BEXAR COUNTY, Texas – Oscar Villarreal had some demons in his past, but his family thought he was headed in a better direction.
The recovering heroin addict's family said he was a good man getting his life together. Now they're left to pick up the pieces after the 38-year-old husband and father of four was found shot multiple times, face-down in a pool of blood Wednesday night.
"No one deserves to die the way he died. It's a horrible death," said his sister, Diane Villarreal.
Villarreal's family spoke exclusively with KSAT12 the day after his death outside the West Side home where they last saw him.
"It just hurts that he's not here no more, and he's not coming back," his sister said.
Villarreal's sister said he had told his wife he was walking to the store. He never came back. Instead, Bexar County sheriff's deputies found his body more than 14 miles away, in the 14200 block of Quesenberry Road near Von Ormy.
"My sister-in-law was saying that his cigarettes were here, his phone, all his stuff that he usually takes with him when he goes to work, when he goes anywhere was still here, like he left it like he was just going and was going to come right back," Diane Villarreal said.
She said Villarreal had his problems, like a conviction for burglary and a heroin addiction. But she said he was going on two weeks sober and was on what she called "the right road."
"Yeah, he was going to get my sister-in-law an apartment," she said. "They were getting their life together."
But when asked what Oscar Villarreal was like, his sister remembered him as a good man while acknowledging he had some problems.
"Yeah, he got into trouble, and stuff like that. But we all do. We all do," Diane Villarreal said.
His struggles aren't what comes to mind when she thinks of him, though.
Instead, it's, "His smile. He just had this crazy smile," she said.
Gabriel Cruz-Juarez, Oscar Villarreal's oldest son, said he was a good father who took care of him and made him laugh.
"He loved everybody. He had everybody's back," Cruz-Juarez said. "And he would tell me what to do and what not to do, how to not be bad and stuff. And I kept that in mind."
Now the husband and father of four is gone, and his son says, "It's not going to be the same."
Anyone who may know the victim or has information about his death is asked to call the Bexar County Sheriff's Office at 210-335-TIPS.