A brutal and chaotic scene unfolded at Motel 6 in McAllen Saturday morning when officers responded to a distressed call from the front desk attendant, records show.
When police arrived on Saturday around 6:30 a.m. at the hotel on 700 W. Expressway 83, they found two bodies before they encountered the suspect, Alamo resident Carlos Antonio Cardenas, 26, holding a knife and covered in blood.
An officer saw Cardenas, who was standing soaked in blood “from his face to his shoes,” outside the hotel front office poking the window with a black foldable knife, trying to get in. Upon seeing the weapon in Cardenas’ hands, the officer pointed his gun at Cardenas and told him to drop the knife before arresting him.
Cardenas spoke incoherently after he was placed in handcuffs. When asked what his name was, he refused and claimed an unknown “they” would hear it, according to a 22-page probable cause affidavit.
A clear glass pipe with burnt residue was discovered in Cardenas’ pocket.
Other officers who arrived at the hotel found that the victim facing down on the ground at the southeast parking lot, 42-year-old Luis Eduardo Garza, of San Juan, and the man on the second floor hallway near a stairwell to the pool, 45-year-old Keith Henry Cole, from Richmond, Virginia, had no pulse. Both men had multiple stab wounds. Paramedics arrived and confirmed both men had no signs of life.
After inspecting the surveillance video, police officers were able to observe Cardenas stabbing both victims.
The video showed Cardenas and an unidentified man walk out of hotel room 220 at around 4:35 a.m. The other man drove away in a white car leaving Cardenas behind at the hotel.
As Cardenas walked back to the hotel room he spotted Cole, one of the victims, walking with a backpack on the second floor hallway. The men were seen talking, though Cole attempted to go on his way, before Cardenas took an aggressive stance. Close to 6 a.m., the officer said he saw Cardenas on the surveillance video attack Cole with a knife.
Cole was stabbed multiple times on the front and back side of his body, as he attempted to kick his attacker off. Cardenas was seen leaving Cole twice after the attack before returning to stab his body repeatedly while he lay on the ground.
After the first murder, Cardenas walked over to a black car parked at the east side parking lot that arrived at 4:35 a.m. and remained there during the stabbing. Cardenas handed Cole’s backpack to the driver of the black car.
After the hand-off, Cardenas spotted the second victim, Garza, in the nearby parking lot where Garza was standing by the driver’s side of a white Ford Explorer. Cardenas approached Garza around 6 a.m., and attempted to stab him.
The Ford Explorer drove away as Garza tried to unsuccessfully fend off the attack. When Garza slipped and fell, Cardenas stabbed his body several times before grabbing a bag from Garza and giving it to the driver of the black vehicle.
Cardenas warned the attendant that if the police was called “they are going to kill you and they are going to kill all of us.” When Cardenas began kicking the front desk glass door trying to get in, the attendant dialed 911 and escaped through another exit leaving Cardenas banging on the glass door.
Drenched in blood, Cardenas then headed over to the front office. Another man trying to get a room was inside the front office speaking with the front desk attendant through a locked glass partition.
“Something happened, somebody got killed,” Cardenas reportedly told the attendant, the affidavit stated.
According to a police officer’s report, Cardenas also said someone was trying to kill him.
Cardenas warned the attendant that if the police was called “they are going to kill you and they are going to kill all of us.” When Cardenas began kicking the front desk glass door trying to get in, the attendant dialed 911 and escaped through another exit leaving Cardenas banging on the glass door.
The other man who was in the lobby began walking off and Cardenas followed behind him.
According to the affidavit, Cardenas grabbed the man from the lobby as they exited the front office and threatened him with a knife.
“You need to come with me,” Cardenas allegedly told the man, as he came up from behind him, wrapped his left arm around him and shoved a knife to his face.
The man claimed Cardenas wanted him to take the knife, but the man refused and Cardenas let him go.
While Cardenas ransacked a nearby vehicle, which was later confirmed to belong to the front desk attendant, the man ran off and called police from another hotel.
After police arrived and arrested Cardenas, paramedics wheeled him into an ambulance. As police walked over to the crime scene with the man who fled to a nearby hotel, Cardenas yelled out, “I saved you. I saved you,” the affidavit read.
A police officer noted in his report that he suspected Cardenas was under the influence of some drug, but the affidavits did not mention the results of any drug tests.
Cardenas started spitting, vomiting and speaking incoherently in the ambulance, before he was taken to an emergency room where small lacerations on the fingers of his right hand were cleaned and treated before he was medically cleared and taken to jail.
Police noted that the hotel room where Cardenas and the unknown man emerged from in the video appeared to have been ransacked. Bags were left open with clothing and clear plastic baggies were scattered about the room as if a “struggle had ensued.”
Another officer followed a trail of blood to a hotel storage room that appeared to have been forced open.
Cardenas is charged with capital murder, attempted murder and burglary of a vehicle.
He remains held in the Hidalgo County Adult Detention Center on a total of $906,000 in bonds.
