Family of Murdered San Francisco Woman Share ‘Relief’ After Suspect Arrested in Cold Case

Gabriela Soza was shocked when she got a text Monday morning saying that the man who shot and killed her sister 10 years ago was arrested.

The news came just two months after her father, who she said had never given up on justice for his daughter, Maria Lourdes Soza, passed away from cancer. For Soza, the timing was hard to believe, and felt like a rock had been lifted from her shoulders now that both he, and Maria Lourdes, could rest in peace.

“It was just a relief,” she said. “Like you could breathe now. It was like a pain in the chest. It is like everybody can really rest and be calm.”

Soza recalled the January day in 2015 when Maria Lourdes, who went by Lourdes among family and friends, was struck by a stray bullet in the crosshairs of a drive-by shooting.

Lourdes had just picked up her three children from her parents’ house on her way home from work at San Francisco International Airport in Millbrae. After pulling up to her home in the Bayview, she was checking her mailbox when she heard shots ring out.

“When she heard that gun, like a mom, like a lion, you protect,” Soza said. “Like eagles you just put your wings on it.

“She told her kids to go down, she pushed her partner [down],” she continued. Soza remembered Lourdes’ partner telling her” she didn’t get a chance to even squat.”

A decade-old cold case

Anthony James Tyree, 34, was arrested Wednesday for allegedly firing the “barrage” of shots that hit Lourdes from a passenger seat in the Dodge pick-up truck speeding down Ingalls Street just after 4 p.m. on Jan. 27, 2015.

District Attorney Brooke Jenkins alleged in a press release that as the Dodge overtook a black Infinity, he and another person in the car opened fire, striking two people in the Infinity, including the driver, and Lourdes Soza, whose home happened to be behind the incident.

Lourdes and the Infinity’s passenger both died of their wounds. The driver was injured, according to San Francisco police.

For months following the tragedy, the San Francisco Police Department searched for the shooters, launching a double-homicide investigation that led to publicly-released surveillance footage of a suspect vehicle seven months later.

At the time, the Soza family pleaded for people to help locate the person who killed Lourdes, but no arrests were made.

Soza said after a certain period of time had passed, they felt like no one was looking anymore.

Still, she said, until her father died, he continued to believe that he would find the person who had killed his daughter.

“Because to him, the kids are supposed to bury the parents, not the parents, their child,” Soza said. “He stayed with that. [For] 10 years, my father was waiting for justice to be served. It was an obsession of my father.”

‘Her kids were her world’

Soza said the decade since her sister’s passing has been difficult for the family, but has also brought them together.

After her death, Lourdes’ kids were separated. Her oldest daughter stayed with Lourdes’ parents, while her son and younger daughter went to live with their fathers.

“We tried to be there, even though it was hard because [Lourdes’ kids] were small [when it] happened,” Soza said. “We were trying to be moms, no matter what.”

She remembers going to their homes and sitting outside in the car or on the curb with the kids.

“They were still in San Francisco, but they were not in one home like how they were when my sister was alive,” Soza said.

Now that they’re older, though, Soza said they do everything together with their extended family. She and her three sisters have also kept Lourdes close.

“We’re five. We’re always going to be five,” she told KQED.

Soza credited her family’s enduring closeness and ability to forgive Tyree to Lourdes.

“I kind of forgave that person, because I know that’s something that my sister was, she would forgive,” Soza said. “She’ll be upset with [you] one day, and then the next day she’ll be talking to you, just because family always is strong.”

Lourdes always protected her children and put her family above everything, Soza recalled.

“Her kids were her world,” she said.

“She always gave without nothing [in] return,” Soza continued. “She helped a lot of people without [caring] even if you said thank you. If you ask her for a favor, she’ll give it to you; if you ask for money, she’ll do it. She was a very giving, loving person.”

Long-awaited relief

According to police, the cold case was turned over to homicide investigators in August 2024. During their investigation, officers developed probable cause to believe Tyree was responsible for both murders and obtained a warrant to arrest him on Aug. 13.

Early Monday morning, homicide investigators and SFPD’s specialized tactical unit served a search warrant at Tyree’s Pittsburg home, where they found an AR-15 short-barreled ghost gun rifle.

Tyree was arrested and transported to San Francisco County Jail. On Tuesday, he was arraigned on two murder charges, along with single counts for attempted murder and illegal possession of a firearm by a felon.

He did not enter a plea and is currently being held in the county jail without bail. He’s expected to return to court Monday.

“We’re all emotional, not in a bad way or sad way, but relieved that now my sister could rest in peace and we could get this person out of the street because he could harm other families,” Soza said. “That justice finally came after 10 years, I know my father would have been very happy.”