1:35 PM. One unanswered call: Just minutes before Caroline “Caro” Peña was fatally attacked in Del Rio, Texas, she reached out to the one person she trusted most—her best friend of eight years
THE LAST CALL AT 1:35 PM: A LIFETIME OF LINGERING GUILT
The horrific street slaying of thirty-two-year-old Caroline “Caro” Peña in Del Rio, Texas, has left behind an intermediate trail of heartbreak, anchored by an agonizing digital timestamp. New records have revealed that at exactly 1:35 PM on Thursday, just minutes before the fatal confrontation began to unfold outside the Sonic Drive-In, Peña placed a phone call to her best friend of eight years, Christina Salinas.
Salinas, an adult daycare worker who was wrapping up her shift at the time, was unable to answer the call. It is a single, missed connection that she admits will torment her for the rest of her life, leaving her to grapple with the painful belief that her physical presence could have completely altered the trajectory of the afternoon.
“I feel like if I would have answered that call, honestly I would have been there with her,” Salinas shared during an emotional interview with news outlet KHOU. “It wouldn’t have gotten like that. I know that if I would have gotten out of work a few minutes earlier, I wouldn’t have let you gone down alone, and you know that. My heart hurts, B. You’re gone but not forgotten.”
IDENTIFIED BY A HAIRBUN: THE FINAL GOODBYE AT THE HELIPAD
The nightmare for Salinas escalated rapidly when graphic bystander images of a bloodied woman standing face-to-face with her attackers outside the drive-through began circulating across local social media networks. Scrolling through her feed, Salinas experienced a moment of instant, devastating recognition, identifying her best friend not by her face, but by the personal details she knew by heart.
“Her hair was in the same bun,” Salinas recalled in tears. “When I saw that, that’s all I needed to see was the back of her shirt. I knew it was her right off the bat.”
Salinas immediately rushed to the Val Verde Regional Medical Center, arriving while medical teams were desperately working to stabilize Peña following the deep blade wounds to her torso. Salinas confirmed that her friend was still actively breathing and conscious enough to perceive her presence. In a tender, heartbreaking final encounter, Salinas was able to give Peña a final kiss on the forehead just moments before the thirty-two-year-old mother was loaded onto an emergency medical helicopter bound for a trauma unit in San Antonio, where she tragically succumbed to her injuries hours later.
To preserve the memory of their bond, Salinas shared the final photograph the pair had taken together inside a vehicle just days prior, alongside Ring doorbell footage capturing the last time Peña had playfully walked up to her house to eat, laugh, and spend time together. “It’s like a part of me got ripped out and that’s something I’m not going to get back,” Salinas stated. “No matter how much justice is being served, I still don’t have my friend here alive with me.”
GOOFING OFF FOR THE CAMERA: SUSPECTS’ CHILLING BEHAVIOR IN CUSTODY
While the victim’s family plunged into deep mourning, the narrative surrounding the suspects took a bizarre and deeply unsettling turn during their formal processing by law enforcement. The Diaz siblings—twenty-one-year-old Kitty Mia Diaz and nineteen-year-old Amaya “Cookie” Diaz—were apprehended by Del Rio police officers at approximately 4:00 PM on Thursday, with their associate, twenty-one-year-old Kyandra Renee Faz, being taken into custody shortly thereafter. All three have been formally booked on first-degree murder charges.
As the sisters were being escorted from their residence to awaiting police cruisers, independent journalist Michael Elizondo captured video footage that has shocked the local community. While a minimally clothed Kitty Diaz structure a broad, barefoot smile for the lenses, her younger sister, Amaya, angrily shouted, “Stop recording!” at the gathered media.
The defiance did not stop at the transport doors. According to Elizondo, once Amaya Diaz was secured in the rear seat of the patrol vehicle, her demeanor shifted from anger to a celebratory, mocking mood.
“All of the sudden I see the window go down, and the girl was sticking out her face, sticking out her tongue and goofing off,” Elizondo reported, describing the complete lack of gravity shown by the nineteen-year-old suspect immediately following a fatal stabbing.
The Del Rio Police Department has kept tight control over the forensic details of the case file, and a definitive motive explaining what sparked the initial street fight between the three suspects and the mother of five has not yet been established. All three women remain held under heavy bonds at the regional detention facility as prosecutors compile the digital and physical evidence for the grand jury.
