The search for the brother of a woman fatally shot in San Gabriel ended with his arrest Thursday night in Riverside County, according to the Los Angeles Sheriff's Department.
Johnny Goins, 31, was detained by local authorities at a Moreno Valley shopping mall around 8:30 p.m. Los Angeles County deputies took him into custody and booked him for murder in the shooting death of his sister, Tanaya, 32, in an incident described by detectives as domestic violence.
She was shot in the apartment where she was raising her 12 year old son in the 5100 block of Rosemead Boulevard. Deputies responding to a call of shots fired found her already dead. The son was transported to a local hospital with a wrist injury determined not to be serious. How he had suffered the injury, investigators could not immediately say.
Family members gathered to mourn the loss, their pain all the more unbearable after it became apparent her brother had been identified as the suspected shooter.
"She didn't deserve to die like this. Not from her brother...This ain’t right," said a cousin.
It was not clear to neighbors how long the brother had been staying at the apartment. They knew more about the significant other who lived with Tanaya Goins in an apparently volatile relationship.
Neighbor Mary Espinosa, who lived across the courtyard, said she heard frequent arguments.
Three days ago, Espinosa said, Tanaya Goins threw his clothes at him outside the door and he went to another apartment.
Shortly after 6:30 a.m. Thursday, Espinosa said she heard Goins shouting. Shortly thereafter, neighbors heard three to four shots, and the voice of a man who was yelling.
Investigators determined the voice was that of the significant other, who remained at the scene — not the brother who left, and is believed to have taken the gun with him.
Arriving deputies also found the 12 year old son with an injury to his arm.
Espinosa said he was holding his wrist, shaken and praying for his mother.
The son went to the hospital, the injury determined to be not serious.
Tanaya Goins' mother showed a photo and shared a poignant epitaph.
"She was going to school to be a criminal investigator," her mother said. "She was just finishing up."
Photo Credit: Bobbie Eng