A 55-year-old man has been charged with the murder of a 47-year-old man who was found unresponsive at an Austin construction site in June. The suspect has been identified as Jose Antonio Martinez, and he told investigators that he had sold opiates since 1991.
According to the affidavit, Austin police on June 24 responded to a call at the construction site at 101 Brushy Street, where they found Luis Gerardo Cancel-Vargas unresponsive. He was pronounced dead less than half an hour after the officers arrived.
Witnesses told police that Cancel-Vargas had gone to use the restroom at around 11 a.m., and when he did not return after an hour, his coworkers checked on him and found him unconscious. Surveillance footage from the site later corroborated the timeline.
Investigators also found tin foil with burned residue inside the restroom. Cancel-Vargas’ wife, who was at the construction site, told police about her husband’s drug use and later identified his dealer, who went by the nickname “Tear Drop.” She provided the passcode to Cancel-Vargas’ cellphone, which was found in the bathroom and later helped police investigate the case.
Investigators found text messages between Cancel-Vargas and “Tear Drop,” including a final message sent around 20 minutes before the coworkers saw Cancel-Vargas go to the restroom. The messages discussed narcotics transactions, other dealers and addresses that investigators determined belonged to Jose Antonio Martinez.
Police were already investigating Martinez in a narcotics case involving the Austin Police Department, Texas Department of Public Safety and Drug Enforcement Administration.
While investigators were waiting for the Travis County medical examiner’s findings on Cancel-Vargas’ cause of death, they had already begun surveilling Martinez, according to the affidavit.
In July, an investigating officer pulled Martinez over in East Austin for failing to use his turn signal. A police K9 alerted on Martinez’s vehicle, and officers recovered a cellphone that Martinez identified as his. The number matched the one Cancel-Vargas had used to communicate with “Tear Drop.”
Police later obtained a search warrant for the phone and said its contents confirmed Martinez’s drug dealing and connection to Cancel-Vargas. Martinez was arrested on August 19 and charged with possession of fentanyl.
Martinez later admitted to selling opiates, first heroin and later fentanyl. He also said he had been in and out of prison on several charges, including selling heroin to an undercover officer.
Martinez told investigators that he had overdosed twice and was revived by friends with whom he was using drugs. He also told police that he had previously worked as a substance abuse counselor from 2019 to 2022 and had been trained to revive people experiencing opioid overdoses.