Southwest
Texas homeowners who finally evicted squatter 'treated like criminals'
After finally evicting a contractor-turned-squatter from their new home, a pair of Texas homeowners said that law enforcement made them feel like wrongdoers throughout their two-month ordeal.
Yudith Matthews and Abram Mendez, who bought the San Antonio home to accommodate their growing family, said they are “relieved” that the contractor has finally cleared out the last of his things. On Wednesday night, their family got together to secure and board up their new home to ensure the squatter — or other potential intruders — didn’t sneak back inside.
Until this week’s long-fought victory, they said they felt “powerless” amid a legal system that “takes advantage of homeowners… and the working class” over “entitled” squatters — even, they said, when their safety was jeopardized.
“If I [tried] to protect my house, I [would] get arrested,” Matthews told Fox News Digital. “Your heart is about to jump out of your chest. You’re concerned, you don’t sleep. What else is going to happen? How much damage is he going to do?”
TEXAS HOMEOWNERS FURIOUS AFTER SQUATTER REFUSES TO LEAVE PROPERTY, POLICE WON’T REMOVE HIM: ‘TRUST NO ONE’
Navy veteran Abram Mendez and his wife Yudith Matthews said they planned to move into their larger house in San Antonio, Texas, on Easter. That timeline was vastly skewed by their long-fought battle with a contractor-turned-squatter. (Yudith Matthews)
Other than “unloading some materials,” Matthews and Mendez told Fox News Digital the handyman never completed any of the work he was hired to do.
The married couple said they have incurred about $17,000 in damages, utilities and court fees, clearing out the “last actual dollars” in their account. The squatter allegedly destroyed new plumbing work in their garage, barbecued inside with a propane tank, sprayed mahogany cabinets with a bleach mixture, smoked and urinated indoors and broke doors and molding throughout the house to facilitate his legal entry and exit.
The couple said they fell in love with the seven-bedroom, three-bathroom home in a peaceful neighborhood and purchased it in November. They couldn’t wrap their heads around why someone would “destroy it” needlessly.
TEXAS HOMEOWNERS CONFRONT SQUATTERS, SAY POLICE WON’T HELP
Matthews and Mendez said their squatter broke multiple doors and windows in the home so that he could continue to enter and exit the property. (Yudith Matthews)
“Out of spite? To someone you don’t even know? Are you taking the world’s anger out on one person? [Is it] because they don’t need to pay? They just walk away and they are not responsible,” Matthews said.
Allegedly, their squatter bought a blender to leave running throughout the day during his unwanted stay and intentionally turned off their new freezer, letting meat and broken eggs spoil inside. Matthews and Mendez were ordered to restore electricity and water to the home and pay fines after, they claim, the squatter and his female accomplice stole water and electricity.
Even obtaining a writ of possession — a formal document that a property owner posts on their door to inform a tenant or squatter that they must leave in 24 hours or be removed by force by police — cost an additional $300.
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The squatter shined high-powered flashlights into the homeowners’ eyes, menaced them with bleach and even flashed a knife during their repeated standoffs. (Yudith Matthews)
“All they care about is bail money, all they care about is bond money, all they care about is fees — they were ‘feeing’ us to death,” Mendez, a father of three, told Fox News Digital. “As long as the squatter is off the street and in someone’s home, that’s going to generate revenue — lawyer’s fees, other things that will stimulate the local economy. But it’s all footed by a taxpaying homeowner who’s worked hard, who has little income or some equity where the best case is to flip it.”
If the contractor had paid a fee and appealed the judge’s decision, they said, their ordeal could have persisted past this week. But by a “stroke of luck,” they said, he was late to a Tuesday court hearing and narrowly missed the window.
The contractor, a man in his forties who the couple said has gout, had asked to stay on a couch inside the house. When they realized he had amassed an alarming number of possessions inside, they called the San Antonio Police Department.
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The couple and their families supervised while the squatter finally loaded his things into moving vans — including four guitars he’d installed special mounts for inside the home — and moved his car and motorcycle off the property. (Yudith Matthews)
He had not stayed in the home for the requisite 30 days to be considered a squatter under Texas property law when police were first called to the property on Feb. 29, but the couple claim officers made no efforts to verify his opposing account, or even check his identification.
“[The squatter] said, ‘No, I live here’ and the police said right away, ‘You’re the resident, you have the right to live here,’” Mendez recalled. “The police came so many times, we have him red-handed, we might have him on video, but police just walk away and say it’s a civil matter.”
Matthews and Mendez said they fell in love with the seven-bedroom, three-bathroom home. The quiet neighborhood, nearby stream and large yard made the property a great place to raise their children, ages 11, 10 and 8. (Yudith Matthews)
“That’s a cop out,” Mendez said. “Police are entitling these people to a right they’re not entitled to… they don’t quite care because they know the lieutenant is going to cover them, they don’t want to write a report.”
The couple said they have filed complaints with the San Antonio Police Department after one encounter where an officer allegedly raised his voice, saying that he “didn’t have time to deal with this.”
“You feel so disappointed, you don’t even bother calling the police when they treat you like you are a criminal,” Matthews said.
Previously, footage of the couple confronting their squatter as he entered the home through a propped window was aired on “FOX & Friends.” After that encounter, the couple were prohibited from entering the home.
Pictured is a crude propane cooking setup the squatter used inside the Texas couple’s home. (Yudith Matthews)
From that point on, the legal process and surveying the property became a full-time job.
“My husband did runs around the house, [we are] taking turns to supervise the property,” Matthews said. “[The squatter] took from us family time, so many events, so many fun things that we do with the kids on the weekend… it’s very unfair. Our kids, they get really stressed.”
After serving seven years as an intelligence officer in the Navy, many of them on active duty tours in Asia, Afghanistan and Iraq, Mendez is fortunate enough to be retired. He couldn’t have managed the nightmare otherwise, he said.
“He decided to keep breaking the windows, breaking the sheet rock, destroying the appliances that we have in there — who is going to be responsible for that?” Matthews asked. (Yudith Matthews)
“How do families where mom and dad have to work — what a nightmare,” Matthews remarked. “Imagine a family who are working 9-5 by themselves with zero support, dealing with this type of thing.”
In one of dozens of visits San Antonio police made to the property, per records provided by the department, the couple claimed the squatter flashed a knife at them. Matthews and Mendez say arriving police “kicked the knife into a corner” and “told him he had a right” to the weapon as a tenant in the house.
Pictured are dishes left in the sink by the squatter after he packed up his things and left this week. (Yudith Matthews)
Matthews claims he shined high-wattage flashlights in her face and even threatened to spray her with bleach in one of their many clashes.
“We are fighting, risking our lives because we don’t get protection from the police, the government, anyone,” she told Fox News Digital. “We saved up enough money, we’re in our mid-forties, we’re focusing on our home and now someone is stealing hard-earned decades of money from us for their laziness. That’s it, they’re lazy.”
“We saved up enough money, we’re in our mid-forties, we’re focusing on our home and now someone is stealing hard-earned decades of money from us for their laziness.”
After no less than four court appearances and paying a $300 fee, the couple were finally able to post an eviction notice on their home’s door. (Yudith Matthews)
Officer Ricardo Guzman of the SAPD told Fox News Digital that law enforcement’s “hands are tied” in these situations.
“A big thing about these squatting things, the hard part on us is the squatter’s rights. Once they move in and they have property, even if it’s an abandoned building, that’s their property,” he told Fox News Digital. “There are laws preventing us from grabbing their property and throwing them out. That’s where it becomes a civil matter, the owner will have to go through the eviction process.”
The unwelcome guest used boards and nails to permanently prop open several windows of the home, which he would use to enter and exit. (Yudith Matthews)
Although the worst is over for the couple, they are still in the process of obtaining a restraining order against their squatter and inventorying damage and stolen items, they said.
“The law did not work for us,” Mendez said. “It eventually worked for us — but after a month of what bills, what losses. [Now] that’s more elbow grease, more sanding, more painting — time eaten up by a squatter who has nothing to lose because the police entitled him by saying, ‘You have a right to stay there.’”
Debris left behind by a squatter is pictured in Yudith Matthews and Abram Mendez’s home. The couple said the contractor installed an extra door in their living room — and brought it with him when he left the premises this week. (Yudith Matthews)
Fox News Digital could not reach the squatter, or an attorney who had represented him in previous criminal court cases, for comment.
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Southwest
Arizona governor vetoes Charlie Kirk memorial license plate, sparking GOP outrage: ‘This bill falls short’
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Democratic Arizona Gov. Katie Hobbs is facing fierce backlash after vetoing a bill that would have created a specialty license plate honoring slain Turning Point USA founder Charlie Kirk, a move Republicans are blasting as a stunning act of partisanship after his assassination.
Kirk, who was assassinated while speaking at a Sept. 10 Turning Point USA event at Utah Valley University, lived in Arizona with his wife, Erika, and two children.
The proposed specialty plate, referred to as the “Charlie Kirk memorial” plate or the “Conservative grassroots network special plate,” featured a photo of the late Kirk and the TPUSA logo in front of an American flag background.
Below the license plate number were the words “FOR CHARLIE.”
A custom Arizona license plate, featuring a Turning Point USA and Charlie Kirk design, shared by state Sen. Jake Hoffman. (Senator Jake Hoffman via X)
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Of the $25 fee required for the plate, $17 would be an annual donation deposited into the Conservative Grassroots Network Special Plate Fund, according to the legislation.
While the recipient of the Grassroots Network Special Plate Fund was not explicitly designated as TPUSA in the bill, it noted the director of the fund would allocate revenue annually to a nonprofit organization, founded in 2012, that focuses on restoring traditional values, maintaining a grassroots activist network on high school and college campuses in Arizona, and assisting college students with voter registration and absentee ballots.
People gather at a memorial to mourn Turning Point USA Founder Charlie Kirk outside Turning Point USA headquarters Sept. 12, 2025, in Phoenix. (Charly Triballeau/AFP via Getty Images)
TPUSA, founded by Kirk in 2012, is well known for its grassroots activist networks on high school and college campuses. It is headquartered in Phoenix, Arizona.
The $25 fee and annual $17 donation are consistent with the fees for the other 109 nonprofit license plates offered by the Arizona Department of Transportation (ADOT).
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The state Senate passed the bill, 16-2, with the House of Representatives voting 31-23 in favor prior to Hobbs’ veto.
Specialty plates in Arizona are authorized by the legislature and sent to the governor to be signed into law. They have been offered since 1989.
In a letter explaining the veto, Hobbs cited concerns with the bill “bring[ing] people together,” claiming it would “insert politics into a function of government that should remain nonpartisan.”
Democratic Arizona Gov. Katie Hobbs is facing fierce backlash after vetoing a bill that would have created a specialty license plate honoring slain Turning Point USA founder Charlie Kirk. (Rebecca Noble/Getty Images)
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“Charlie Kirk’s assassination is tragic and a horrifying act of violence,” Hobbs wrote. “In America, we resolve our political differences at the ballot box. No matter who it targets, political violence puts us all in harm’s way and damages our sacred democratic institutions.
“I will continue working toward solutions that bring people together, but this bill falls short of that standard.”
Specialty license plates with political interests already approved by the state include the “Choose Life” Plate, which benefits the Arizona Life Coalition and its mission to promote anti-abortion advocacy and education; the “In God We Trust” Plate, which benefits conservative Christian legal advocacy group Alliance Defending Freedom; and the Arizona Realtors’ “Homes for All” Plate, which funds affordable housing projects.
Charlie Kirk, founder of Turning Point USA, speaks during the Turning Point Action conference in 2023 in West Palm Beach, Fla. (Lynne Sladky/AP Photo)
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Another approved plate, “Alice Cooper’s Solid Rock Plate,” which benefits Solid Rock Teen Centers, features a portrait of the legendary musician, who has made political comments about social issues including gender identity.
Republican state Sen. Jake Hoffman, who sponsored the bill, posted a fiery statement on social media after the governor’s action, claiming her “grotesque partisanship knows no bounds.”
“Even in the wake of a global civil rights leader — an Arizona resident and her own constituent — being assassinated in broad daylight for his defense of the First Amendment, Hobbs couldn’t find the human decency to put her far-Left extremism aside simply to allow those how wish to honor him to do so,” Hoffman wrote. “Katie Hobbs will forever be known as a stain on the pages of Arizona’s story.”
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On Saturday, TPUSA COO Tyler Bowyer shared an X post that said, “Deport Katie Hobbs.”
TPUSA, Bowyer and Hobbs’ office did not immediately respond to Fox News Digital’s requests for comment.
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Southwest
Air Force veteran warns ‘cartels don’t collapse — they fracture’ after notorious drug lord killed
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Nearly two weeks after Mexican forces killed notorious cartel boss Ruben “El Mencho” Oseguera Cervantes, questions remain about how the powerful Jalisco New Generation Cartel (CJNG) will respond and whether the blow will meaningfully disrupt the flow of fentanyl into the United States.
Carlos De La Cruz, a 20-year U.S. Air Force veteran who deployed after 9/11 and later served along the southern border, told Fox News the cartel leader’s death marked a major victory, but warned Americans should not mistake it for the end of the fight.
“When I say that this is a significant win, I mean it,” De La Cruz said. “El Mencho ran one of the most violent cartels on the planet.”
Oseguera, who rose to prominence in the post–El Chapo era, oversaw CJNG’s aggressive expansion across Mexico and into key trafficking corridors feeding U.S. drug markets. Under his leadership, the cartel became a central architect of fentanyl and methamphetamine trafficking and drew a $15 million U.S. reward for information leading to his capture.
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Smoke rises from burning vehicles after a military operation that a government source said killed Mexican drug lord Nemesio Oseguera, known as “El Mencho,” in Puerto Vallarta, Mexico, on Feb. 22, 2026. (Screen grab obtained from a social media video. @morelifediares via Instagram/YouTube via Reuters)
But De La Cruz cautioned that removing a cartel kingpin does not dismantle the organization.
“Cartels don’t collapse when you just cut the head off — they fracture,” he said. “And part of that fracture is going to see a lot of short-term violence while all these factions fight over territory.”
Following Oseguera’s killing on Feb. 22, the U.S. State Department issued travel alerts in multiple Mexican states, citing road blockages and criminal activity tied to security operations, underscoring concerns about instability in the aftermath.
Drawing on his military background studying enemy command structures, De La Cruz described the cartel fight as a long-term campaign requiring sustained pressure.
A mughsot of Ruben “Nemesio” Oseguera Cervantes, known as “El Mencho,” beside graffiti depicting the letters of the Jalisco New Generation Cartel, covering the facade of an abandoned home in El Limoncito, in the Michoacan state of Mexico. (Eduardo Verdugo/AP Images; Drug Enforcement Administration)
“You don’t win a war with just one airstrike,” he said. “The goal is dismantling the networks and going after their financing.”
De La Cruz, who is running for Congress and is the brother of Texas Republican Rep. Monica De La Cruz, argued that CJNG’s Foreign Terrorist Organization designation gives U.S. law enforcement and intelligence agencies expanded tools to target cartel infrastructure and financial pipelines.
KAROLINE LEAVITT WARNS CARTELS TO ‘NOT LAY A FINGER’ ON AMERICANS OR PAY ‘SEVERE CONSEQUENCES’
A soldier stands guard by a charred vehicle after it was set on fire in Cointzio, Mexico, Sunday, Feb. 22, 2026, after the cartel leader’s death. (Armando Solis/AP Photo)
But he stressed that the fentanyl crisis should be viewed as a domestic security emergency, not a distant foreign problem.
“For decades, they were using their territories as launching pads to pump chemical weapons into America — because that’s exactly what fentanyl is,” he said.
De La Cruz, who said he worked side by side with Customs agents while deployed to the border, warned that cartel networks are highly adaptive and that any gains could be temporary without sustained follow-through.
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Smoke rises after violence hit Puerto Vallarta, Mexico. (Courtesy of Scott Posilkin)
“These networks, they’re going to adjust. They’re going to adapt and they’re going to adapt quickly,” he said. “We have to continue to go after the money launderers, especially on our side of the border, because that’s the full fight.”
While Oseguera’s death removes one of the most dominant figures in Mexico’s criminal underworld, De La Cruz said the mission is personal.
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“I took an oath to defend this country,” he said. “And I intend to stand by that oath.”
Fox News Digital’s Greg Wehner contributed to this report.
Stepheny Price covers crime, including missing persons, homicides and migrant crime. Send story tips to stepheny.price@fox.com.
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TUCSON, Ariz. — More than five weeks after the suspected abduction of Nancy Guthrie — the 84-year-old mother of “Today” co-host Savannah Guthrie — Arizona authorities say cadaver dogs used earlier in the investigation are not currently being deployed as the search continues.
The elder Guthrie is believed to have been kidnapped from her home in the Catalina Foothills in northern Tucson around 2:30 a.m. on Feb. 1.
While no suspects have been publicly identified, and she has not been found, cadaver dogs had been deployed earlier in the case, according to Pima County Sheriff Chris Nanos. They have not been visible in weeks.
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A member of the Pima County Sheriff’s Office remains outside of Nancy Guthrie’s home, Monday, Feb. 9, 2026 in Tucson, Ariz. (AP Photo/Ty ONeil; Nathan Congleton/NBC via Getty Images)
“They are available if needed in the future,” he told Fox News Digital.
There are a number of reasons not to be using cadaver dogs at this stage in the investigation, according to Betsy Brantner Smith, a retired police sergeant and spokeswoman for the National Police Association.
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Savannah Guthrie visits the Today show at Rockefeller Plaza in New York on Thursday, March 5, 2026. (Charles Sykes/Invision/AP)
One would be if there’s credible information that Guthrie is still alive.
“Anything is possible,” Nanos told Fox News Digital last week, adding that he would not discuss specific leads or evidence in the case.
DNA IS STILL PENDING AS VOLUNTEERS FIND ANOTHER GLOVE IN THE SEARCH FOR NANCY GUTHRIE
Brantner Smith, who is not involved in the case, said departments may hold back K-9 resources for several reasons. Those could be that authorities don’t have a good idea of where to search, they think she might be concealed in a place where dogs would have a hard time detecting her, or they believe she’s been taken to Mexico, according to Brantner Smith.
Law enforcement agents walk around the neighborhood where Annie Guthrie, whose mother Nancy Guthrie has been missing for more than a week, lives just outside Tucson, Ariz. (Ty ONeil/AP Photo)
“I do believe that the sheriff’s department has much more information that they are not releasing to the public,” she told Fox News Digital. “And I’m not sure at this point why that would be, unless they have a solid suspect and don’t want to tip them off.”
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Most departments, including the Pima County Sheriff’s, don’t have their own cadaver dogs and borrow them from state and federal authorities or neighboring jurisdictions.
An investigator looks inside a culvert in the neighborhood where Annie Guthrie, whose mother Nancy Guthrie has been missing for more than a week, lives just outside Tucson, Ariz., on Tuesday, Feb. 10, 2026. (Ty ONeil/AP Photo)
In Guthrie’s case, the sheriff’s department sought K-9 assistance from the local Border Patrol office earlier in the investigation.
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PCSD deferred further comment on the K-9s to Customs and Border Protection, which did not immediately respond to a request for comment.
A member of the Pima County Sheriff’s Office walks around Nancy Guthrie’s home on Tuesday, Feb. 10, 2026 in Tucson, Ariz. (Ty ONeil/AP Photo)
The biggest lead so far has been Nest camera video showing a masked intruder on Guthrie’s doorstep the morning of her abduction.
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He is described as about 5 feet, 9 inches to 5 feet, 10 inches tall and of medium build.
Nancy Guthrie, 84, has been missing from her Arizona home since Jan. 31, 2026. (Don Arnold/WireImage/Getty Images)
He was wearing a black Ozark Trail backpack.
Authorities have said they won’t consider the case cold until they run out of viable leads to follow up on — and tens of thousands have come in so far.
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Savannah Guthrie has asked anyone with information to dial 1-800-CALL-FBI.
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There’s a combined reward of more than $1.2 million for information that leads to her mother’s recovery.
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