AUSTIN, Texas — Domitilia Caal Pop said her partner, Emmanuel Pop Ba, would call her on his lunch break every day while he was at work.
But on Dec. 5, on the hour Pop Ba would typically call, she didn't hear from him.
Fear began to loom. Caal Pop would later learn the man she had shared her life with for 10 years had been shot and killed.
Pop Ba, 32, leaves behind three children: two girls he shares with Caal Pop and a son he adopted from his homeland of Guatemala.
"Let there be justice for who did this. Emmanuel has a family and he has children, and they left my children without a father," Caal Pop told KVUE in Spanish.
PHOTOS: Emmanuel Pop Ba leaves behind partner of 10 years, 3 children
Caal Pop detailed how she stood paralyzed at the sight of Austin Police Department officers knocking at her door to deliver the news she dreaded having to hear.
"That's when they told me they found him dead from a gunshot wound," Caal Pop said. "I could have never imagined they would come and tell me that tragedy."
Pop Ba had been working as a mover in the area of Shadywood Drive in South Austin, where one of four shooting sprees unfolded.
His sister-in-law, Filomena Caal Pop, explained how Pop Ba would always eat his lunch in his car on his break and call his family. But on that fateful day as the alleged gunman ran loose across Austin, Pop Ba lost his life.
Pop Ba's sister-in-law said he came from Guatemala to the U.S. to make a life for himself and his family. He brought Filomena Caal Pop along so her sister could have company.
It's a debt she hopes she can repay now that her brother-in-law is gone.
"What's left for me to do is to do the same for his family since now he won't be able to," Filomena Caal Pop said in Spanish.
Domitilia and Filomena Caal Pop describe Pop Ba – who would have been 33 on Dec. 24 – as a good father, someone dedicated to his family and a man of his word.
"There are so many families that are left destroyed ... They don't realize what they do to the families," Domitilia Caal Pop said.
A GoFundMe was started by Filomena Caal Pop. The family hopes once they get funeral arrangements sorted in the U.S., they will be able to take Pop Ba's body to Guatemala so the rest of his family can honor his life.