By Scott Loftis
A Missouri woman is being held without bond in the Lawrence (Mo.) County jail after she reportedly told police that she shot three people, including two in Carroll County. Two of the shooting victims died from their wounds, including one in Carroll County.
Taylor Santiago, 31, of Aurora, Mo., is charged in Missouri with first-degree murder, first-degree robbery, unlawful use of a weapon and endangering the welfare of a child.
The Carroll County victims have not been identified by authorities.
According to an arrest warrant affidavit written by a detective with the Aurora- Marionville Police Department, Santiago turned herself in at the Aurora Police Department and said she had killed three people after deciding to do so while getting coffee at a local convenience store.
The Aurora-Marionville Police Department said in a Jan. 23 news release that Santiago arrived at the Aurora Police and Fire Facility at approximately 1:45 a.m. that day and called from the parking lot to report that she had just murdered her estranged husband, Troy Huffman, at her residence. Officers immediately took Santiago into custody, the news release says, and responded to her apartment, where they found Huffman’s body.
During her statement to police, the news release says, Santiago also said she had driven to Arkansas and shot two additional victims, one of whom was the biological father of one of her children.
Local victims not identified
The Carroll County Sheriff’s Office said in a Facebook post the same day that deputies responded to a call of an unknown disturbance to discover two shooting victims, one male and one female. The female victim was pronounced dead, the sheriff’s office said, and the male victim was transported to the hospital in serious condition.
The local shooting occurred in the area of Carroll County Road 511, southeast of Eureka Springs.
Neither local victim has been officially identified. The affidavit for Santiago’s arrest indicates that the male victim’s initials are NG and that he was in a relationship with the female victim.
The arrest affidavit says that Santiago invited Huffman to her apartment under the pretenses of seeing a child.
When Huffman arrived, Santiago told him to wait inside the apartment with the door closed, the affidavit says. She then went into the child’s room and told him she was “going to take care of the bad guys” and to cover his ears, the affidavit says. She then drew a .38-caliber revolver from a holster on her hip, put it behind her back and then exited the child’s room and shot Huffman twice, according to the affidavit. She said she wasn’t sure Huffman was dead and didn’t check to make sure, the affidavit says. He was blocking the door, so she moved him out of the way and took his car keys, the affidavit says.
Santiago said the only reason she invited Huffman to her apartment was with the intention of killing him and stealing his car, according to the affidavit.
She told police that after shooting Huffman, she drove to Carroll County and “committed two additional murders” before returning to Aurora and turning herself in, the affidavit says.
The arrest affidavit says Huffman was shot twice, once in the chest and once in the head.
No further information regarding the local victims was available at press time.
Brother serving life sentence
Carroll County Sheriff Daniel Klatt said Monday, Jan. 27, that it was his understanding that Taylor Santiago is the sister of Joseph Santiago, a Berryville man who is currently serving life in prison after pleading guilty in June 2018 to the January 2017 slaying of his older brother, Alex.
Alex Santiago was 21 and Joseph Santiago was approximately three weeks from his 18th birthday at the time of the slaying. Prosecutors charged Joseph Santiago as an adult.
CCSO deputies responding to a call from the Santiago brothers’ father, Robert Keever, found Alex Santiago’s body inside the family’s rented mobile home at 92 Carroll County Road 219, in the Grandview area northwest of Berryville, on Jan. 17, 2017.
A probable-cause affidavit written by then-CCSO investigator Lt. Jerry Reddick says Alex Santiago had “extensive trauma to his head and had a sword sticking out of his mid-section.”
A baseball bat found near the body was covered in blood, and a scabbard for the sword was found lying on the bed in the master bedroom where Joseph Santiago had been, the affidavit says.
The affidavit says deputies responding to the residence spoke with Keever in the front yard and he told them Joseph Santiago was still in the back bedroom watching television. The affidavit says that during his initial call to the sheriff’s office, Keever indicated that Alex Santiago was autistic.
Defense attorneys requested a mental evaluation of Joseph Santiago in August 2017 and he was interviewed by a state psychologist in February 2018. The psychologist reported that Santiago lacked a mental disease or defect, had the capacity to effectively assist his attorney in his own defense and had the capacity to understand the proceedings against him.
Joseph Santiago is being held at the Arkansas Department of Corrections’ Cummins Unit in Grady.
