The hunt for a gunman suspected of killing five people in Texas and a sixth in Pennsylvania ended with his arrest in New York state.
Paul Devoe III, 43, surrendered after a brief standoff Monday on New York’s Long Island, authorities said. He had a handgun with him but no one was injured during the arrest.
Devoe was charged in Texas in the death of Paula Griffith, an ex-girlfriend and one of four people found shot to death Sunday in a home near Austin. Detectives also found the bodies of Griffith’s 15-year-old daughter; 17-year-old Danielle Hensley; and Griffith’s boyfriend, 48-year-old Jay Feltner, according to an arrest warrant affidavit.
Devoe also was charged with killing a bartender in Marble Falls, Texas, on Friday and with unlawful flight to avoid prosecution, Supervisory Deputy U.S. Marshal Hector Gomez said.
He was to be arraigned Tuesday’s in New York’s Suffolk County.
A vehicle found in the driveway where Devoe was arrested in Shirley, N.Y., about 60 miles east of New York City, led investigators to connect him to the sixth victim. The vehicle had Pennsylvania license plates belonging to an 81-year-old woman in Greencastle, Pa., who was found shot in the head, according to the marshals. Pennsylvania State Trooper Edward S. Asbury identified her as Betty Jane Dehart, 81, who lived alone.
Suspect confesses to his momAt the Pennsylvania crime scene, authorities found a vehicle registered to one of the four victims from the Texas home.
Pennsylvania authorities were still deciding what charges are warranted there, Asbury said.
“I guess the question we have is, ‘Why?”’ Asbury said. “Her home is off the beaten path. It is visible from (Interstate) 81 but not readily accessible.”
Before his arrest, Devoe is alleged to have called his mother in New York state using Feltner’s cell phone and told her he had killed five people, the warrant affidavit said.
Larry Faulkner, Paula Griffith’s former common-law husband, told authorities that Devoe had dated Griffith for about three months a couple of years ago.
The Austin-area home is in a rural subdivision close to Jonestown.
“It’s unnerving and scary,” said neighbor Brenda Sies, 50, who lives near the house but said she didn’t see or hear anything unusual over the weekend. “Everybody is very sad and worried that a murder can take place when we’re within a couple of hundred feet.”