Just past 7 pm on Sunday evening, October 15, local resident Sara Castleberry, saw a black SUV driving up their long driveway. They live on CR 7611 located just south of Devine, off to the right before you get to Luckey Feed Lot. Three strangers were in the vehicle, a man and a woman along with a little boy, but as the woman approached the homeowner Sara, she called her by name.
“They were driving very slowly, so I told my seven-year-old son to go to his bedroom, and I got my gun and walked outside. My dog started going nuts as soon as they pulled up to our house and a woman walked up and met me at the gate. She asked, ‘Are you Sara?’ I said ‘yes’, and she said ‘I really need to talk to you about something, if we can go somewhere where it’s a little more quiet.'”
Meanwhile, the Castleberry’s guard dog was snarling and barking at the unwelcome visitors.
“I told her ‘no, you are making me feel extremely uncomfortable and my husband will be here any minute.'”
Sara said she could see a man who was still sitting in the vehicle, and the back window was rolled down so she could see a little boy in the back seat, too.
“Then she told me, ‘My name is Crystal…and I think you are possibly my mother.”
Shocked, Sara asked how old the woman was, and the woman responded that she was 30 years old. Sara knew at that point that the woman was lying as Sara is only 28.
“Our conversation lasted about five minutes, and she just wasn’t saying anything that makes sense,” Sara said. “It was so scary. I can hardly sleep now. She kept trying to get me to go somewhere else ‘to talk’. I think she was trying to get me away from our dog, which was growling and snarling at her and wouldn’t let her in the yard,” Sara said.
Once Sara’s husband Billy arrived home, he asked them to leave repeatedly. The homeowners became especially nervous after the male got out of the SUV and put his hands in his pockets. Shortly after the strangers left the residence in their SUV, Sara got into her truck to follow them and alert 9-1-1.
She caught up with them shortly afterward, and followed them while on the phone with dispatch. According to Sara, they stopped just south of Devine, where she believes the couple dropped off the little boy who was in the back seat. Then, the black Dodge Durango SUV went into Devine, and stopped at the Pico’s gas station. At that point, a Devine PD officer responded and met the suspects, followed by several other deputies and officers. A male and female were both arrested and jailed.
According to the Sheriff’s department “The officers located mail that was stolen from CR 7611. No further information on this case is available at this time.”
Later after talking to her neighbor, Sara found out that the man and woman in the SUV had stopped at her neighbor’s house, Cullen Whitney, to get some information before they approached her home.
“They stopped to talk to my 80-year-old neighbor, claiming they used to live in our house, and they asked him who lives here, and he told them ‘Sara and Billy’ live there.’ So that’s how they found out my name,” Sara said. “The couple also showed the neighbor a stack of mail belonging to a man named Larry who used to live down the street from us. Larry passed away several months ago, and they told my neighbor they were picking up the mail for Larry, not realizing Larry had passed away.”
“I don’t know what to think,” Sara adds, “All I know is I cannot sleep. I don’t know what they wanted or why they came to our house, but I feel like they were dangerous and I want to warn everyone in case they show up at your house.”
Cullen Whitney adds, “The lady said ‘Oh I used to live down there,’ pointing to Sara and Billy’s house, which I know is a lie because I’ve lived here a long time and I know who lived there before. Then she told me she died 3 times and was revived on that property. I asked her what her name was but she just kept looking up at the sky, and looking around and across the field. That’s when she showed me a stack of mail about an inch thick, with my old neighbor’s name on it. He passed away about a year and a half ago. She jabbered on for a while, and I couldn’t understand half of what she said. A few minutes later a young boy she called her son came walking up to my house, and then this woman’s husband, (who I could see parked at Larry’s old house), drove up and they got in the car with them. That’s when they drove over to my neighbor Sara’s house. I had never seen that black SUV or those people before. Before she left, the lady was admiring my mail box and said, ‘You sure have a big mail box!’…..I know they have been admiring Larry’s mail box, so I hope I’m not next!”
