Victims’ stories
Families mourn Pam Johnson, Allie Barrow and Edward Magaña.
Pam Johnson was the glue that held her large family together, making them feel loved with frequent phone calls, notes and gifts. Allie Barrow was “an angel on earth,” as one friend describes her – young, fun and planning to get married soon. And Edward Magaña and his wife, who had grandchildren, were getting ready to enjoy their “golden years” together.
All three were killed in the past week, and police early Tuesday arrested parolee Jose Gilberto Rodriguez in the Cypress area. Law officials have said they expect to charge Rodriguez with three counts of capital murder.
Here’s a closer look at the victims of a deadly crime spree that frightened residents across the city.
Pam Johnson
Johnson was getting ready for a family reunion when she was killed in her Cypress home.
The second-youngest of six siblings, the 62-yearold was “the one that kept us all together, more connected,” said her sister, Tresa Arnold Wilkins — especially after their parents died.
Saturday would have been their mother’s 100th birthday, and all six siblings and their families planned to gather at a brother’s house in Mt. Enterprise in East Texas. Johnson had done all the work, her sisters said, from sending out handwritten invitations to ordering a 100th birthday cake.
“She’d bought hula hoops, bubbles, stuff for the kids,” said sister Peggy Bosse, who lives outside Fort Worth. “She was a kid at heart, anyway.”
Johnson had asked for a ride to the reunion because she didn’t trust her 2004 PT Cruiser to make the three-hour drive. Her oldest brother was trying to pick her up on Friday when he realized something was wrong.
“He called me on the road and said, ‘Hey, where’s Pam?’” Wilkins said. The lights were on inside her house, but she wasn’t answering the door. That wasn’t like her. “Something was not right.”
Johnson grew up in Victoria and had lived in the Houston area all her life. Mostly deaf from birth, she spoke and read lips, though she also used sign language.
Johnson stocked shelves at a Cypress-area Kroger, and Wilkins said most of the customers she helped at Kroger didn’t realize she was deaf until she spoke.
“She didn’t want people to feel sorry for her,” Wilkins said. “She just wanted to be treated like an equal.”
Johnson had lived alone in her Cypress home since her husband of 24 years died in 2009. George Johnson was “a car guy” who restored old trucks, Wilkins said, and Johnson developed a love for antiquelooking cars. “When the PT Cruiser came out, she said ‘I want one of those.’”
She was deeply involved in the Mormon church, her family said, and she had good neighbors and a circle of friends who cared about her. At home, she loved watching movies on the Hallmark channel and had a craft room full of paper and scrapbook supplies.
Last weekend, the day after police found her body, Johnson’s family still got together in Mt. Enterprise for the weekend reunion she had planned.
“It didn’t end up being the celebration we intended on it being,” Wilkins said. “But we were together, and that brought a lot of peace.”
Allie Barrow
One friend described Allie Barrow as “an angel on earth.”
“She was just so beautiful inside and out, and she did not deserve this,” Miranda Eason said.
Barrow was gunned down Saturday where she worked, at a Mattress Firm near Willowbrook Mall. Her body was left wedged between two mattresses.
The week before, she’d turned 28.
Barrow studied history at Sam Houston State University, then trained to be a licensed hair stylist at Houston’s Aveda Institute. But after completing her training, she’d decided that salon work wasn’t for her, Eason said, so about a year ago, Barrow got a job at the Willowbrook Mattress Firm.
Her longtime boyfriend worked for the company as well; they were planning to marry soon. In fact, Eason said, Barrow had made a date with a friend last week to shop for a wedding dress.
Barrow had a large circle of friends, Eason said. She was funny and always told the people she loved how much she cared about them and how beautiful they were.
“It’s so heartbreaking.” Eason said. “She didn’t deserve it. All she did was love and care.”
Edward Magaña
Magaña, a 57-year-old father of four, was fatally shot Monday afternoon as he worked at a Mattress One store in north Houston. His wife said she was just coming home from work when she got the call that her husband had been killed.
Family members set up a GoFundMe page Tuesday to raise money for Magaña’s funeral expenses. It includes a message from his wife, Martha Granillo.
Now that their kids were grown with children of their own, she wrote, “we were in the middle of just enjoying our golden years next to one another.”
“But now, instead of planning that trip or that cruise we always discussed, I am left to plan a funeral service,” Granillo wrote.
The widow, in an interview with KTRK, said “I’m missing him right now, but I’m praying to be strong because my kids are here.”
Magaña, who came to the United States from El Salvador years ago, had worked several jobs over the years. His chosen profession was teaching, said his son, Raul, but he was a “jack of all trades” who also had worked as an Uber driver and a salesman.
He’d been at Mattress One for only a few weeks.
Magaña liked to tell his kids stories about his life during long talks on the patio, his son said.
“He was a good dad,” Raul Magaña. “(He) gave us all kids advice on life and how to live it.”
Magaña’s family is working on funeral arrangements, but on Tuesday they were still trying to process what happened.
“It’s so weird,” daughter Paola Morales told KHOU. “I’m just waiting for him to walk through the door.”