Mother Dies After Protecting 5 Kids During Home Invasion, Last Words Revealed

Police tape in a stock photo. Carl Ballou/Shutterstock

Police in North Carolina are looking for two suspects in the shooting death of a mother who reportedly protected her five children during a home invasion.

Lucero Sosa Capote died while defending her children from the two home invasion intruders, according to Union County police. Her son told WBTV that she placed herself in front of the suspects.

“The last words she said to me were ‘I love you,'” Leonardo Sosa, 12, said.

“It was wrong, for someone to do that, to my own mother,” her son added. “I always told her, I’d say that, me and my dad would always protect her.”

“She was the best mom I could ever have since the day I was born,” said her son, Leonardo.

Two children were injured in the incident last week, officials told WJZY. A 4-year-old was hit in the head.

Rafael Vargas, the woman’s husband, said he was at work when the home invasion took place. He added that his family is financially strapped and doesn’t keep money in the home.

“Somebody shoots 3 times and I think she was fighting for his kids and she gave her life for his kids,” Vargas told WJZY.

“It ain’t going to be the same life I use to got with my wife and my kids but that’s something we have to deal with,” he added.

Vargas’ sister added of the children, “They just miss their mother and they’re just crying for her and they want to come home.”

Relatives said that Capote was a kind, generous woman.

“No one ever complained about her, she was always so nice, so sweet to everyone,“ said her brother, Jason Sosa. ”She was always so happy.”

He added that all five children are under the age 0f 13.

‘This isn’t right, this isn’t right. You took the mother of five kids, it’s not right. You didn’t have to do that,” said Jason Sosa.

Anyone who has information on the suspects or this incident should call the Monroe Police Department at 704-282-4700 or the Union County Crime Stoppers at 704-283-5600.

Facts About Crime in the US

Violent crime in the United States has fallen sharply over the past 25 years, according to both the FBI’s Uniform Crime Reports (UCR) and the Bureau of Justice Statistics (BJS) National Crime Victimization Survey (NCVS).

The rate of violent crimes fell by 49 percent between 1993 and 2017, according to the FBI’s UCR, which only reflects crimes reported to the police.

The violent crime rate dropped by 74 percent between 1993 and 2017, according to the BJS’s NCVS, which takes into account both crimes that have been reported to the police and those that have not.

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“From 1993 to 2017, the rate of violent victimization declined 74 percent, from 79.8 to 20.6 victimizations per 1,000 persons age 12 or older,” the U.S. Department of Justice stated.

Both studies are based on data up to and including 2017, the most recent year for which complete figures are available.

The FBI recently released preliminary data for 2018. According to the Preliminary Semiannual Uniform Crime Report, January to June 2018, violent crime rates in the United States dropped by 4.3 percent compared to the same six-month period in 2017.