While Carpentersville police have confirmed the identity of a woman who was shot to death in a murder-suicide on Friday night, they aren’t releasing many new details about the case, which remains under investigation.
Meanwhile, police say it was very difficult to stop Tony Rodriguez, the Lake in the Hills man they are “confident” killed her, from turning the gun on himself, because there wasn’t enough time.
When officers arrived on the scene, Rodriguez, 39, met them outside with the gun already under his chin, officials said.
“And within seconds, he made his decision,” Police Chief Alan Popp said.
Nicole S. Brown, 38, of the 0-99 block of Alameda Drive, was gunned down on the 100 block of Pueblo Road on Friday night, just blocks away from her home, Cmdr. Timothy Bosshart said.
Brown, who has a son, a daughter and a granddaughter, was living in Texas before moving to Carpentersville about six months ago, said Julie Loewe, who had been close with both Brown and Rodriguez since their days at Dundee-Crown High School. Rodriguez had two sons of his own, she said.
Neighbors said Brown and Rodriguez had been dating for about six months, before breaking up a few weeks ago. Facebook posts indicate she ended the relationship.
“To the two men that keep on, I am not the cause of all of your problems,” Brown wrote in an entry dated the day she was killed. “One of you messed it up yourself and the other one treated me like crap. Why can’t you both just move on and just leave me alone?”
Loewe said Rodriguez had a history of depression and was extremely upset about the breakup.
“It’s been five days and I still don’t feel any better,” Rodriguez wrote in a post the day before the shootings. “I haven’t left the house except for medical or legal appointments and I don’t really have any interest in doing so. Maybe if I’m lucky I’ll have a heart attack or something.”
On Friday night, the pair met in his parked SUV to talk about the relationship, when she saw his gun and ran to Jesus Ignacio’s house on the 100 block of Pueblo Road for help, neighbors said.
But Rodriguez, according to Ignacio, found her and killed her outside his home, firing two bullets into her body.
Rodriguez then drove to Loewe’s house less than a mile away on the 1500 block of Amarillo Drive.
“He came to me,” Loewe said. “He was very sorry for what he did, but he couldn’t take it back.”
As police closed in on the home, Rodriguez saw officers from the window and went outside to meet them — with the gun already under his chin, Chief Popp said.
When someone approaches officers with a gun already at his head, their options to stop what followed next are limited, Deputy Chief Michael Kilbourne said.
“There’s not much realistically that can be done in a case like that, not with the time frame that it occurred in,” Kilbourne said, adding that police are still reviewing the case. “It certainly wasn’t your classic standoff where you’ve got time to discuss and take other options.”
The gun used in Brown’s killing is believed to be same one Rodriguez used to kill himself, which is one of the reasons police are confident he killed her, Popp said.
Travis Brown, Nicole Brown’s ex-husband, said she was a strong-willed woman who loved life. Her pastimes were fishing, boating, riding four-wheelers and cracking jokes. The pair met in the early 1990s when they were both in high school — she was his math tutor.
“I loved her the first time I saw her,” he said. “She was the most beautiful thing I saw. We were inseparable for a long time.”
The Kane County coroner is conducting both autopsies. Funeral arrangements for Brown are pending at Miller Funeral Home in West Dundee. Counseling is available for the two officers who witnessed the suicide, Kilbourne said.
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