The family of Rosa Ybarra is remembering the 67-year-old leasing agent as a loving caregiver and community fixture after her killing.

HOUSTON — A Houston family is remembering a 67-year-old leasing agent killed while at work as a loving mother, grandmother and caregiver who spent her life helping others.

Rosa Ybarra was one of two people killed in a shooting at the Park at Woodlake Apartments on Houston’s west side. Charging documents say Derrick Duane Jackson walked into the management office and shot and killed Ybarra and Felix Macz.



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Now, Ybarra’s family is demanding justice while facing the difficult task of moving forward without the woman they describe as the backbone of their family.

Ybarra’s granddaughter, Saleen Salinas, was out of town when she learned her grandmother had been killed.

“The last thing that she told me, she’ll be waiting for me when I get home, that she loved me so much and that she missed me and that she was proud of me,” Salinas said.

Ybarra’s daughter, Krystal Martinez, said her mother spent decades caring for others. Before becoming a leasing consultant, Ybarra ran a child care service and drove neighborhood children to school.

“She used to be called Miss Rosie, and she used to bus all the neighborhood kids to school and help a lot of the low-income women that didn’t have a father or something out with daycare, after-school daycare,” Martinez said.

Ybarra was also caring for her adult son with a disability and was in the process of adopting a 3-year-old boy from foster care, according to her family.

Her longtime friend, Debra Uilkie, said Ybarra was the “monarch” of the family.

“She’s the monarch of this family, and I spend holidays with them. My children spend holidays with them. It’s going to be difficult to move on,” Uilkie said.

The family has also created a GoFundMe fundraiser honoring Rosa Ybarra’s legacy to help support those she leaves behind.

As they mourn, Ybarra’s family said they want the suspect held accountable and hope no other family experiences the pain they now face.

“We just want everybody to remember her as the kind of person that she was, with her red hair, with her red lipstick, always sassy, lovable,” Sabrina Salinas said.

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