Inset: Bobby Joe McCullah, Jr. (Harris County Sheriff's Office). Background: The street where the defendant allegedly hit his girlfriend with a U-Haul truck in Humble, Texas (Google Maps).
A Texas man is behind bars after killing his girlfriend with a U-Haul truck, law enforcement in the Lone Star State says.
Bobby Joe McCullah, Jr., 35, stands accused of one count of murder over the death of 35-year-old Amber Mauceli.
The incident occurred Friday morning on Ravendale Road in Humble — a small town in the northeastern Houston metro area.
Authorities allege the defendant killed the victim by "striking" her with "a deadly weapon, namely, a motor vehicle," according to a relatively threadbare criminal complaint obtained by Law&Crime.
At around 5:15 a.m. that morning, Harris County Sheriff's Office deputies were called to the location — near Old Humble Road and Homestead Road — in response to reports of a woman who had been hit by a U-Haul truck, law enforcement said.
Witnesses at the scene told investigators they heard McCullah and Mauceli in a verbal altercation just minutes before the 911 call was made, the sheriff's office said in a press release.
"Mauceli [was found] lying unresponsive in the roadway with injuries consistent with being struck by a vehicle," the sheriff's office said. "EMS responded and pronounced her deceased at the scene."
That same day, the defendant was located and arrested.
While the charging document is largely conclusory, a court order referring a bail decision to the district court elaborates on the allegations of the case, according to law enforcement.
The judge wrote:
Officer arrived on scene and observed [the victim] lying on the ground in the middle of the roadway suffering from being run over by a vehicle and sustaining multiple abrasions consistent with road rash. [The victim] was pronounced deceased on scene. [Witnesses] stated that they observed [the victim] being struck by a U-Haul truck and [the truck] flee the scene. Officer spoke to friends of [the victim] and [defendant], and she stated that they owned a Dodge Charger and a U-Haul truck, which no one other than the [defendant] and [the victim] drove. Surveillance shows that at 4:54 am [defendant] and [the victim] were arguing and that at 5:11 am [the victim] was struck by the U-Haul and run over.
After that, the U-Haul allegedly left the scene.
Later, a group of students allegedly told a sheriff's deputy that the "U-Haul struck [the victim]," so she located the truck "and asked [defendant] if he hit anyone, and he stated no," the order says.
The case is being investigated as an intimate partner homicide, according to the sheriff's office.
McCullah is currently detained in the Harris County Jail awaiting a bond determination.
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