Revenge-linked fatal shooting on West Side
- San Antonio police arrested Tayvarie Brunson, 18, and Jaylon Barnes, 19, in the March 8 killing of Justice Xavier Hansel Lee at Cable Ranch Apartments. - Detectives say Lee, 25, was shot while running toward the parking lot, and the gunfire may have been retaliation for a 2024 robbery. - The case shifted from an unsolved apartment-complex shooting to a revenge-motive murder case built on video and shell-casing evidence.
A West Side apartment shooting that looked murky in March has turned into something much more specific. San Antonio police now say the killing of Justice Xavier Hansel Lee at the Cable Ranch Apartments was likely revenge — and two young men, Tayvarie Brunson and Jaylon Barnes, have been arrested on murder charges. That matters because the original scene was messy, with two people shot and real uncertainty about who fired first. Now detectives are laying out a clearer theory: Lee came to visit someone, the suspects arrived armed, and the shooting was tied to bad blood from a 2024 robbery. ### What happened at the apartment complex? The shooting happened on March 8 at the Cable Ranch Apartments in the 8600 block of Waters Edge Drive on San Antonio’s West Side. When officers got there, they found Lee; other people were involved. ### Who was killed? The man who died was Justice Xavier Hansel Lee, 25. That fills in one of the biggest gaps from the first public accounts, which focused more on the chaos of the scene than on who the victim was. By May 2, arrest records had tied Lee’s death to Barnes and Brunson, both now facing first-degree felony murder charges in Bexar County. ### Why do detectives think this was revenge? The key detail is the motive police put in the arrest paperwork. Detectives say the shooting may have been retaliation connected to a 2024 robbery-related attack with history behind it. ### How do police say the shooting unfolded? Investigators say Lee had gone to the apartment complex to visit someone when Brunson and Barnes showed up armed and opened fire. Police say Lee returned fire, then a burst of gunfire with multiple people caught in it. ### What evidence pushed the case forward? Turns out the case did not hinge on motive alone. Detectives say they recovered firearms from a nearby apartment, and forensic testing linked those guns to shell casings and the arrest affidavit hold together. ### Why is this update important? Because the story changed from “police are still figuring out what happened” to “police think they know who did it and why.” In March, officers were still working through a confusing case. ### What’s the bottom line? Basically, this is no longer just a fatal West Side shooting. It is now an alleged revenge killing with two arrests, a named victim, and a case built around prior conflict, surveillance video, and forensic gun evidence. The unanswered parts now are narrower — what exactly happened in the 2024 robbery, who fired which shots, and how the defense will challenge the police timeline.
