Police say the suspect surrendered soon after the shooting, and the case now stands on a guilty plea.
COLUMBUS, Neb. — What began as an emergency call to a Walmart parking lot in Columbus is now nearing its final court phase after Manuel Mesa-Cabrera admitted killing the man police identified as his stepfather during a May 2025 shooting outside the store.
The case still carries the force of its setting: a fatal family shooting in a public commercial lot during evening hours, followed by a quick surrender and a yearlong move through the criminal system. Police identified the victim as 42-year-old Anhil David Mirabal Hernandez. Court reporting later showed Mesa-Cabrera, now 26, pleaded guilty to second-degree murder and a weapons charge, setting up a sentencing hearing later this month.
Police said officers were dispatched at about 6:20 p.m. on May 27, 2025, to the Walmart at 818 E. 23rd St. Capt. Doug Molczyk said that when officers arrived, they found a man on the ground with what appeared to be a gunshot wound to the chest. Officers began rendering aid until Columbus Fire Department medics arrived. Hernandez was then taken to Columbus Community Hospital, where he later died. Early local reports placed the shooting near the store on East 23rd Street, a location widely used by shoppers and commuters in Columbus. That setting gave the first phase of the case a public-safety dimension even before police established the relationship between the dead man and the suspect. Authorities did not announce any other injuries, and available public summaries do not describe a broader threat continuing after the shooting.
The next key development came quickly. Police said Manuel Alejandro Mesa Cabrera turned himself in shortly after the shooting at the Columbus Police Department. During the investigation, officers learned that Hernandez was his stepfather. Mesa-Cabrera was arrested and booked into the Platte County Detention Facility on charges of first-degree murder and use of a firearm to commit a felony. In the days that followed, the case moved from emergency response to homicide investigation. Later reporting based on an arrest affidavit added allegations that the encounter at Walmart had been arranged by Mesa-Cabrera, who asked Hernandez to help look for a vehicle part. Prosecutors later said that once the two were parked, Mesa-Cabrera used a 9 mm Smith and Wesson handgun to shoot Hernandez in the chest and head. The public summaries now available do not fully describe what witnesses saw in the lot or whether security footage captured the entire encounter.
The Walmart setting remained one of the most striking parts of the case because it framed the killing as both intimate and public. Police said the suspect and victim were relatives, yet the shooting happened at a large retail location rather than in a private residence. That combination shaped how the case was first understood in Nebraska coverage. Broadcasters reported the victim’s name, his age, and the suspect’s family link early in the investigation, giving the story a human and local focus instead of leaving it as an anonymous police blotter item. As more records surfaced, local coverage described prosecutors’ view that the killing had been planned in the days before it happened and that the gun had been legally purchased about two weeks earlier. Those later details suggested that the public scene at Walmart was not random in prosecutors’ telling, but part of a deliberate setup.
The legal path shifted in March 2026. Court reporting said Mesa-Cabrera pleaded guilty to second-degree murder and a weapons charge. That plea replaced the earlier first-degree murder posture and moved the case away from the prospect of a full trial. News coverage available to the public does not detail all negotiations behind the agreement, and it does not say whether prosecutors dropped any other allegations in exchange for the plea beyond amending the homicide count. An affidavit cited by local outlets also said Mesa-Cabrera had previously been diagnosed with schizophrenia and was not taking medication or seeing a doctor at the time. Public reporting so far does not show a court ruling treating that diagnosis as a defense, but it could still become part of the sentencing discussion as attorneys argue aggravating and mitigating factors.
There is also the question of what the community will hear next. Sentencing, reported as set for April 30, may offer the fullest public account yet of what happened before the shooting, how prosecutors assessed intent, and how Hernandez’s family describes the loss. A hearing could also clarify whether the state will emphasize planning evidence, the public setting of the killing, or the vulnerability created by the alleged request for help with a vehicle part. Until then, some details remain unsettled in public view, including whether anyone in the parking lot witnessed the entire attack and whether family members other than the defendant and victim played any role in the events leading up to it.
The case remains defined by that first 911 call and everything that followed from it. The next formal step is April 30, when the court is expected to sentence Mesa-Cabrera on the charges he has already admitted.
Author note: Last updated April 13, 2026.