Friends say they are shocked over the shooting death of a Chula Vista man and the arrest of the victim's girlfriend on charges of first-degree murder.
A 30-year-old man was shot and killed the Pinnacle Apartments on Santa Rita near East Palomar Street in the Otay Ranch area of Chula Vista. Friends have identified the victim as Rayshaun Cole.
Melissa Hayes-Spencer, a U.S. Customs and Border Protection officer, was taken into custody and booked on first-degree murder charges.
Investigators say a 911 call at 8:47 a.m. alerted police to the shooting. Hayes-Spencer told the dispatcher that her boyfriend was hitting her and that she had shot him, according to Chula Vista Police.
Paramedics found her boyfriend on the bedroom floor with a gunshot wound to his chest, police said. The man died less than 20 minutes later.
Pastor Sam Wilson, Jr. said he was surprised to learn of the arrest because he saw only affection between the couple.
"That's what strikes me weird about this because whenever I saw them together and later on in his Facebook posts, and their lovingness together and it totally caught me by surprise," Wilson told NBC 7.
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Former neighbors say Hayes-Spencer was a very friendly, outgoing person.
However, they say there was a dark side to her relationship with her boyfriend that showed itself every couple of weeks and it was something neighbors couldn't ignore.
One woman who lived next to Hayes-Spencer heard loud arguments coming next door concerned her. Knowing Hayes-Spencer had a duty gun, the woman kept her children on the other side of her home. She moved away from the complex just last month.
