Authorities have arrested Raul Meza after he called the police and confessed to kἱlling not only a man in Pflugerville this month but also a woman in Austin in 2019, investigators announced Tuesday,30 May 2023.
Police said Meza, who received a 30-year sentence for kἱlling a girl in Austin in 1982, is a serial killer who might be involved in as many as 10 other homicides. Police said they have charged Meza in the death of 80-year-old Jesse Fraga in Pflugerville and in the death of Austin resident Gloria Lofton, 66, who was killed in May 2019.
At the time that Lofton died, her death was considered suspicious, police said. After Meza confessed to kἱlling her, police were able to match DNA from the scene to Meza, investigators said. Austin police said they also are investigating Meza in connection to eight to 10 other cold cases that have similarities to Meza’s other kἱllings, said Detective Katy Conner.
Meza called police on May 24 while he was being sought for the death of Fraga, Austin police said in a news conference Tuesday.
Meza told a detective on the phone-
“I got out (of prison) in 2016 and ended up murdeṟing a lady soon after, and it was on Sara Drive,” Detective Patrick Reed said.
When police arrested Meza on Monday, he told them he was-
“ready and prepared to kill again and looking forward to it,” said Reed.
When Meza was arrested, police said, he was on a bicycle and had a backpack with him containing duct tape, zip ties, and a .22-caliber gun, police said.
Police said investigators do not believe Meza is responsible for either of the recent deaths that have taken place near the Rainey Street entertainment district downtown. Two bodies have been found in Lady Bird Lake this year, but police have said there is no evidence of foul play in those deaths.
The U.S. Marshals Service’s Lone Star Fugitive Task Force arrested Meza in North Austin on Monday, according to Pflugerville police. Police discovered Fraga’s body on May 20 after receiving a check welfare call. They said Meza stole Fraga’s car but later abandoned it.
Fraga’s body was found with a belt around his neck, said Austin Police Detective Nathan Sexton at the news conference on Tuesday. The Travis County medical examiner found a puncture wound on Fraga’s neck and that his cervical spine had been severed, said Sexton.
Meza was convicted of murdeṟ in the sẹxual assault and strangling of 8-year-old Kendra Page in 1982 in Austin. He received a 30-year sentence. He later received another four-year sentence for having a weapon in prison.
Meza initially was released from prison in 1993 when the time he served plus additional time counted off for good behavior equaled the length of his sentence under the state’s mandatory supervision law, which has since been changed.
He was sent back to prison in 1994 for a parole violation and was then released in 2002.
Interim City Manager Bruce Mills said at the news conference that he helped investigate Page’s death in 1982 when he was a police detective.
“I remember it like it was yesterday,” Mills said. “Eight-year-old Kendra Page was found January 3 behind Langford Elementary School and she had been assaulted and murdeṟed.”
Police were disappointed that he never went to trial and then was released 11 years later, Mills said.
“Here’s a guy who probably should have spent the rest of his life in prison,” said Mills.
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Meza didn’t have any stable employment in the Austin area when he was arrested and his parole had expired, police said. Fraga, a retired Travis County probation officer, had known Meza since the 1990s and had tried to help him after he was released from prison, according to a lawsuit.
A search warrant said Meza had been Fraga’s roommate for two years but had moved out of Fraga’s house in the 700 block of Camp Fire Trail on May 12.