Search for suspects in California 'massacre' of 6 continues

"We also believe this was not a random act of violence. We believe this was a targeted family," Tulare County Sheriff Mike Boudreaux said Monday at a news conference.

Samuel Pina said his granddaughter, 16-year-old Alissa Parraz, and her 10-month-old baby, Nycholas Nolan Parraz, were among those killed.

"I can't wrap my head around what kind of monster would do this," he told The Associated Press.

Pina said Parraz and her baby were living with her father's side of the family in Goshen, and that her dad's uncle, her dad's cousin, her grandmother and her great-grandmother were also killed.

He said the family is in shock.

"It comes in big waves," he said.

Boudreaux told the Los Angeles Times it appeared Alissa Parraz and her child were shot in the head as she tried to run away. A deputy found the bodies of the infant, cradled in his mother's arms, in a ditch outside the home. An elderly woman appeared to be shot in the head while she slept.

Boudreaux told the newspaper that he believes the violence is connected to a cartel, but did not name which organization investigators are looking into.

"If (they) are specifically shooting everyone in the head, they know what they are doing ... (and) they are comfortable with what they are doing," the sheriff told the Times.

Deputies responded around 3:30 a.m. Monday to reports of multiple shots fired at the residence in unincorporated Goshen, some 35 miles (56 kilometers) southeast of Fresno.

"Actually the report was that an active shooter was in the area because of the number of shots that were being fired," Boudreaux said at the news conference.

Deputies found two victims dead in the street and a third person fatally shot in the doorway of the residence, Boudreaux said.

Three more victims were found inside the home, including a man who was still alive but later died at a hospital, he said.

The sheriff's office previously said the teen mother was 17 and her child was 6 months old.

Rural California is no stranger to drug-related violence. In 2020, seven people were fatally shot in a small, rural Riverside County town where the property had been used for an illegal marijuana growing operation — a common practice in that area.

The following year, a man accidentally shot himself while working at his family's illegal marijuana grow in Butte County's Forbestown. His father and two brothers were accused of moving his body to prevent investigators from discovering the grow site.

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Associated Press Researcher Rhonda Shafner in New York contributed to this report.