Las Cruces Bowling Alley Massacre: Part One

0:00 Speaker 1: Warning, Kind of Murdery contains adult themes, explicit language, and descriptions of violence. It is not suitable for anyone, and we recommend you stop listening now.

0:18 Speaker 2: True Crime with a dash of the paranormal, the garish, the strange in the darkly comic. A podcast that's about more than just murder. It's my very own pocket dimension, home to a curated collection of bizarre and compelling stories, the unsolved, the unsettling, and the unbelievable. I cover it all just so long as it's kind of murdery. Hey, everybody, thank you so much for being here. I've said this before, but I'll say it again. Time is money, and things are so darn expensive these days that your time is more valuable than ever.

0:54 Speaker 2: And boy, I sure do appreciate you choosing to spend that time with me. I am Zevanote And this is kind of Murdery. And today I'm going to be telling you a story that was inspired by the suggestion of a listener named Paul, who brought to my attention the Los Crusius Bowling Alley massacre. So here we go. That's where we're headed today. This is part one of kind of murders the Los Crucis Bowling Alley Massacre, and it starts now February tenth, nineteen ninety Saturday morning in Los Crusis, New Mexico.

1:36 Speaker 2: The place is Los Crusis Bowl. Nothing special from the outside, a low building with a wide parking lot, the kind of spot people go to because they've been going there for years. Inside, it's exactly what you'd expect. Long rows of lanes stretching out under fluorescent lights, the steady smell of oil and cleaner baked into the wood, and the carpet front counter off to one side where they handle shoes and payments, and that a small office, tight functional where they keep the safe, the paperwork and money from the night before.

2:06 Speaker 2: Mornings like this don't carry much weight. You're not dealing with the crowd yet. It's just opening up lights, registers, getting everything ready before the first customers drift in. The routine doesn't change. Unlock the doors, count the cash, check the drawers, make sure nothing's off from the previous night. It's muscle memory more than anything. People move through it without thinking. There were seven people inside that morning, employees getting the place ready, moving between the counter and the office handling the same tasks they handled every weekend.

2:35 Speaker 2: A couple of kids were there too. That wasn't unusual. Bowling alleys always had that overlap work and family. People hanging around because they were part of the place, not just passing through it. Nobody's on edge, nobody's watching the door thinking about who might come through it. There's no reason to. The office door opens and closes as part of the routine. Someone steps in to check the safe, steps back out. Another goes in to grab something, maybe paperwork, maybe to confirm the count. It's all ordinary, the kind of movement that doesn't stick in your memory because it happens the same way every time.

3:08 Speaker 2: The front door is unlocked, that's standard. You don't keep it shut at that hour. You're open, even if the business hasn't started yet. It's a glass door. You can see straight through into the building from the parking lot. Lights are on, people are moving place looks active. Nothing about it says stay out. From outside, it looks like any other morning. Inside it feels like one too. No raised voices, no urgency, no sense that anything is about to break from the pattern. Just people doing their jobs, moving through a space they know in a rhythm.

3:39 Speaker 2: They don't have to think about any more. That's how it was. When the door opened, two men walk in. Nobody reacts right away. At that hour, people come and go. Someone might be early, might be looking for a lane, might be there to ask a question at the counter. You don't stop what you're doing. Every time the door opens, your glance maybe, then you go back to whatever your handing. That's how places like this work. You assume anyone who walks in belongs there. They don't announce themselves, they don't hurry.

4:07 Speaker 2: They come in through the entrance like they've done it before, like they know exactly what kind of place this is and how it operates in the morning. That's the part that matters. Nothing about their injury forces a reaction. For a few seconds, they're just there, part of the same space as everyone else. Then they start talking. It's not loud, not aggressive in the way people expect trouble to sound. It's controlled, direct, the kind of tone that cuts through what's already happening without needing volume.

4:36 Speaker 2: People stop moving not because they're startled, but because something in the way it's said doesn't fit. It doesn't belong in the rhythm of the room. The guns come out right after that. That's when everything settles or unsettles into place. Nobody asks questions, nobody tests it. There's no confusion about what's happening. Once the weapons are visible, the room changes without anyone having to say it out loud. The distance between people, the open space that existed a minute earlier. That all stops mattering.

5:06 Speaker 2: The guns take that away. What's left is compliance. They tell everyone to move the office. That's where they want them. They don't grab anyone, they don't chase any one down. They don't need to. The instructions are enough, and the guns make sure those instructions get followed. One person moves, then another, then the rest. It happens in sequence, steady controlled, no scrambling, no sudden break for the door. There isn't an opening for that. They keep talking while it happens, not yelling, just directing who goes first, who follows, where to stand once they're inside.

5:40 Speaker 2: It's specific without being complicated. Every step is clear, and nobody inside the building has any reason to think that ignoring it would end well. The office starts filling up. One person goes in, then another, then another, until all seven are inside. That room. It wasn't built for that many people. You can see it in how they have to stand, how close they are to each other, how there's no space left. Once the last one crosses the threshold, the door is right there behind them, still open for a moment.

6:08 Speaker 2: As the last person steps through, the two men follow them in. They don't stay outside, and they don't leave anyone in the main area. They bring the whole situation into that room with them and close the distance down to nothing. One of them shifts slightly toward the door, keeping it in his line of sight. The other faces the group. They don't need to say anything to make it clear what comes next. The door closes. Out on the lanes, nothing is changed. The lights are still on, the front counter is still empty.

6:34 Speaker 2: The entrance is still unlocked. A glass door facing the parking lot, just like it always does. Anyone driving past would see the same thing they would have five minutes earlier. Inside the office, every bit of that morning has been pulled into one room and locked in place. Once the door shuts, the rest of the building might as well not exist. Everything is inside the office now, seven people packed into a room that was never meant to hold them, There's a desk pushed against one wall, filing cabinets, the safe.

7:02 Speaker 2: That's it. No extra space, no corner to step into and get distance. Everyone's close enough to feel each other, shifting, breathing, trying not to move more than they have to. The two men stay in the room with them. They don't hover or pace like they're unsure of what to do. They settle into positions that give them control of the whole space. One keeps the door in his peripheral vision, making sure nothing changes behind him. The other watches the group directly. The guns are still out, still steady, still doing all the work.

7:34 Speaker 2: Nobody needs to be reminded what they mean. The men start giving instructions again, not rushed, not complicated, simple things. Where to stand, who sits, how to position themselves so everyone stays visible. It's not about efficiency, it's about control. Every adjustment keeps the room exactly how they want it. Nobody moves unless they're told to, and when they are told to, it's small, deliberate, just enough to tighten the space even more. There's no talking from anyone else, not the kind that carries across the room anyway.

8:07 Speaker 2: No questions, no attempts to slow things down or redirect what's happening. People answer when they're told to answer. Otherwise, they stay quiet, the kind of quiet that isn't natural, the kind of quiet that's forced into place. Time doesn't move the way it did a few minutes earlier. There's no sense of what's happening outside that room. No sound from the lanes, no door opening, no interruption from the front of the building. The office is sealed off in a way that has nothing to do with locks or barriers.

8:35 Speaker 2: It's sealed because everything that matters is happening inside it, and nothing from outside is getting in. The men don't rush. That's the part that doesn't fit if you're thinking about this like a simple robbery. They're not in a hurry to get through it. They don't act like they're worried about how long they've been there or who might show up. They've taken the room and they're holding it like time isn't a factor. Nobody's been hurt yet. But the way things are set up, it's clear that that's not because it couldn't happen.

9:05 Speaker 2: It's because it hasn't happened yet. The space stays tight, the door stays closed, The rest of the building stays quiet and unchanged, like nothing has been interrupted. Anyone walking in through the front entrance would still see lights on lanes empty, a normal morning in progress. Inside the office, seven people are standing or sitting where they've been placed, close enough so that there's no room left between them, under the control of two men who haven't needed to raise their voices once to take over the entire building, and they're still not done.

9:37 Speaker 2: It comes out simple, no speech, no build up, just what they want and who's going to give it to them. The office is where the money's kept, so they've already put themselves exactly where they need to be. No searching, no moving people back out into the open. Everything happens right there. They tell them to open the safe. Whoever has access steps forward and does it. Hands aren't steady, but they get the job done. There's no hesitation that changes anything. Nobody's arguing, nobody's stalling. With two guns in the room and nowhere to go, there's only one direction this part can take.

10:11 Speaker 2: The safe opens, cash is taken out and hand it over. Bills from the night before, operating money for the day, not a huge amount, something in the range of four or five thousand dollars, enough to matter to the business, not enough to explain anything beyond a straightforward robbery. They take it. At that point, it should be finished. That's how it usually goes. You get what you came for, you leave, Nobody gets hurt if nobody complicates it. The room should have opened back up, the door should have been unlocked, and the whole thing should have ended as fast as it started.

10:43 Speaker 2: But it doesn't. The men don't move toward the door. They don't back out of the office. They don't release anyone or tell them to stay put while they leave. They stay right where they are, holding the same positions, keeping the same control that they've had from the start. The money is already in their hands, but nothing about the room changes. The people inside don't get any space back. They don't get any distance from each other or from the two men. The guns are still there, still pointed, still keeping everything exactly where it is.

11:13 Speaker 2: The instructions stopped for a moment, but the robber's control of the room doesn't. Time starts to feel different, not because anything new is happening, but because nothing is happening when it should be. The part that made sense, the robbery has already been completed. What's left doesn't line up with that any more. The two men shift slightly in the room, small movements to keep everyone in view. One adjusts his position near the door, making sure it stays covered. The other keeps his focus on the group.

11:42 Speaker 2: They don't look like they're deciding what to do next. They look like they already know. Nobody's told to leave, nobody's told to sit tight and wait. They're just held there. The door stays closed behind them. The rest of the building stays quiet. Out front. The glass entrance still shows a place that looks open and lit, ready for business. There's no sign from the outside that anything has changed inside the office. The robbery is over, but the room is still locked in place, and no one inside has been given a reason why they should have been gone already.

12:15 Speaker 2: The men, the robbers, They should have been gone. That's the part that starts to sit wrong, even if nobody inside the room says it out loud. The money's already in their hands. There's nothing left to take, nothing left to open, nothing left to explain. Every step that would normally bring something like this to an end has already happened. But the two men stay where they are. They don't hurry, They don't move toward the door. They don't tell anyone to lie down or count to a hundred while they leave.

12:42 Speaker 2: They don't create distance between themselves and the people in the room. If anything, they keep that distance exactly the same, tight controlled, close enough that no one in the room could shift position without being noticed immediately. The room holds nobody inside. It moves unless they're told to. Nobody speaks unless they're answering something directly. The kind of quiet that settles in isn't natural. It's the result of everything being locked into place with no indication of what comes next.

13:11 Speaker 2: The two men make small adjustments. One steps a little closer to the desk, then back. The other angles himself slightly so he can see everyone without turning his head. They're not pacing, not restless. It's measured. Every movement has a purpose, even if that purpose isn't clear to anyone else in the room. They're not arguing, they're not asking each other what to do. There's no moment where one of them hesitates or looks uncertain. Whatever they're doing, they're doing it together, and they're doing it like they expected to still be standing in that room at this point, and that's what makes the time stretch.

13:46 Speaker 2: It's not just that they're staying, it's that they're staying without any sign that something has gone wrong. No complication, no interruption, nothing forcing them to linger. The robbery didn't stall out or take longer than planned. It happened clean, and still they're there. Outside. Nothing changes. The building doesn't react because it doesn't have a way to the front. Door stays unlocked. The parking lot doesn't fill up. No one walks in at the wrong moment. There's no outside pressure pushing against what's happening in that office, and inside the office, the air feels heavier, not because anything new has happened, but because nothing has happened.

14:24 Speaker 2: That explains why they haven't left. The longer it goes, the harder it is to match what's happening in that room with what it's supposed to be. Nobody is released, nobody is separated out. Everyone stays in that same tight space, close enough to hear every movement, every shift of weight, every small adjustment that the two men make. The guns haven't gone away, they haven't lowered them or put them aside. Now that the money's been taken. They keep them ready, part of the same control that they've had from the start that never changes.

14:57 Speaker 2: There's a point at which it stops feeling like they're waiting for something, and it starts feeling like the waiting itself is part of it. And then the shooting starts. There isn't a warning that changes anything in the room, no shift that opens space or gives anyone a chance to move differently than they already have. It comes out of the same control the two men have held from the moment they walked in like it belongs to the sequence that they've been following the whole time. The first shot is fired at close range in a room that small, there's no distance for it to travel.

15:28 Speaker 2: The sound fills everything up at once. It doesn't echo out into the rest of the building in any way that brings help. It stays contained the same way that everything else has stayed contained since the door closed. Then more shots follow. They're not firing wildly, they're not spraying the room or losing control of what they're doing. They're aiming one person at a time, close enough that there's no question where the shots are going or what they're meant to do the positions that people were forced into earlier, standing close, sitting where they were told.

15:59 Speaker 2: Those positions don't change. There's no room to break away, no path to the door that doesn't run straight into the men holding the guns. People are hit where they are, Some are shot more than once, some collapse immediately. Others are hit and stay conscious, still in the same space, still within arm's reach of everyone else. The distance between people never changes. The men don't rush through it, they don't move in a way that suggests panic or hesitation. They continue in the same deliberate manner they've been moving since the beginning, focused on the people in front of them, finishing what they started when they brought everyone into that room.

16:35 Speaker 2: The office door stays closed. Nothing from outside interrupts it, No one walks in, No one hears enough from outside to change what's happening inside. The rest of the building stays exactly as it was, quiet, open, unchanged, while everything in that room, While the lives of everyone in that room, their fates are decided within a few feet of space. The shooting continues until the men stop, not because something forces them to stop, but because they choose to. When it ends, the room hasn't rearranged itself.

17:08 Speaker 2: It's the same walls, the same desk, the same tight space. But now there are people lying on the floor dead and others who have been shot and are still alive, still confined with the rest of the victims, trying to stay conscious. No one has been moved out, no one has been helped. Everything that has happened is still contained inside that office, exactly where it took place. The men have gone still after the shooting. But then they move again, not quickly, not in a way that suggests they're trying to get out before somebody sees them.

17:39 Speaker 2: It's the same kind of movement they've used the whole time, deliberate, controlled, like they're working through steps they already know. They start setting the fire, they don't tear the room apart to do it. They don't need to. Whatever they use to start that fire, they find it all contained within that office, close to everything that has already happened. Their goal isn't to burn the building down. It's to burn what's inside the office, to damage whatever's left behind, to use fire to hide evidence.

18:10 Speaker 2: Heat builds in a room that already doesn't have much space. Smoke starts to gather low at first, then thicker. The air changes. It gets harder to breathe, harder to see. The same walls that kept every one inside now hold the smoke in place too. The two men don't stay for the fire to take over. They've done what they came to do, and now they leave. They move out of the office, back into the main part of the building and out through the front door they walked through. There's no one there to stop them, no one outside to see them leave.

18:39 Speaker 2: They're gone the very same way they arrived, without drawing attention. Inside, the fire continues to build. The office holds it for a moment, then it starts to push outward. Smoke moves into the main area of the building, spreading through the open spaces of the lanes and towards the front. The structure of the bowling alley doesn't stop it, it carries it. The people left inside the office are still there. Some don't move at all. They're already dead. Others are alive, injured, surrounded by heat and smoke.

19:09 Speaker 2: The room hasn't opened, hasn't given them any way out. Everything that's happened from the moment the door first closed to now has stayed contained in that same space from outside. It takes time before anything looks wrong. Then the smoke starts to show. The smoke is what finally gets noticed, not right away, not the second it starts, but soon enough that someone passing by sees it coming out of the building and knows that something is wrong. A patrol officer spots it and calls it in. Fire units respond.

19:40 Speaker 2: They don't know what they're walking into yet at that point. It's just a structure fire at a bowling alley, something burning inside a building that should be empty except for whoever opened it that morning. They move in to put the fire out. The front entrance is still unlocked. They go through the same door the two men used earlier. Inside the building looks wrong immediately. Smoke has spread through the main area, hanging in the air, cutting visibility. The lanes are still empty, but the place isn't quiet anymore.

20:08 Speaker 2: There's movement, urgency, the sound of equipment, and voices. As they start working the fire. They push toward where the smoke is coming from. That leads them to the office. The fire is inside that room, that's where it's strongest. They move in. They put water on it. They start knocking it down. It takes time. Fire and smoke don't give anything back easily, and whatever's inside that office has already been burning long enough to do damage. As the fire fighters get control of it, they start to see what's in the room.

20:37 Speaker 2: There are people inside. At first its shapes, then its bodies. It's not a single victim. It's not something that can be explained by the fire itself. There are multiple people, all in the same confined area, all where they were when the robbery and then the shooting first happened. Some of them are already dead, others are alive. The responders shift immediately from putting out the fire to pulling people out, calling for medical assistance, trying to get to the ones who are still breathing. The building fills with more units fire, police, medical, and the scene changes from a fire response to something else entirely.

21:15 Speaker 2: It's no longer just about putting out flames. It's about what was done inside that office before the fire ever started. Outside, the area begins to lock down, vehicles pull in, lights flashing. People are held back. As the situation becomes clear, words starts to spread that this isn't just a fire, something happened inside that building. Something that didn't start with smoke inside the office is still the center of it. That's where everything leads back to. The call comes from inside the building.

21:47 Speaker 2: It doesn't come in a clear report. It comes in a broken, strained voice, the voice of someone who shouldn't be able to speak at all, but does anyway. A twelve year old girl shot multiple times, still conscious, still able to reach a phone and dial for help inside a building that's already filling with smoke. She tells them where she is. She tells them what happened, as much as she can get out. The words aren't laid out in any clean sequence. They don't need to be. The dispatcher hears enough to understand that this isn't just a fire, not even close.

22:20 Speaker 2: There are people inside, there's been shooting. There are others in the room with her. The call becomes the first account of what happened, not from the outside, not from someone piecing it together afterward, but from someone who lived through it and is still there while everything is unfolding around her. She stays on the line as long as she can. Every word takes effort, every breath is work, but she keeps talking long enough to make sure they know. By the time responders reach her, the building is already in motion, fire crews, working officers moving through the space, medics being called in.

22:55 Speaker 2: That office is no longer just the source of the fire. It's the center of everything. And they find her inside that same room. She's been shot and left there with the others. She's alive, barely but alive. They move her out, get her into the hands of medical personnel, and she's taken from the building that never gave her a way out on her own. Around her, the rest of the scene settles into what it is. Seven people had been inside that office. Five of them are dead, two survived. The fire didn't cause the deaths.

23:27 Speaker 2: The fire came after investigators start arriving, while the last of the smoke is clearing, The building is secured, the perimeter pushed back, access controlled. What started as a response to smoke becomes something else, something that pulls in detectives, evidence, texts, people who know how to read a room after everything inside has already happened, and the office is where everything leads back to the confined space. The positions of the bodies, the damage from the fire layered over the damage that was already there.

23:59 Speaker 2: They don't have the benefit of a clean scene. Heat and water have already taken their toll. Whatever was left behind has been altered, degraded, in some cases erased. The robbery part is easy to understand. The rest of it isn't. They took a few thousand dollars and stayed anyway, held the room, shot everyone inside of it, set the fire after walked out the same way they'd come in, without anyone stopping them, without anyone even knowing they'd been there until the smoke started showing. That's where it sits.

24:33 Speaker 2: A place that looked open, a room that got sealed, and two men who walked in took control, shot seven people, set a fire, and left nothing behind that made them easy to find. All right, That's the end of the Los Crusis Bowling Alley Massacre Part one. Please join me next Thursday, April ninth for part two. And Hey, if you know anybody who likes a true crime podcast, a friend, a family member, a coworker, a random person on the street who's maybe wearing a button that says I love true crime podcasts, please do tell them about the show.

25:10 Speaker 2: Tell them about kind of murdery I sure would appreciate it. I'll see you next week. I'm Zevanodleberg and this has been kind of Murdery.

25:21 Speaker 1: If you like the show, please subscribe, review and tell your friends. You can find us on social media at kinda Murdery or email at Kindermurdery at gmail dot com