An arrest affidavit describes a crisis call, a struggle over a handgun and the suspect’s statement to officers after his detention.

CORPUS CHRISTI, Texas — A 20-year-old man has been charged with murder in the death of his 47-year-old father after police said the elder man was fatally shot while sleeping inside a home on Greenwich Drive. Officers detained Markus Xavier Benavidez outside the residence late July 13 after responding to a 911 call reporting the shooting.

The charge stems from a sequence described in an arrest affidavit, police reports and accounts from local news organizations that obtained the court document. The records identify the victim as Markus Benavidez and describe a family member’s concerns about the younger Benavidez in the period before the shooting. The witness told investigators that he had recently been hospitalized and had been experiencing hallucinations and symptoms described as related to drug withdrawal. About an hour before the shooting, according to the affidavit, she contacted a crisis hotline after he said he was not feeling right. Those statements are part of the police account and have not been tested in court.

The Corpus Christi Police Department said officers were dispatched to the 3500 block of Greenwich Drive at 11:32 p.m. July 13 after receiving a report of a shooting. According to the affidavit, the caller told dispatchers that her son had shot her husband. Police said officers arrived and found the younger Benavidez outside the residence, near an open garage and a white SUV. Officers held him at gunpoint until additional personnel arrived, then took him into custody. The department’s initial public statement said a suspect matching the description provided in the call was detained at the scene and that investigators considered the episode isolated.

Inside the home, officers found the elder Benavidez on a bed, according to the affidavit. One officer checked him for signs of life and found no pulse. Emergency medical personnel later pronounced him dead at the scene. The Nueces County Medical Examiner’s Office identified him as Markus Benavidez, 47. Corpus Christi police later confirmed publicly that the victim was the father of the 20-year-old suspect. Authorities have not publicly described a motive, and the available records do not establish why the shooting occurred.

The witness’s account places the events leading to the shooting inside the home over the course of the evening. She told investigators that the younger Benavidez had recently returned from a hospital stay and had been behaving unusually. After the elder Benavidez went to a bedroom to sleep, she remained awake with her son in another part of the house, according to the affidavit. She reported seeing him nod and look toward the ceiling in a manner that made her believe he was reacting to something she could not see or hear. The affidavit recounts those observations as the witness described them; it does not independently establish what the younger Benavidez was experiencing.

The witness told detectives that the younger Benavidez eventually entered the bedroom where his father was sleeping and began going through drawers. She said he removed a handgun from a nightstand. Accounts of the affidavit say she tried to intervene by grabbing his arms. She reported hearing gunfire during the struggle, with published descriptions varying slightly on whether she initially heard one shot or one to two shots before additional gunfire. Police found the victim in the bedroom afterward. The differences in the secondary accounts do not change the central allegation that investigators say the younger Benavidez obtained the handgun while his father was asleep and that shots were fired during the confrontation.

Investigators collected physical evidence as they processed the residence. Police reports and the affidavit say officers recovered a firearm and a bullet from the bedroom, while crime scene personnel documented the location. The younger Benavidez was also tested for gunshot residue, according to local reporting on the affidavit. Authorities have not publicly released laboratory results from that testing or a complete forensic report. The available documents likewise do not provide a final reconstruction of every shot fired, and police have continued to describe the homicide investigation as active.

The affidavit also describes what happened after officers detained Benavidez. Police advised him of his Miranda rights shortly before midnight, according to reports based on the document. He declined to answer investigators’ questions and asked for an attorney. As officers were placing him into a patrol vehicle, however, investigators say he made a spontaneous statement: “I did what I did.” Detectives later attempted to interview him at the police department’s Main Station, but he again declined to give a statement, according to KRIS and KIII. The reported remark is an allegation contained in the investigation and should not be read as a court finding or a substitute for proof of the murder charge.

Public reporting shortly after the arrest gave differing descriptions of Benavidez’s bond status. KIII reported July 14 that a judge had set bond at $1 million. Law&Crime reported the following day that he was being held in the Nueces County Jail without bond. The publicly available reports reviewed for this story do not explain the difference, which could reflect a later court action, differing database information or the timing of the reports. No inference can be made from the discrepancy about the merits of the charge. A criminal charge is an accusation, and Benavidez is presumed innocent unless proven guilty in court.

The police department’s first announcement was more limited than the later affidavit reporting. It said officers had responded to a shooting, found a deceased male with a gunshot wound and detained a suspect at the scene. Detectives from the Criminal Investigations Division were called to take over the case, and both a witness and the suspect were taken to the Main Station for formal interviews. Police identified the suspect publicly as Markus Benavidez, 20, and said he was arrested on a murder charge. The department said the people involved knew one another and stressed that investigators regarded the shooting as an isolated event rather than an ongoing threat to the surrounding neighborhood.

The later release of details from the arrest affidavit added the family relationship and the reported events inside the home. It also placed the crisis-hotline call roughly an hour before the shooting, a detail that gives investigators a clearer chronology but does not itself explain the killing. Authorities have not publicly announced that any medical condition, substance use, withdrawal symptom or reported hallucination caused the shooting. Those matters remain part of a witness’s account of the hours and days preceding the death. No publicly reviewed record establishes a legal defense based on the reported behavior, and no such determination can be made from an arrest affidavit alone.

The elder Benavidez’s obituary described him as a Corpus Christi native who took pride in providing for his family and maintained lasting friendships through his work. It said he enjoyed fishing and cooking and placed particular value on time spent with relatives. The obituary listed his wife, parents, sisters, daughters, son, son-in-law, grandson and other relatives among his survivors. That account provides a fuller picture of the victim beyond the criminal case, while the investigation focuses on the circumstances of his death. He was born Sept. 25, 1978, and died July 13, 2026, at age 47.

Police have not publicly released a detailed motive, a complete forensic analysis or a final investigative report. The department has asked anyone with information about the shooting to contact its Criminal Investigations Division and has said the case remains active. Searches of publicly available reports through Aug. 22 did not identify a later disposition of the murder charge. The next stages of the case will depend on court proceedings and any additional evidence filed by prosecutors or the defense.

Author note: Last updated August 22, 2026.