KANSAS CITY, Kan. — Even with the alleged shooter behind bars, one KCK family is still afraid.
“I remember just screaming ‘No! He’s a kid! What are you doing? What’re you doing?'” Berlin Baros said.
Loved ones continue to mourn a teen killed in Kansas City, Kansas, earlier this month. The 19-year-old was killed on Friday, Dec. 13, south of Central on 11th Street.
Elijio Daniel Gonzalez is being held in the Wyandotte County jail, charged in the deadly shooting. But when Gonzalez allegedly shot and killed his teenage daughter’s boyfriend, he was out on probation.
Now his ex-wife and children are concerned history might repeat itself.
Candles and pictures of 19-year-old Alberto Munoz Jr. line the KCK sidewalk where he was shot and killed. Berlin Baros and her three children watched it happen.
“It’s been horrible. I’ve never experienced nothing like this in my life,” Baros said.
Berlin’s ex-husband, 44-year-old Elijio Gonzalez, who goes by Daniel, showed up to pick up their kids on the 13th.
The family dynamics have been tumultuous for years. Berlin said he had made threats to kill her before, and she got a restraining order on him in 2015.
“I told him once there’s going to come one day, and there’s something you’re going to try to do against me, but you’re not going to be able to do it. I didn’t understand why I even told him that. But now I see why,” she said.
They split after Gonzalez had been in and out of prison on charges ranging from drugs to stalking, theft, fleeing, obstruction and being a felon with a gun.
Berlin came home on Dec. 13 to find Gonzalez in her yard.
“I just told him, ‘I’m tired. I’m tired of everything that has went on,'” Baros said.
She said her daughter’s boyfriend, Alberto Munoz, tried to diffuse the situation.
“I tried to make him leave, and he looked at me and he wouldn’t leave. I know he stayed because he was trying to protect us,” Baros said.
Berlin and her kids said Gonzalez pulled out a gun, allegedly shooting Munoz in the chest and kept shooting as he took off, with three of his kids standing there and two more of his children in the car.
“This man was not satisfied ’til he did this. I feel like he just wanted to destroy us as a family,” Baros said.
Gonzalez is now in jail, but he’s being held with a $250,000 cash or surety bond. Berlin knows his family has money and could help him get out.
Because Gonzalez also has past charges for failing to appear in court and violating probation, she’s worried if he is released, he’ll never own up to what happened.
“For Alberto, we need justice. I know it won’t bring him back. It won’t help what happened. But he’ll never be able to hurt anybody else,” Baros said.
The family said Munoz was a loving kid, with an amazing smile and infectious, goofy laugh who didn’t deserve what happened to him.
Gonzalez’s case is scheduled for a docket call at the Wyandotte County Courthouse on Tuesday.
