SAN ANTONIO – After more than 13 years of investigation, Universal City police and the Texas Rangers arrested a woman Friday in connection with the 2007 fatal shooting of a 21-year-old man.
Lara Selders, 34, was taken into custody on capital murder charges. She, along with two other suspects, are accused of killing Blase Wright Jr., 21. The two other suspects remain at-large Friday.
Universal City police have been investigating Wright’s death since he was gunned down at his apartment in an apparent burglary on Feb. 2, 2007. Investigators believe Wright was shot while struggling with the gunman.
A witness told investigators they saw a man run into a small gold car after the shooting that was occupied by another man and a woman.
Investigators identified Lara Selders as a potential person of interest in 2007, but she was never interviewed, according to her arrest affidavit. Selders had a car matching the description.
In 2009, police discovered evidence of a separate drive-by shooting that used the same gun linked to Wright’s death. Still, police didn’t have enough evidence tying the crime to the suspects.
In July 2020, after speaking with the witness again, they identified Selders in a photo lineup, according to the affidavit.
Investigators with the police and the Texas Rangers interviewed Selders shortly after the witness identified her, according to the affidavit. She told police that she was the one depicted in a composite sketch that investigators released after Wright’s death.
Selders said she drove her boyfriend and the other suspect to the robbery, according to the affidavit. She said her boyfriend also admitted to shooting Wright.
Police later interviewed her boyfriend, who did not deny that he was at the murder scene that night. In fact, he told investigators “he was not concerned in the next step of the investigation, even if it was a warrant for his arrest,” according to the affidavit.
Police believe the other two arrests will be made in the coming days.
“We were hoping to do this and bring closure to the family,” said Detective Anthony Travis.
Wright’s family has been seeking justice for him since he was killed.
“Everybody loved him. I mean at his funeral there were just hundreds and hundreds of people,” said Wright’s youngest sister Chelsea Baker.