2nd person charged in Durham ambush shooting. How police think he’s connected
AI-generated summary reviewed by our newsroom.
- Durham police have charged Edy Steven Flores Reyes with first-degree murder in a May shooting.
- Search warrants link Reyes and Gracie Landa through a shared child and phone records.
- Police seized firearms and evidence from the couple’s home last week.
A second person charged in an ambush-style shooting that killed a Durham man and injured two women appears to be the father of his codefendant’s child.
Edy Steven Flores Reyes, 24, of Burlington was arrested on a charge of first-degree murder in the death of 23-year-old Christopher Piedrasanta-Perez, Durham police said Monday.
Gracie Elizabeth Faye Landa, 18, of Burlington was arrested last week in the fatal shooting, The News & Observer previously reported.
Search warrants reviewed by The N&O indicate Reyes and Landa may have a child, and that the victims were at Whipporwill Park that night because of a planned fight between Landa and another woman over Reyes.
The shooting occurred about 12:30 a.m. May 30, when Piedrasanta-Perez and two passengers in his car were shot by two to three people who emerged from the woods after they parked. One of the passengers shot back, and at least 40 casings from two different types of guns were found at the crime scene, court documents state.
Surviving victims told police they were there so a friend could fight a girl they knew as “Casey,” according to search warrants. The friend, who arrived in a separate car, had agreed to participate in the fight after “Casey” threatened the friend’s sister because she had been romantically messaging with “Casey’s” boyfriend, who police identified as Reyes, the warrants state.
Reyes and “Casey” allegedly shared a child together, according to the warrants. An Instagram account belonging to “Casey” was associated with Landa’s email address and phone number, which matched a 2025 Burlington Police Department report where Landa provided her number and email, the warrants state.
Landa went missing from her Tampa home in June 2023, and authorities later said they believed the then-17-year-old had traveled to Durham. Officials never publicly announced if she had been found.
Phone records for Landa and Reyes showed they were at the crime scene at the time of the shooting, according to a search warrant. After the killing, Reyes allegedly sent one of the surviving victims — whom he’d tried to fight a year earlier — “a series of smiley faces” via Instagram, the warrant states.
Detectives executed a search warrant at Reyes and Landa’s Burlington home Aug. 19, seizing:
- Five guns
- A brown 9 mm switch — a tool that can convert a semi-automatic handgun into a machine gun
- Multiple extended magazines
- Four cellphones
- A passport
- Spent shell casings
- Ammunition
Investigators also uncovered Instagram messages between Reyes and an unidentified third person instructing them to give Reyes a gun so the person “does not get in trouble,” according to the warrant. The person replied that they’d “already gotten rid of the gun,” the warrant states.
Reyes was already in jail in Alamance County when he was served Friday with the murder charge, Durham police said. Court records show he was arrested Aug. 19 on charges of felony possession of cocaine, simple possession of a Schedule IV controlled substance and two counts of possessing a weapon of mass destruction.
Landa remained in the Durham County jail without bail as of Monday afternoon.
This story was originally published August 25, 2025 at 3:29 PM.
