Police: Suspect in death of wife, 4 daughters in custody

The search for a man charged in the deaths of his wife and four daughters in the US ended in the hills of a northern Mexico town where authorities said the suspect threatened to take his life as officers closed in on him.
Juan David Villegas-Hernandez was taken into custody by Sonora state police on Sunday a day after police in Roswell, New Mexico, said the 34-year-old shot and killed his wife, Cynthia Villegas, and their four daughters ages 14, 11, 7 and 3.
The mother, who also was 34, was a well-respected employee of the Eastern New Mexico Medical Center, said Roswell Mayor Dennis Kintigh, who spoke with the CEO of the hospital on Sunday.

"This rippled through town quickly," he said. "Candidly, it's hard to get your mind around the deaths of small children. It's hard for law enforcement; it's hard for family members and the whole community."
He described Roswell, a desert town in southern New Mexico, as a community that can often feel isolated from much of the rest of the state. It's home to about 50,000 people.
Records show that nearly 10 years ago the Villegas purchased their home in Roswell, where the shooting happened. Before that, it appeared Villegas-Hernandez had lived in Sierra Vista, Arizona.

He is originally from Arizpe, a city in the Mexican state of Sonora where he was arrested. It lies southeast of the border crossing nearest Nogales, Arizona.

Villegas-Hernandez has dual citizenship in the United States and Mexico, which means he can't be deported and is subject to Mexico's often-lengthy extradition process, said Victor Felix, of Sonora state police.
Roswell police haven't released a possible motive for the killings. But according to court documents obtained yesterday by the Albuquerque Journal, Cynthia Villegas had just asked her husband for a divorce.
The newspaper said a criminal complaint filed in Chaves County Magistrate Court showed a struggling marriage an unhappy and unemployed husband worried about infidelity and a wife in fear of a man who had allegedly become controlling and threatening.

During his years in Roswell, however, Villegas-Hernandez had little if any contact with police, said Todd Wildermuth, a spokesman for Roswell police.
Authorities had launched a search for the suspect early Sunday after relatives who stopped at the family's house late Saturday called authorities. One of the relatives saw the body of a victim through a partially open window.