MIAMI-DADE COUNTY, Fla. – Miami-Dade police released new video Thursday that shows a vehicle believed to have been involved in a fatal shooting that occurred last year on Interstate 95.
Police are hoping the video will generate new leads in the shooting that left 22-year-old Melissa Gonzalez dead.
“My plea to you today isn’t as a detective, it’s not as a member of law enforcement, it’s not as a member of the Miami-Dade Police Department even — it’s as a member of humanity,” Detective Juan Segovia said Thursday at a news conference with the victim’s family.
The lead investigator is still working to uncover who shot and killed Gonzalez one year ago.
Authorities said Gonzalez was driving south on I-95 near the Northwest 79th Street exit around 8:30 p.m. on Jan. 3, 2020, when a stray bullet pierced the car she was driving, whizzing behind her boyfriend, Julian Veliz Cortina, who was sitting in the passenger seat.
Segovia still believes that bullet came from gunfire on a nearby surface street — Northwest 83rd Street, which runs parallel to I-95.
The video released Thursday shows a car taking off at a high rate of speed on that surface street after the shooting.
“At the beginning of that shot, you’re going to see somebody jumping into the vehicle,” Segovia said. “And then you see the vehicle speed off at a high rate of speed. Maybe that will stir something up, maybe someone will recognize it.”
For Gonzalez’s mom, Sheilla Nunez, and her boyfriend, the pain of her loss is amplified by the void of an arrest.
Gonzalez had just graduated from Florida International University and was an aspiring attorney.
There is now a $7,000 reward for information that leads to an arrest.
Anyone with further information is asked to call Miami-Dade Crime Stoppers at 305-471-8477.