A paroled man was arrested and charged with killing a 38-year-old mother with a machete and a concrete block, according to the sheriff of Texas. These charges came after an “exhaustive manhunt.”
There is a murder charge against Richard Tanner Ozment. As of Thursday morning, September 26, his online booking records show that he was being held at the McLennan County Jail.
Michaela Brooker was “very badly injured” but still alive when McLennan County officers went to the address in China Spring, Texas. Ozment had been living with his parents next door since getting parole, Sheriff Parnell McNamara said at a press conference that KCENNews streamed.
People got a copy of the criminal complaint, which says the mother was flown to Baylor Scott & White Medical Center in Temple, Texas, where she died after having “extensive injuries, mainly to her head.”
When he spoke to the press, McNamara said, “This is one of the most horrible, horrible, brutal, senseless attacks we have seen in a long time.” There was no reason for it to happen.
González-Núñez said Ozment had been given a 40-year prison term for a previous crime and had served about 10 years before being released on parole three months ago.
Ozment was charged with several counts of burglary in 2014. According to online court records from McLennan County, he gave up his right to a jury hearing and pleaded guilty. He was given a 40-year prison term in 2015.
People called the Texas Department of Criminal Justice to confirm when he would be released from jail, but they didn’t get back to us in time for publication.
“It makes no sense when someone gets out of jail early like this and then commits this kind of crime,” McNamara said of the killing on Saturday, September 21.
It was said that Ozment’s mother found her son “standing outside” and “very sweaty” on Saturday morning.
According to the complaint, Sandra Ozment tried to walk past him but he “stepped in front of her and wouldn’t let her pass.” After she pushed past him anyway, she “reported seeing a human foot lying on the ground behind an RV on the property.” (At the news conference, the sheriff made it clear that Brooker’s foot had not been cut off.)
The complaint says that she yelled, “What have you done?” and that his mother then went “into the house yelling and barricaded herself until responders arrived.”
According to the complaint, her husband called 911 even though Ozment had told his father not to. When police came, they “found a person outside the house fleeing the scene.”
An all-agency manhunt began after 9 a.m. and finished around 5:45 p.m., according to McNamara. It included a helicopter and tracking dogs.
McNamara says that an officer riding a horse found Ozment hiding by a stock tank and underwater about 100 yards from the crime scene.
At the news conference, Deputy Falcón said, “We were horseback riding along the tank when I could see from his neck area to the top of his head.” He also said that he saw Ozment, hiding under a tree branch in the water, “when he shook his head and the water splattered.”
“At that moment, I told him to stay still until we got police,” Falcón said, adding that Ozment “tried to submerge his head back in there,” but Falcón told him with a gun to stay above water while the SWAT team surrounded him.
In a GoFundMe page set up to help Brooker’s kid, friends and family said that the “loved mother” had been “a victim of a senseless act of violence.”
The sheriff told the press on September 23 that Ozment and Brooker “knew each other,” but he didn’t say much else about their meetings and didn’t know why Brooker was in the area. People asked McNamara for more information about the case on Thursday, but he didn’t answer.
He said he had “no idea” what made the attack happen.
The sheriff said that the machete that was reportedly used in the attack had been found and that Ozment’s parents had been helpful.
The sheriff said that Ozment had been charged with sexual assault as a child, but he didn’t know any more details about the case.
D.A. Josh Tetens told PEOPLE that Ozment has not pleaded guilty to the charges and that the case does not yet have a court date.
Ozment’s lawyer, Bryan C. Cantrell, could not immediately reach for comment.