Mom, aunt among alleged Texas gunman's 5 victims
Among the five victims slain during a shooting rampage in a town east of Dallas are the mother and aunt of the man arrested Tuesday as a suspect in the murders, according to his brother.
Charles Everett Brownlow Jr., 36, was arrested in a creek near a railroad track after leading police in a chase through the town of Terrell, 30 miles east of Dallas.
The five fatal shootings took place at four locations over almost six hours before the suspect was spotted by an off-duty officer.
His brother, Terrence Walker, told the Associated Press that Brownlow lived at their mother's home in the quiet North Central Texas town of 16,000 people.
He said his brother "always wanted to take something that wasn't his," and that their mother, Mary Brownlow, always put up with it.
"I was hoping my mom would open her eyes and realize that she needed to let him grow up, put him out," Walker said. He said his own family spent the night at a hotel instead of their home in Forney, and that he was armed with a pistol in case his brother came after him.
"We're all in a state of shock," Terrell Police Chief Jody Lay told reporters. "You have a tendency to think, 'How can that happen here?' This is a country community, a rural community, people are real close. This is going to be, it's going to have a really big impact on us."
Police have not announced specific charges against Brownlow or indicated a motive in the killings.
Public records show that Brownlow has an extensive criminal history, including previous charges of burglary, unlawful possession of a firearm and marijuana, and family violence.
The shootings began around 5 p.m. Monday when a gunman killed a woman with a single shot to the head at a Terrell home.
Thirty minutes later, authorities responded to a fire at Mary Brownlow's home two blocks away and found the body of a woman in the house. Police put out an alert for Brownlow after determining that his white Ford Focus was missing from the residence.
More gunfire was reported around 10 p.m. in yet another residential area by a suspect fitting Brownlow's description, Forney.com reports, although no one was injured at the scene.
A half-hour later, at the scene of one more shooting, police found a man and a woman dead and a 3-year-old child unharmed.
The final killing occurred about 10:37 p.m. after an off-duty police officer spotted the suspect and his car at a convenience store. Brownlow allegedly shot and killed a clerk before fleeing in his vehicle, leading a police chase past the first two crime scenes. Lay said he wrecked the car and ran into a heavily wooded area.
Contributing: The Associated Press