Anger over a custody hearing turned into gunfire Tuesday afternoon, ending with two people dead and one wounded outside a Holbrook courthouse in northeastern Arizona. The mother and grandmother of the children in question were killed, and their grandfather is now facing murder charges.
A double homicide is rare in Holbrook, Navajo County Attorney Brad Carlyon said. He estimates the entire county sees three or four murders a year.
“It’s still shocking to the conscience in Navajo County,” he said.
The shooting began just after 5 p.m., Carylon said, after a judge decided to recognize an order from a New Mexico court granting temporary custody of the children to their mother. It was then that their paternal grandfather, Saloman Diaz, got a gun out of his car and killed the children’s mother and maternal grandmother in the parking lot.
Carylon said these murders have got him thinking about shootings across the country.
“It will make the news today, and tomorrow there will be another one and nobody will remember what happened in Holbrook, except for those who were there and those who were directly impacted by it,” Carylon said. “And the day after there will be another.”
The children were not present during the shooting.
