The sun wasn’t up Saturday, and the pounding on Gaby Loya’s door in the quiet Aurora subdivision was loud and urgent.
Waiting at her door was a woman who identified herself as the sister of one of Loya’s neighbors.
“She was screaming, saying she needed the address because she needed to call police. Her brother had committed suicide. She said, ‘My brother killed himself,’ ” Loya, 30, said Sunday.
When police arrived and broke down the door at 2553 S. Killarney Court — three houses away from Loya’s home — they found the bodies of a man and a woman.
Maria Duron and Art Medina rented the home in September, according to the owner of the house, who asked that he not be identified. Police haven’t identified the dead couple, but officials said they were common-law husband and wife.
Police are investigating the case as an apparent murder-suicide, and no suspects are being sought. The coroner is in the process of determining the cause of death.
At least two of the four children appeared to have been in the home during the incident, said Jeri Chavez, 42, who saw the 1-year- old twins loaded into the back of an ambulance. She said she thought that Duron’s two other children, a 3-year-old girl and a 4-year-old boy, were in the home that morning.
All the children are with relatives, police said.
Duron was in the real-estate business, Chavez said. Medina had been unemployed for several months, she added.
“He told me he quit and was getting unemployment,” she said.
There was nothing out of the ordinary about the pair, whom Chavez frequently saw outside the home with their children. They were friendly, said Chavez, who has a 13-month-old daughter, Jayleen.
“We would talk about the kids. I never heard or saw them argue,” she said. “This is pretty shocking.”
On Sunday, yellow crime-scene tape blocked the couple’s home and a blue plastic tarp that police hung during their investigation still blocked the broken front door.
“It is a tragedy, what happened with that young family,” the landlord said.
Tom McGhee: 303-954-1671 or tmcghee@denverpost.com
This article has been corrected in this online archive. Originally, due to incorrect information provided by a source, the ages
and relationship of the children of Maria Duron were incorrect. Maria Duron and Art Medina were parents to a set
of fraternal twins, who are 1. Duron had two other children, a
3-year-old girl and a 4-year-old boy.
