Man charged with murder in former area resident’s death

A Texas man has been charged with capital murder in the death of a former Whitfield County resident who was living near Houston.

Luis Eduardo Guzman, 31, was taken into custody on Wednesday by the Montgomery County (Texas) Sheriff’s Office and is being held without bond in the Dec. 21 home invasion death of Lisa Lynette Whitt-Ulloa, 34, who formerly worked as a real estate agent in Chatsworth and Dalton. Guzman was arrested without incident in the Waller County city of Brookshire at his place of employment as a welder, according to The Courier newspaper of Montgomery County, Texas (www.hcnonline.com).

A press release following the invasion said two masked men entered the home through an unlocked door and bound and assaulted family members with wooden clubs, including Whitt-Ulloa’s husband, Michael, 26, and her 18-year-old daughter. A son was staying with nearby relatives. The husband and daughter were taken to a hospital with injuries, but Whitt-Ulloa died by strangulation, according to a forensic report.

Whitt-Ulloa and her daughter were from Georgia, investigators said. Robbery is suspected as a motive.

Realtor Velma Ray recalled Whitt-Ulloa, whom she knew as Lisa Brock, as “bubbly” when they worked together at Peach Realty in Chatsworth.

“She was always a happy-type person,” Ray said. “I had not kept up with her, but it’s just so sad. She was so young, too.”

Mike Doran, owner and broker at Re/Max Select Realty in Dalton, also knew Whitt-Ulloa.

“She was very likable, and a hard-working person who did well,” he said. “She did a lot of new construction (real estate) with her late husband, Danny Witt. I was glad to see on the Internet posting where the guy who did it was arrested.”

Danny Witt, a Whitfield County contractor, died in August 2008 from what authorities determined was a self-inflicted gunshot to the abdomen.

Whitt-Ulloa was listed as an agent with ERA Trinity in an area real estate listings magazine in November 2006, and as working with Re/Max Select Realty in March of 2007 in a similar publication.

Officials with the Montgomery County sheriff’s office and the Montgomery County District Attorney’s Office declined comment on whether either department had additional suspects in connection with the home invasion, the newspaper reported.

Capital murder is punishable by life without parole or death by lethal injection in Texas. Prosecutors did not say whether they would seek the death penalty.