“I’m feeling very unsafe. It does concern and alert me,” one witness said.
SAN ANTONIO — It was a weekend of fear and frustration for people who live just a few feet away from a southwest-side business police said is connected to two shootings on consecutive nights.
Sunday morning, a few minutes after midnight, the neighborhood was upset for hours during a shootout and standoff between San Antonio Police and a man detectives say shot at them.
“This has been a continuous issue. The day before the standoff there was a call for a shooting the night prior,” said Linna, who recorded cell phone video of police with guns trained on the location just a few feet from a bedroom window.
“We did start off with hearing the shooting,” Linna said. “The exchange between the detectives and the people.”
Her husband said they took immediate steps to get their children out of the line of fire.
“We woke them up and moved them to our room on the other side away from the windows and walls,” the man said. He adds that they recently moved into the area.
“You hear gunshots almost every night in this part of town but you don’t plan to see it in front of your face.”
He recorded video of the 28-year-old man on the ground after he was shot by a detective.
Police say they man refused to come out of the business for several hours.
Sgt. Washington Moscoso said police went to the business in the 5000 block of SW Military Drive to investigate a disturbance after nearby residents complained of constant upheaval.
“Our South SAFFE (San Antonio Fear Free Environment) officer started receiving complaints of this establishment back in November of 2024,” Moscoso said. “Adjacent to that location on the backside is two apartment complexes, so residents of those apartment complexes started calling out to police saying ‘Hey this is going on all hours of the night.’”
Moscoso said the disturbances would start up around 2:00 a.m. and then operate all the way through five or six in the morning, with complaints of illegal activities and gunfire.
“Some even said that there was like a fight club going on behind the establishment where they would have like a crowd of people and they’d have two combatants and then they had like a referee and if the fight went down to the ground they’d stop it, get them back on their feet and they have at it again,” Moscoso said.
Moscoso said some of the action was even posted on social media. “They’re not hiding it. They’re very brazen, they’re very blatant about it.”
Moscoso said Friday night into Saturday morning, specialty units investigated a shooting where there were no injuries.
“We made a couple of arrests, two that were in a vehicle and then the owner of the establishment was stopped in a different vehicle but he was arrested for some weapons charges,” Moscoso said.
Online records indicate 40-year-old Oscar Merlo was charged with unlawful possession of a firearm by a felon. He was later released from jail on a $20,000 bond.
With regard to the early Sunday morning shooting, Moscoso said officers went up to the door of the business.
“The officer went and knocked on the door and then right then is when there was some shots fired,” he said.
Moscoso said the suspect was wounded when a detective returned fire but none of the officers were injured.
Getting results for problems like this, Moscoso said, requires people to speak up.
“When you have complaints like this or any kind of concern that you have in your neighborhood or business call the police! We do react, we do respond,” Moscoso said.
Saying any place that exhibits a pattern of behavior can be the focus of not only SAFFE officers, but a more targeted effort by the city’s DART or Dangerous Assessment Response Team.
“This facility before this weekend had already been presented to the DART team, so they’re well aware of it and they have escalated this to a priority for DART,” Moscoso said.
A spokesman for the Texas Alcoholic Beverage Commission said they stand ready to assist SAPD but they have no direct involvement because the facility does not have a liquor license.
Moscoso said they are looking into allegations that the business has been providing alcohol, not only to adult patrons but to underage customers as well.
The people who listened to police try to coax the injured man out of the building for about three hours said relief can’t come soon enough.
“They told all the people to go out the front door but we did have five individuals who came out the back here, four that walked out and one that crawled out. He was the one that was shot,” Linna said.
Watching the man crawl across the parking lot to get access to medical care, Linna said, was difficult.
“By what I was told I guess they don’t have a permit for this property and everything that was going on there was very much unsafe and illegal” Linna said. “I’m feeling very unsafe. It does concern and alert me.”