Authorities reconstructed the suspect’s flight through a neighborhood after two brothers were mortally wounded outside their family’s home.
SAN ANTONIO, Texas — As deputies treated two brothers who had just been shot outside their home, the man investigators say opened fire was moving through the surrounding neighborhood, calling 911, appearing on doorbell video and eventually hiding in a stranger’s backyard, authorities said.
That trail became a central part of the investigation against Daniel Antonio Perez, 40, who is charged with two counts of capital murder in the deaths of Maliki Perales, 11, and Drayvn Quiroz, 20. Bexar County Sheriff Javier Salazar said Perez called emergency dispatchers after the Aug. 4 shooting and acknowledged shooting his neighbors but did not tell authorities where he was. Deputies instead used his cellphone signal to locate him roughly a quarter-mile from the 9800 block of Acadian Drive. Investigators later recovered a handgun from a drainage culvert several houses from the scene.
The search unfolded quickly because deputies were responding to two urgent problems at once. At the victims’ home, Maliki and Quiroz had been critically wounded by gunfire shortly after 7:30 p.m. Elsewhere in the neighborhood, officers were looking for an armed man who had left the shooting scene on foot. Salazar said Perez was located and taken into custody roughly 10 minutes after the gunfire. Authorities said deputies found him in the backyard of a residence that was not his home and ordered him to surrender at gunpoint. No additional exchange of gunfire was reported during the arrest.
Investigators say the sequence began across the street from where it ended. According to the sheriff, the brothers were moving their family’s vehicle in the driveway when Perez came from his residence on the opposite side of Acadian Drive and opened fire. Both brothers were struck multiple times, authorities said. Maliki died that night after being taken for emergency treatment. Quiroz remained alive into the next morning but died shortly before Salazar addressed reporters at a news conference. The Bexar County Medical Examiner’s Office identified the victims, and Maliki’s death was ruled a homicide.
Detectives also began gathering video from the neighborhood. KSAT reported that doorbell-camera footage captured Perez approaching another residence and making statements that appeared to suggest he believed someone was trying to kill him. Salazar said investigators found no evidence supporting a claim that the brothers had threatened Perez or initiated a confrontation. The sheriff described the attack as unprovoked based on the evidence available at the time. Video evidence can establish movement and capture statements, but its ultimate meaning will be determined alongside other evidence as the criminal case moves forward.
The physical evidence described by authorities included the handgun recovered from the culvert. Salazar said investigators believed Perez discarded the weapon after leaving the victims’ home. Authorities have not publicly released a complete forensic report tying every recovered item to every shot alleged in the charging documents. The gun’s location nevertheless became important to the sheriff’s public account because investigators viewed the act of abandoning it, followed by Perez’s effort to hide, as evidence of deliberate conduct after the shooting. Those conclusions remain part of the prosecution’s developing case rather than findings reached by a jury.
The 911 call added another source of evidence. Salazar said Perez told dispatchers he had shot his neighbors, but deputies still had to determine his location. Cellphone data then guided them toward the backyard where he was found. That sequence distinguishes the call from a conventional surrender in which a suspect remains at the scene or tells officers where to find him. “It’s not like he confessed and told us and laid down,” Salazar said in the sheriff’s account reported by KSAT. Deputies, he said, still had to locate Perez and issue commands at gunpoint before taking him into custody.
While investigators followed Perez’s path, detectives were also reconstructing what happened at the Perales home. Salazar said two other siblings, a 14-year-old boy and a 17-year-old girl, were near the front door and were also fired upon. Neither was hit. Those allegations contributed to additional aggravated assault counts. Court records reported by KSAT list Perez as facing two capital murder charges, one charge of aggravated assault causing serious bodily injury and four counts of aggravated assault with a deadly weapon. He is being held on total bonds of $2.3 million, according to those records.
The evidence gathered after the shooting has taken on added significance because investigators have not announced a conventional motive such as an ongoing feud, financial conflict or prior physical confrontation. Salazar said authorities knew of no history of trouble between Perez and the family across the street. The victims’ father, Andrew Perales, similarly told local media that his family did not have enemies and regularly helped others in the neighborhood. He said the shooting erupted while he was ordering food and after family members had asked for the vehicle to be repositioned in the driveway, underscoring what relatives described as the ordinary circumstances immediately before the attack.
Investigators also learned from Perez’s relatives that he had experienced previous mental health concerns, Salazar said. Family members described depression and episodes that they believed involved seeing things that were not there. Authorities said those concerns had not previously been reported to law enforcement, and no verified public record reviewed for this article establishes a formal diagnosis explaining Perez’s conduct on Aug. 4. The sheriff described an apparent crisis while also emphasizing that mental health questions and criminal responsibility are separate legal issues. A court, not investigators speaking at a news conference, will ultimately decide issues of responsibility if they are litigated.
Salazar connected that issue directly to the evidence collected during the manhunt. He argued that discarding the gun and concealing himself demonstrated an ability to take purposeful actions after the shooting. “While clearly there’s some sort of a mental health crisis going on, he still had the presence of mind and the culpable mental state to go conceal the weapon somewhere and then go conceal himself somewhere else,” Salazar said. The sheriff’s statement represents the investigative position. It is not a substitute for a medical evaluation, a legal ruling on mental capacity or a verdict on the capital murder allegations.
The human consequences were unfolding at the same time investigators were building that evidentiary timeline. Maliki died on the night of the attack. Quiroz died the next morning. Their father later described sons who worked and spent time with family, recalling barbecues and movie nights rather than neighborhood conflict. He said Quiroz had worked with him in the family’s business. Salazar said the household was known for helping and feeding people around the neighborhood. Two additional siblings survived the gunfire investigators say was directed toward them, leaving the same family at the center of both the homicide case and the surviving assault allegations.
Some facts remain unresolved. Authorities have not publicly established why Perez allegedly chose the brothers as targets. Statements he made after the shooting suggesting fear are part of the evidence, but Salazar said investigators did not find support for a self-defense account. Public reporting has not disclosed a final ballistics analysis, a complete set of witness interviews or the full contents of Perez’s 911 call. Those materials could become relevant as prosecutors determine how to present the case and defense attorneys evaluate the government’s evidence. Their absence from the public record means the known timeline is detailed but not complete.
Perez’s next court appearance was listed for Nov. 3, 2026, in records cited by local news outlets, with the proceeding described as a pre-indictment hearing. The capital murder and assault charges remain allegations. No report reviewed for this article established that prosecutors had made a final decision on whether to seek the death penalty. Until the case advances further, the cellphone trail, the 911 call, neighborhood video and recovered handgun remain pieces of an investigative reconstruction that began with gunfire outside one home and ended minutes later in a backyard several blocks away.
Author note: Last updated September 20, 2026.