The distraught son of a Daytona Beach woman killed by her estranged husband could barely contain his sobbing as he told a 911 dispatcher that his mother called him on his phone and he heard his father shoot her.
“My mom’s been shot. My father shot my mom,” the hysterical son told the 911 dispatcher.
Jacqueline Reyes, 44, was shot and killed in her Reena Drive home in Daytona Beach around 6:08 p.m. on July 27, Daytona Beach Police Chief Jakari Young said in a media briefing July 28.
Young said the woman had moved to Daytona Beach to get away from Robert Reyes Jr., 54, of St. Cloud, but Reyes sought out his estranged wife and “executed” her after learning she had started dating again.
Son: Mother screaming on the phone before she was fatally shot in Daytona Beach home
The son, who was calling from his wife’s phone, said in the 911 call that his mother called him and he heard her screaming before she was gunned down.
“I heard my mom call and I heard her screaming and I heard my dad say he was going to kill her and then I heard a gunshot, and I have not heard anything since,” the man said in the 911 call.
The man said he could hear that the phone line was open, but the room went silent.
“I don’t hear her. I heard a gunshot and then I heard a body drop. I am assuming she is dead,” a distraught Jacqueline Reyes’ son said in the 911 call.
Son: Parents divorced but father wanted his mother back
In trying to calm down the frantic son, the dispatcher told him not to think the worst and kept asking him to tell him more about his parents.
“Do they live together?” the dispatcher asked.
“No,” the son responded. “They are divorced for over a year but my dad has been trying to get her back.”
The son said his parents lived in separate homes and that his mother lived alone in her Daytona Beach home. Police said Reyes Jr. lived in St. Cloud.
The dispatcher asked the son if he could still hear the line open on his mother’s cellphone. The son said he could not hear anything on the open line.
The 911 caller said he and his wife were on their way to Daytona Beach from about an hour away.
“I don’t know if they are both dead. They are probably both dead. He probably shot himself,” the son told the 911 dispatcher.
Police Chief Young said Reyes Jr., wanted to carry out a murder-suicide in the Daytona Beach home, but a malfunctioning gun foiled his plan. Video surveillance showed Reyes Jr. trying to shoot himself, but the gun failed, so he fled, the chief said.
The chief said investigators believe Reyes Jr. used the same gun to take his own life in Titusville, where he tried to get away from police.
As the son talked with the dispatcher, he said it was the worst day of his life, after telling the dispatcher he feared his mother was dead.
“My mom was screaming, begging for her life, and I could hear my father talking and then I heard the gunshot,” the son said.
The dispatcher asked the son if his father had a gun.
“He has a pistol. I heard my mother say, ‘put down the gun’ and that’s when I heard the gun go off,” the son said.
Patricio G. Balona is a crime and public safety reporter covering Volusia County and occasionally Flagler County. His coverage areas include Daytona Beach, DeLand, Ormond Beach and beyond.
This article originally appeared on The Daytona Beach News-Journal: “My father shot my mom’: 911 call released in Daytona Beach murder
Reporting by Patricio G. Balona, Daytona Beach News-Journal / The Daytona Beach News-Journal
USA TODAY Network via Reuters Connect
By Patricio G. Balona, Daytona Beach News-Journal | USA TODAY Network
