Las Vegas Review-Journal (Sunday)
Metro: Girl saw mom fatally stabbed
4-year-old told witness ‘daddy did it,’ cops say
Moments before police arrived at the Las Vegas apartment complex, a witness ran up to a 4-year-old girl in bloodstained clothes and asked who hurt the child’s mother.
“Daddy did it,” the girl replied, according to an arrest report for her father, the suspect in her mother’s death.
Court documents show that the woman, identified by the Clark County coroner’s office as Airadis Tablada D Rouville but named in arrest reports as Airadis Tablada D’Rouville, previously told police responding to a domestic violence report that she had broken up with 45-year-old Alfredo Zuniga-Escobar around January. Five months later, Zuniga-Escobar fatally stabbed her, an arrest report states.
Officers were called about 6 p.m. on June 7 to Zuniga-Escobar’s apartment in the 2800 block of South Eastern Avenue, near Sahara Avenue, after a report of someone bleeding, the Metropolitan Police Department has said. When officers arrived, they found Tablada D Rouville, 35, with stab wounds; she later died at Sunrise Hospital and Medical Center.
Also that same day, Tablada D Rouville’s mother called police to report her daughter and granddaughter missing. She said the two lived with her and hadn’t returned after leaving the home to take out some trash that morning, according to the arrest report.
She said Tablada D Rouville was wearing a bathrobe when she took out the trash. Her daughter was also wearing a robe when she was hospitalized, the arrest report states.
“After filing the missing persons report, she received a phone call from the granddaughter stating they were with daddy,” according to the report. “(The woman’s mother) stated Alfredo had been abusive, controlling, and had a previous documented
domestic battery report filed.”
Records show that the police event number referring to the missing persons report wasn’t created until 8:13 p.m., more than two hours after Tablada D Rouville was stabbed. The arrest report states that the woman’s mother said Tablada D Rouville and her daughter “went missing sometime in the morning hours,” but it was unclear what time the woman reported them missing.
Blood stains
Police found Tablada D Rouville and Zuniga-Escobar bleeding outside the apartment building. Their 4-yearold daughter was found “near both subjects with apparent blood stains on her clothing,” the report states.
Tablada D Rouville was hospitalized with stab wounds on her head and back, along with “apparent defensive wounds” on her hand. The coroner’s office ruled her death a homicide due to multiple stab wounds.
Zuniga-Escobar was taken to University Medical Center with “minor cuts,” according to his arrest report.
Police spoke to a witness who said a woman who “appeared to be covered in blood” was running from the apartment building, “trying to get away.”
“A male was running after her with a female child next to them covered in blood,” the report states. “The witness observed the male grab the female at the front entrance to the building and began holding her.”
During an interview with detectives, Zuniga-Escobar claimed that his ex-girlfriend had called him at 10 a.m. and asked to be picked up from a nightclub and that he picked up their daughter afterward.
Zuniga-Escobar said the two got into a fight, and “she got crazy and attacked him with a knife,” the report states. He claimed that he hadn’t stabbed Tablada D Rouville.
“Alfredo’s account of how he came in contact with Airadis and his child completely contradicted Airadis’s mothers statement,” the report said.
Previous domestic violence
An earlier arrest report for Zuniga-Escobar shows that on Feb. 25, police were called to a “domestic disturbance” between him and Tablada D Rouville at the woman’s apartment. Tablada D Rouville told officers she had dated the man for about seven years but had broken up with him “within the past two months.”
She said they were meeting to visit their daughter at a day care facility. But Zuniga-Escobar confronted Tablada D Rouville about their breakup, and the woman got into her car.
“Zuniga wanted to continue the argument and yelled at Tablada to exit the vehicle,” the report states. “When Tablada refused, Zuniga picked up a landscaping brick and threw it through the driver side window of the car.”
Zuniga-Escobar was arrested and booked into the Clark County Detention Center, but by the following day, he had been released after posting a surety bond on $3,000 bail, court records show.
He was charged with a felony count of assault constituting domestic violence with a deadly weapon and a misdemeanor count of domestic battery. The case is still open, and those charges will be heard along with the felony count of murder with a deadly weapon he faces in connection with Tablada D Rouville’s death, court records show.
Zuniga-Escobar remained in the detention center as of Thursday without bail, jail records show. A preliminary hearing in the case is scheduled for June 24.