Friend says man who shot two people, himself lost rental units to bank

A landlord who recently lost his condos in North Las Vegas to foreclosure shot himself to death early Wednesday, hours after he fatally shot a man and injured a woman who owed him money in what was simply a dispute over cash, a friend said.

"He was my best friend," said Tim Quimby, 48.

Albert Gutierrez barricaded himself in his apartment Tuesday night, police said.

Quimby said Gutierrez then sent him a text just after 9 p.m. that read, "See u on the other side."

North Las Vegas police are investigating the murder-suicide and would not comment on the details of the case. Some tenants of the 90-unit condo complex think it may have been a drug deal gone wrong.

Quimby disagreed.

"Everybody around here is saying it was a drug deal gone wrong, but it wasn't," said an emphatic Quimby, who worked for Gutierrez remodeling and rehabbing some of his units until the bank took them over.

"It was all over money," he added. "It's that simple."

Dennis Pankey, who owns more than 50 of the units at the Cheyenne Park Villas at 3333 E. Cheyenne Ave., said it was no secret that Gutierrez had fallen on hard times. He couldn't afford the association fees, Pankey said. And Gutierrez occasionally rented his units for as little as $200 a month, Pankey said.

"I don't know how big the foreclosures were in what happened, but it must have added to his problems," said Pankey, 50, who on Wednesday morning was removing Gutierrez's name from the small sign in front of the complex, which sits across the street from the College of Southern Nevada.

Pankey said he did not know Gutierrez well but knew the man's father. He said father and son worked together to rent the units.

"It's got to be tough," Pankey said of the Gutierrez family, from San Bernardino, Calif.

The tragedy unfolded overnight Tuesday in North Las Vegas after police officers responded to shots fired in the 3100 block of Plumwood Lane near Cheyenne Avenue and Pecos Road.

Officers found both a man and a 42-year-old woman shot. Police have yet to release their identities. The man was pronounced dead at the scene. The woman - the one who Quimby said owed Gutierrez money - was taken to the University Medical Center trauma unit, where she was listed in stable condition Wednesday.

Witnesses told police that immediately after the shooting, the suspect fled into his home in the complex.

"After he shot the dude and the girl, he ran back to his place, and there was a standoff ... and he shot hisself ," said Andre Hammock, 42, a resident of the complex. "But I didn't see any of it. I just heard about it afterward. I just got home when it was all happening, and police made us all stay in our units.

"They were like, 'Stay inside!' and I was like, 'You don't have to convince me to stay inside. I'm going, I'm going.' "

Pankey said the tenants who lived next to Gutierrez were evacuated to the CSN gymnasium across the street from
9 p.m. to 4 a.m. while the standoff ensued. After several hours, SWAT officers entered the suspect's apartment and found the man dead from a self-inflicted gunshot wound.

Tear gas was shot into the apartment, a North Las Vegas city code enforcement officer said. He was at the scene Wednesday morning, boarding up the apartment, which he said smelled of gas.

"Usually things aren't this dramatic when we're boarding places up," he said. "Usually it deals with people being evicted and not paying the rent, not this kind of stuff."

The tenants, while sequestered across the street at the college, told Pankey that the female shooting victim was telling police the suspect got mad after "he didn't like what he bought," Pankey said.

Contact reporter Tom Ragan at tragan@reviewjournal. com or 702-224-5512.