Grieving mother searches for justice in son’s killing
14 months after teen’s deadly shooting near his home, a suspect finally appears in court
Leticia DelBosque sat quietly on the 15th floor of the Harris County courthouse Friday, ignoring the chatter around her.
She sat head down, hands clasped, waiting to see the man who is accused of killing Delmar Nolasco, her 19-year-old son.
It has been 14 months since Nolasco called her as he was walking home from the park where he played basketball every day, telling her he was almost at the house.
Fourteen months since another call, 20 minutes later, that Nolasco had been shot, steps from her home on Terry Street in Near Northside.
Fourteen months since she rushed home and found him sprawled facedown outside their house, bleeding from his head, back and legs.
He is another fatality among the city’s rising body count, one of 275 that year. In 2020, more than 400 Houstonians were killed, an onslaught of new cases police have struggled to clear.
Dec. 11 plays over and over in her head.
Ever since Nolasco’s murder, DelBosque waited for his killer’s arrest. Seethed in anger. Doubted justice would come. Mourned her boy.
“I’m having a hard time not going after this kid,” she’d said, voice raw, days earlier, at a meeting for parents of murdered children. “Someone has to pay.”
He’d filled her with pride. He’d just turned 19. He was a new dad, to little Alyssa. She thought about how he played with the neighborhood dogs. How he delighted in playing basketball at the park near their house, marvelling at the view of the downtown skyline, snapping pictures.
Days before his death, he’d come home beaten and bruised, jumped by some boys from the neighborhood who accused him of stealing weed from them.
She’d torn out of the house looking for them, and when she found them, almost got into a fight with them herself. She’s unapologetic.
In the close-knit pocket of the Near Northside neighborhood, friends soon came calling. Many said Nolasco’s killer had posted about the shooting on social media.
DelBosque tried to get Nolasco’s friends to identify his shooter. None were willing. She called the detective handling the case, over and over, asking for news.
But even though the alleged shooter’s identity was common knowledge, days turned to weeks, weeks to months, and nothing seemed to be happening.
“It’s been letdown after letdown after letdown,” she said.
Only in October did things finally start to change.
A friend of Nolasco’s worked up the courage to go to the police, and identified the shooter.
It was a surprise, DelBosque said. “I didn’t think she’d do it,” she said.
Suspect arrested
In November police obtained an arrest warrant, but detectives couldn’t find the suspect.
She started looking herself, driving by the house where she believed he was staying, sending photographs and videos to detectives working the case. On Wednesday, she got a call. Police had arrested Elias Vidal, 18. He’d been charged with murder.
In court on Friday, DelBosque sat, filled with questions. Would prosecutors bring Vidal into court? Would she get to watch? Would he get bail? How had he managed to retain Dick DeGuerin, one of the city’s most famous defense attorneys?
Just after 10 a.m., a deputy let her and eight members of her family into the 262nd District Court, where Vidal stood facing Judge Lori Chambers Gray, as DeGuerin asked for a lower bail. Vidal wore an orange jumpsuit, his hair akimbo.
She sat, hunched in one of the narrow pews, joined by Nolasco’s dad, grandparents and older sister.
She watched, brow furrowed, and listened as DeGuerin told Gray that he was representing Vidal because the boy’s grandmother had worked for him as his housekeeper for years.
She listened as DeGuerin said police reports had shown trouble between Vidal and Nolasco: that Nolasco and DelBosque had attacked Vidal and a friend days before the murder, and that the day Nolasco died, he’d had a knife in his hand.
DelBosque disputes the context of those claims, however, and says the altercation with Vidal came after he and his friends beat up Nolasco. That he’d only had a knife because he’d just gotten beat up, days before.
“Four kids beat … my son,” she said. “Yeah, I went after (them).”
Gray listened, impassive, as a prosecutor described the killing and subsequent investigation.
Bail reduced
A few minutes later, the judge agreed to reduce Vidal’s bail slightly, to $75,000. She warned the teen: no drinking, no drugs, no weapons. If he was able to post bail, he’d have to wear an ankle monitor and agree to a curfew from 5 p.m. to 7 a.m. every day.
He signed some paperwork, and then a deputy ushered him away.
Moments later, DelBosque and her relatives filed out of the courtroom.
“That’s not bad,” said Enrique DelBosque, Leti’s brother. “$75,000 is still a lot.”
They drove to Terry Street, to the house where DelBosque used to live. They gathered by a waisthigh brown cross, adorned with Nolasco’s name.
It’s cemented into the asphalt so no one will knock it down, she said.
She paused, in the biting cold, thinking back to the last day she saw her son.
Nolasco had called at 3:13 p.m., telling her he was on his way. At 3:39 p.m., minutes after she’d left work — a rarity, since her days almost never ended early — she’d received a panicked call: get home, her son had been shot.
She crouched, and pointed at a divot a bullet had torn in the asphalt.
“He died right here,” she said.