Fabián Shoots Casavales and Miranda

Fabián Shoots Casavales and Miranda is the killing of boxer Eric Casavales and his promoter, José Miranda, by Fabián Martínez in Rosarito. Its significance lies not only in the deaths but in the unresolved account of why they occurred: the narrative gives a sudden street confrontation and a rival story of business strategy, then shows how rumor makes Fabián’s reputation more durable than his denials.

Setting and Circumstances

The encounter takes place one night in Rosarito, where Fabián is spending time casually when he crosses paths with Casavales and Miranda. Casavales is a capable boxer, but on this occasion he is drunk and mistakes the quiet, affluent young man for someone he can provoke. Their meeting begins with ordinary friction: they jostle, drinks spill, shirts are stained, and words are exchanged. The sequence makes the violence emerge from a seemingly minor public dispute rather than from an openly declared confrontation.

Miranda attempts to lead Casavales away. Before he can do so, Casavales takes a pistol from his waistband and waves it at Fabián. The account presents the gesture as part of the boxer’s drunken mockery; Casavales then staggers away laughing at the fear he believes he has caused. This immediate insult and display of a weapon form the stated trigger in the chance-encounter version of events, though the book later complicates whether the meeting was accidental at all.

The Killing

After Casavales leaves, Fabián goes to his Mercedes and takes a pistol from the glove box. He finds Casavales and Miranda standing outside the boxer’s car and shoots both men. The narrative distinguishes this return from the earlier scuffle: Fabián has left the encounter, obtained his own weapon, and sought the two men out. The account therefore depicts a deliberate decision to return and confront them, even as it leaves the larger motive unsettled.

Fabián throws the pistol into the ocean, gets back into the Mercedes, and drives to Tijuana. The brief aftermath moves from the deaths to his departure without describing the physical consequences in detail. The narration says he feels good about himself, then sharpens that point by repeating the self-satisfaction. That reaction sits uneasily beside the apparent impulsiveness of the encounter: the violence is not presented as an act followed by visible remorse, but as one that, in this version, leaves Fabián pleased with himself.

Competing Accounts

The book explicitly marks the chance-encounter narrative as only one version. A competing story, popular at Ted’s Big Boy, holds that Fabián’s confrontation with Casavales was not accidental. According to this account, Miranda was blocking a bout that Cesar Felizardo needed in order to advance, and would not accept an offer that Adán Barrera had personally made, despite its being described as reasonable. This version recasts the killing as connected to the management of boxing opportunities and the interests of the Barrera organization, rather than as a response to a drunken insult.

The sequence offers a later circumstance that gives the rumor its force: later that year, Felizardo receives his fight for the lightweight championship and wins it. That outcome is consistent with the alleged benefit of removing the promoter’s obstruction, but it does not establish that the murder was arranged for that purpose. The account is careful to preserve the uncertainty. Nobody knows the real reason, and the reader is given no final confirmation that either explanation is complete.

Reputation and Narrative Significance

Fabián denies killing anyone for any reason. The denial does not settle the question; the more he denies it, the more credible the stories become to those repeating them. The event thus has two outcomes: Casavales and Miranda are dead, while the explanation remains contested and circulates as part of Fabián’s public identity. The gap between what can be narrated as a sequence of actions and what can be known about their motive is central to the episode.

The story also joins Fabián’s growing association with the Juniors to a reputation for lethal decisiveness. Raúl Barrera gives him the nickname El Tiburón, a label that turns the killing and its surrounding rumors into a recognizable persona. The book does not resolve whether Fabián acted from anger, pursued a strategic objective, or became the subject of a story shaped by others. Instead, it shows how the unresolved alternatives themselves help make the reputation: the act is concrete, the motive uncertain, and the denials unable to control what people believe.