others who already have been are wondering if they should do it again.

Kelly Smith, owner of LeapFrog Productions, which markets promotional products, said, fortunately, his clients understand why he has no choice but to pass on the higher costs he has to pay now.

But even so, Smith said, “They don’t like it, and we don’t like it.”

To try to make it up to his clients, Smith said he’s gone back to the basics.

“You treat them like family, and you go out of your way to please them and make it as easy for them as you can,” Smith said.

Scheller said Smith is on the right track.

“Look for the ways that you can add value to your product or your service,” Scheller said.

But to begin with, Scheller said business owners should evaluate their margins every month, not once a year.

“You need to know ahead of time, ‘Hey, we’re starting to get out of our comfort zone,’” she said.

“The goal would be to recognize that you’re running out of runway before you get to the end of it and have to go try and get a loan,” Scheller said.

Dimmit County Sheriff arrested by Texas Rangers on 3 felony charges

Felony charges of stalking, tampering with a witness and tampering with evidence led to the arrest of Dimmit County Sheriff Marion Boyd by Texas Rangers, according to court documents.

Boyd, 41, was taken into custody Wednesday and the charges stem from three incidents last year, records obtained by KSAT 12 Defenders show.

On Aug. 16, Boyd is accused of coercing a witness of a motor vehicle crash to stop his investigation, in an attempt to “delay or discontinue the prosecution of another,” the documents state.

In the second charge, Boyd is accused of tampering with physical evidence on Aug. 14.

Just a few months prior, on April 3, Boyd allegedly sent explicit images of another man’s genitals to a woman, causing her to feel “harassed, annoyed, alarmed, abused, tormented, embarrassed or offended.”

Each of the charges is listed as a third-degree felony with a bond amount of $7,500 each in the court documents.

The Texas Department of Public Safety confirmed to the Uvalde Leader-News that there is an active investigation into Boyd’s charges.

“As this is an active and ongoing investigation by the Rangers, no additional information is available at this time,” DPS officials said.

KSAT 12 reached out to DPS and the sheriff’s office for further details but did not hear back by this publication.

Boyd has served as sheriff since 2013, and his term was set to end in 2024, according to the Uvalde newspaper.

As of Thursday, the sheriff’s web page appears to have been removed from the county’s website.

With Boyd in custody, it’s unknown who is running the sheriff’s office and the jail in the meantime, the newspaper reports.

Boyd has served in law enforcement for nearly 22 years and is also a former county constable.

Nearly three years ago, Boyd faced scrutiny by the Texas Commission on Jail Standards after its executive director questioned his practice of allowing inmates’ families to visit them while working at outdoor job sites, according to the Uvalde Leader-News.

Boyd defended the practice, claiming the inmates that were allowed to see their families weren’t “high risk” and that he and his deputies knew some of the inmates personally.

The Dimmit County jail and county seat are in Carrizo Springs, located about a 2-hour drive south of downtown San Antonio on Interstate 35. The county is about 50 miles east of Eagle Pass and the U.S.-Mexico border.

Read more on KSAT:

Two Live Oak police officers resign amid investigation into sexual relationships

‘Aladdin’, ‘Hairspray’ & ‘Hadestown’ Broadway tours coming to Majestic Theatre for 2022-2023 season

The Majestic Theatre has announced its lineup of Broadway shows for the 2022-2023 season.

Disney’s “Aladdin,” “Hadestown,” Harper Lee’s “To Kill A Mockingbird,” “Ain’t Too Proud – The Life & Times of the Temptations ” and “Pretty Woman: The Musical“ will make their San Antonio premieres in the upcoming season.

The season opens in September with “Hadestown.”

Here’s the full list of shows and dates:

HADESTOWN , September 13-18, 2022AIN’T TOO PROUD – THE LIFE AND TIMES OF THE TEMPTATIONS, October 11-16, 2022DR. SEUSS’ HOW THE GRINCH STOLE CHRISTMAS! THE MUSICAL! , November 29-December 4, 2022PRETTY WOMAN: THE MUSICAL, January 10-15, 2023DISNEY’S ALADDIN, February 7-12, 2023HAIRSPRAY, March 7-12, 2023Harper Lee’s TO KILL A MOCKINGBIRD, May 2-7, 2023Riverdance 25th Anniversary Show, June 9-11, 2023

Season tickets are available at the Majestic Theatre box office located at 224 E. Houston Street. You can get more information online or by calling Broadway in San Antonio at (210) 226-3333.

Gas prices are soaring. Here’s how to stretch your gallon and dollar.

Gas prices continue to rev up, and drivers are feeling the drain in their wallets.

“Prices are going up, escalating — a whole lot,” said Mytrais Beasley, who was filling her tank for a road trip.

The average price of gas Thursday afternoon in San Antonio was $3.33 a gallon, according to Gasbuddy.com.

“Oh my gosh, they’re crazy,” said Marilyn Rodriguez, who just pumped $40 into a car to get a little more than a half of a tank. “It’s crazy.”

In the past week, the average price of gas locally soared 20 cents a gallon. It’s the most drivers have paid for gasoline since the summer of 2014.

At some stations, prices were making noticeable leaps overnight. One station in Leon Valley suddenly raised the price by 26 cents a gallon.

Drivers are taking note and action.

Aaron Lopez is now driving his diesel car and parking his pickup.

“I’ve got an F-250, and I don’t want to fill that up,” he said. “With this, I get better gas mileage.”

That’s even though diesel was $3.99 gallon.

There are ways to make a tank of gas last a little longer. Experts say start with your car. Proper maintenance such as clean air filters and regular oil changes can optimize fuel economy.

Next, get out the tire gauge. Tires that do not have enough air pressure create drag and waste fuel.

When you buy gas, shop around. As the oil market is volatile, gas prices will fluctuate wildly. Thursday afternoon, there was a 70-cent a gallon difference between the highest and lowest prices.

Use a gas app such as GasBuddy, Waze, GasGuru or AAA to help you locate the lowest prices near you. Some stations offer cash discounts or loyalty programs.

Premium fuels are flirting with $4 a gallon. Automotive experts say unless your car requires premium grade fuel, go for the regular.

And how you drive matters. High speeds, sudden braking and jack-rabbit starts are gas guzzling habits.

ALSO ON KSAT.COM

Gas prices in San Antonio up nearly 24 cents in just one week, AAA data shows

Families can order more free COVID-19 tests from the government this week. Here’s how.

Although COVID-19 cases are on a steady decline nationwide, the federal government will have more free at-home testing kits available for all this week.

U.S. households will be able to order four more testing kits though Covidtests.gov, free of charge, according to federal officials.

A set date on when to order more tests hasn’t yet been released. However, you can keep tabs on the ordering process here.

This announcement came Tuesday during President Biden’s State of the Union address as part of his new antiviral initiative. Biden’s administration is also planning on having 1 million of the antiviral pills from Pfizer available and ready for use in April.

According to the Associated Press, the pill can reduce the risk of hospitalization from COVID-19 by 90%.

More than 270 million free tests were sent to nearly 70 million households when Biden launched the initiative on Jan. 19 in the midst of the omicron surge, according to the AP.

The COVID-19 tests shipped out within 7-12 days of ordering.

Health officials recommend anyone who is experiencing symptoms of COVID-19 to use an at-home test at least five days after coming in close contact with someone who has tested positive.

More on KSAT:

Biden outlines COVID plans, says it’s time to return to work