Instincts lead OC deputy to arrest murder suspect Monday

An Orange County patrol deputy checking on an SUV pulled off the side of the road late Monday morning ended up arresting a man who is accused of stabbing a man to death a few hours earlier in Harris County.

Orange County Sheriff's Captain Joey Jacobs said Deputy Summer Magnen stopped a little before 11 Monday morning to check on the gray SUV off North FM 1442 near Linscomb Road.

"As she pulls up, she's just going to do a welfare check, for like a disabled driver," Jacobs said. "She immediately sees blood and her gut instincts went off."

She asked the man to get out and notices he has blood on him and his speech is slurred. She called for Orange County detectives to come and arrests the man for public intoxication, which is a misdemeanor.

Captain Jacobs said the man told deputies he was driving from Houston to Louisiana. Orange sheriff's investigators worked to track down the owner of the SUV and made calls to the Harris County Sheriff's Office. They learned deputies there were looking for someone in connection with a stabbing death earlier in the morning.

Jacobs said the owner of the car had a connection with the victim.

Orange deputies took 20-year-old Darrian Daquan Hall into custody. Harris County investigators came to Orange and got a search warrant. "There was evidence inside the car that tied back to the murder," Jacobs said.

The Harris County Sheriff's Office reported the bloody body of 30-year-old Deandre Morris Nicholas had been found off a roadway in North Harris County about 3 a.m. Monday. He apparently had been stabbed at a nearby park, walked off and collapsed.

Jacobs said the Harris County investigators obtained an arrest warrant for capital murder against Hall from a Harris County district court. Bond was set at $1 million. Harris County and Orange County officials are working on getting him transferred to the Harris County Jail.

" I can't give enough praise to that patrolman," Jacobs said. If not for her and her instincts, a murder suspect may have gotten away.