Forty-year-old Dr. Anthony Garcia is pictured in this photo released by the Omaha Police.OMAHA, Neb. – Authorities arrested an Indiana doctor Monday on suspicion of carrying out two attacks in Omaha over the past five years in which four people were killed who had ties to a local university medical school that fired him in 2001.
Dr. Anthony Garcia, who now lives in Terre Haute, Ind., was arrested by Illinois State Police during a traffic stop Monday in Union County, which is in the south of the state near Illinois’ borders with Indiana and Missouri, Omaha Police Chief Todd Schmaderer said. Officers said he appeared to be intoxicated when they arrested him that he had a .45-caliber handgun with him.
Garcia, 40, was being held in Illinois on suspicion of four counts of first-degree murder and four counts of using a weapon to commit a felony, Schmaderer said. An Illinois State Police official declined to discuss details of Garcia’s arrest or detention, and said any questions should go to Omaha police.
Garcia didn’t have a listed phone number in Terre Haute or in Chicago, where he previously lived, and it wasn’t immediately clear if he had an attorney. No one answered the phone at his family’s home in Walnut, Calif., Monday evening.
Public records show that since 2003, Garcia has held medical licenses in California, Illinois and Indiana, but his temporary Indiana license expired in January.