'I heard a gunshot': Celebration of life turns into heartbreak for Doerue family

Excerpt

It was supposed to a be a night of smiles, but turned into tragedy following an incident that involved Tascosa standout Chris Doerue.

It was meant to be a day of celebration for the Doerue family.

One of Chris' and Junior's brothers, Alpha, had recently announced that his girlfriend was pregnant and invited family and friends to her family's house May 8, 2022, in the 1400 block of N. Johnson Street in Amarillo.

"To us, it was a celebration of new life," Junior said. "We wanted to celebrate having someone new come into the family."

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Junior arrived after getting off work when many members of the family were there already. At some point in the evening, two young men that Junior didn't recognize arrived — later identified as 21-year-old Leonard Hakizimana and 19-year-old Jeremiah Ntirampeba.

Junior said most of his family didn't pay any attention to the pair at first because they didn't know them. Later on in the night, Junior said, the two began to act differently.

A few men left to change into shorts so they could play basketball, while Junior recalled sitting down eating when Hakizimana and Ntirampeba began to act, "like something was wrong."

"I guess these guys were just talking mess, insulting everybody and going off or something," Junior said. "Everyone started saying, ‘You’ve got to go. You’ve got to leave.’ So Chris told them, ‘Hey man, you need to go. We have baby stuff and family time going on.’"

Junior, who was too far away to hear any conversations, said Chris escorted Hakizimana and Ntirampeba to their car. Junior said Chris then turned around and began talking to Annie Doerue, their mother.

Chris and Annie were near where the children were playing. Chris' back was turned to Hakizimana and Ntirampeba, who were on the sidewalk next to their car. Chris' and Junior, who will still sitting and eating, saw his brother King was roughly 5 yards away from them by other parked cars.

Then everything changed.

"I heard a gunshot," Junior said. "So I jumped out of my chair like, ‘What’s going on?’ Everybody was looking at everybody like, ‘What happened?’ Then we saw Chris just drop down and blood just started gushing from the back of his head."

Junior said King attempted to run at Hakizimana and Ntirampeba from where he was, but the gunmen pointed a weapon at King, causing him to duck behind another parked car. The two then got into their car and drove off.

Junior said he attempted to run after the car on foot, but was unable to catch up to them.

"I came back and Chris was laying there," he said. "My brother Stone was like, ‘Get the truck, put him in, let’s take him to the hospital.’ People around started calling the cops,  and an ambulance came."

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According to a press release put out by the Amarillo Police Department, officers responded to the shooting at 5:51 p.m. Chris was transported to a nearby hospital.

He didn't return home. Chris Doerue was later pronounced dead at the age of 24.

News of Chris' death spread on social media. Jackson described finding out from his wife a day or two after the killing.

"I think she was on Facebook or something and she said, ‘Hey, there’s a Chris Doerue that’s been shot and killed," he said. "She asked, 'Is this your Chris?’ I said, ‘There’s only one Chris Doerue around here.’ At first I thought ... surely it couldn’t be him. As I got to reading and speaking with people, the news started to trickle in that it was him.

"It was just shock. I couldn’t fathom the thought of him being shot and not being here anymore. It took me a minute to process it all. It was a really tough week. Obviously, I’m a little bit more disconnected than most, but at the same time I still had a special relationship with Chris.”

Jackson wasn't alone in his shock.

A month later, Junior still couldn't understand why Hakizimana and Ntirampeba would shoot his brother.

"It wasn’t like we know them or we’ve got beef with them or anything," Junior said during an interview with Amarillo Globe-News a month later. "I know for sure my brothers and I don’t know these guys. We don’t have a problem with them, we don’t know them, and we don’t know why they’d shoot a gun.”

It was difficult for family members and friends alike to understand — a senseless killing over simply being asked to leave a party.

What was more shocking was what became of Hakizimana and Ntirampeba.

The APD statement said they were later detained and interviewed before being arrested for murder.

“They shot my brother and they took off," Junior said. "The ambulance came, the police came and everybody asked, ‘Where they at?’ and we were like, ‘Oh, they ran away.’ While the police were asking us, for some odd reason, they came back. They came back and turned themselves in."

When asked if the family had learned anything else about the shooters since their arrest, Junior said all they learned was that they were from the same country as Alpha's girlfriend.

Nothing else.

The case against Hakizimana and Ntirampeba has not yet gone before a grand jury. As such, the APD declined a request for comment. Through Junior, Annie also declined to speak with the AGN. King also turned down an interview request saying that the rest of the family "wasn't interested" either.

When AGN reached out to obtain a probable cause affidavit, APD Records stated they would need to make a request to the Attorney General. However, they informed the AGN that since the case has not yet gone to prosecution, the information would likely be withheld.

The only other person who spoke to the AGN was Jackson, who wasn't present that evening. All he could say was what was already obvious.

"It was just unnecessary," he said. "Just a senseless act. It’s just hard to understand why it would happen to a guy like Chris. Knowing Chris and knowing the family, knowing it was a time of celebration and to have it interrupted by something like that is just really hard to understand. ... It was just stupid for lack of a better word.”

EDITOR'S NOTE: This is the second in a four-part series on former Tascosa standout Chris Doerue.