On the evening of February 18, 2019, Kristy Nicole Perez had reason to feel hopeful. The 38-year-old Hispanic woman from Longview, Texas, had just won a court ruling against an ex-boyfriend she described as abusive. A friend said Kristy was very close to escaping the relationship, and that evening she posted on Facebook, “God is good.” Hours later, she and her mother were dead.
In the early hours of February 19, 2019, at about 12:38 a.m., Longview police officers responded to a report of a shooting at a home in the 1700 block of Loring Lane. Inside, they discovered the bodies of Kristy and her mother, 58-year-old Lori Susan Perez. Both women had been fatally shot. According to the Gregg County District Attorney’s Office, there were children inside the home at the time of the murders.
The investigation quickly centered on Kristy’s ex-boyfriend, Troy James Rider Jr., who was 43 at the time.
Witnesses at the scene identified him, and police arrested him shortly afterward at a local apartment complex. Investigators believed domestic violence was a factor. Friends and court documents detailed an “acrimonious” breakup in December 2018. In the weeks before her death, Kristy had filed a lawsuit against Rider over a car he had taken and had also obtained an injunction that prohibited him from coming within 300 feet of her.
Rider was charged with capital murder of multiple persons, and his bond was set at $2 million. The case was prosecuted by the Texas Attorney General’s Office, which sought the death penalty. After numerous pre-trial hearings over several years, Rider’s trial was scheduled to begin in late April 2026.
On April 28, 2026, just as the trial was set to start, Troy James Rider Jr. pleaded guilty to capital murder. In exchange for his plea, he avoided a potential death sentence. A judge immediately sentenced him to life in prison without the possibility of parole. During the hearing, a victim impact statement from Kristy’s two sons was read, describing their life of grief. With the plea and sentencing, the case was officially closed in April 2026.
