Victor Mata Villarreal had already shot at a Midland, Texas police officer two days before Friday’s rampage. He evaded capture, then struck again, leaving one dead and ten injured before dying in a standoff with police. It began two days before the massacre. Late Wednesday night, June 10, a Midland cop attempted to stop a vehicle along a local road. The car didn’t immediately pull over, it continued several blocks before stopping. Then the driver, Victor Mata Villarreal, got out, raised a rifle, and fired at the officer. The officer, uninjured, returned fire. Villarreal jumped back into his vehicle and fled. His car was found abandoned nearby. Despite an extensive search, he was not found.
On Friday morning, he was found, but on his own terms.
Around 8 a.m. local time, as officers and law enforcement from multiple agencies responded to reports of an active shooter in the 4600 block of West Wall Street, a stretch of highway running through southwest Midland, Villarreal, 45, of Odessa, opened fire on police and bystanders before barricading himself inside an abandoned veterinary clinic building.
Police Chief Greg Snow described officers being pinned behind their patrol vehicles before armored vehicles arrived to extract them from their positions.
“We then began moving through Highway 80 to see if there’s anybody trapped in their vehicles that we could get out of there. We moved to deny more targets to this active shooter, and then we secured the perimeter and began making a plan to get everybody safe,” Snow said.
Several officers exchanged gunfire with Villarreal. Those shootings are now under investigation. Highway 80 remains closed.
Mayor Lori Blong confirmed the suspect’s death was verified using drone and robot footage, tactics that kept officers out of the building during the final determination.
“My heart breaks for the victims and their families. We are praying for every person touched by today’s events and for the law enforcement officers who risked their own safety to protect our community,” Blong said.
Nine patients were transported to Midland Memorial Hospital. As of Friday afternoon, five had been discharged, three had completed surgeries, and one remained in the operating room. A tenth victim was transported to Odessa Medical Center Hospital. A city spokesperson could not confirm whether all ten injured victims had been shot, leaving open the possibility that some were injured in the chaos surrounding the scene.
Multiple agencies converged on West Wall Street: the Texas Department of Public Safety, Texas Rangers, the Lubbock County Sheriff’s Office SWAT team, and federal law enforcement. FBI Director Kash Patel announced that special agents and victim services personnel had been deployed from the El Paso field office.
The breadth of the response underscores a haunting question now consuming law enforcement: why, after Villarreal fired at a police officer Wednesday night, did he remain at large for 48 hours?
Midland Police had issued a public notice with Villarreal’s photo after the Wednesday incident, warning residents he was wanted for attempted capital murder of a peace officer. He was actively evading capture. On Friday, when officers moved to apprehend him, the confrontation turned into a mass casualty event.
“Our thoughts and prayers are absolutely with the victims, and with their families,” Mayor Blong said at a news conference.
Friday’s attack is the second mass shooting to strike the Midland–Odessa corridor in less than a decade. On August 31, 2019, gunman Seth Aaron Ator opened fire across both cities during an approximately one-hour spree, shooting motorists and pedestrians from a moving vehicle before hijacking a U.S. Postal Service truck. Seven people were killed and 25 injured before Ator was shot and killed by police outside a movie theater. That attack also began with a traffic stop in which Ator fired at a state trooper through his back window.
The parallel between the two events is striking: both began with gunfire aimed at law enforcement during a traffic encounter, both involved a shooter who fired at vehicles and bystanders on public roads, and both ended with the suspect dead. The 2019 shooting prompted calls for expanded background checks in Texas; state legislation that followed was modest in scope.
Authorities have not publicly named the person killed or confirmed the identities of those injured. No motive has been offered for either the Wednesday attack or Friday’s rampage. It remains unclear whether Villarreal had any specific targets or whether the shooting was indiscriminate. The investigation is ongoing, and Highway 80 remains closed as law enforcement continues processing the scene.
“We have no confirmed details on the victims,” Mayor Blong said.
