One witness disarmed the suspect while another stayed with the wounded man, whose final statement became part of the murder investigation.
HALLANDALE BEACH, Fla. — Two witnesses broke up a violent confrontation between roommates at a South Florida mobile home park, police say, but the injured man managed to walk only a short distance before collapsing after identifying the man now charged with his murder.
The witnesses occupy an unusually important place in the case against Edy Rivas Rizo, 27, because police say they not only saw portions of the Aug. 2 confrontation but also separated the men, removed a machete from the fight and remained with each man afterward. Their accounts helped investigators trace what happened before officers arrived at the Sea Esta Mobile Home Park in Hallandale Beach. One witness told police the victim pointed toward Rivas Rizo and said, “That guy just killed me,” shortly before collapsing. The victim later died at a hospital.
Police were dispatched to the mobile home park in the 300 block of Sea Esta Lane at about 1:15 p.m. after calls reporting a stabbing. By the time officers arrived, the physical struggle had ended. The wounded roommate was on the ground, and Rivas Rizo had gone back toward the home the men shared, according to accounts of the arrest report. Officers found Rivas Rizo there and ordered him outside. He complied, police said. The victim was taken to HCA Florida Aventura Hospital and was pronounced dead after the confrontation. Authorities redacted his name from the publicly reported arrest document.
What happened in the minutes before police reached the neighborhood was reconstructed through eyewitness accounts and surveillance footage. Investigators said video showed the victim running while Rivas Rizo followed him carrying a large machete-style knife. Police said the recording captured Rivas Rizo striking toward the victim before both men went to the ground in a struggle. The two witnesses then intervened. Rather than remaining passive observers, they managed to separate the men and take away the weapon, according to police. Their intervention ended the immediate confrontation but could not prevent the victim’s death from the injury he had already suffered.
The witnesses then split up. One stayed close to the wounded man, while the other went with Rivas Rizo toward the residence, according to investigators. Police said the injured roommate walked roughly 15 yards before he fell. The witness beside him later described the victim’s statement identifying Rivas Rizo. Investigators included that account in the arrest report as they documented the evidence supporting the charge. The available reports do not say whether the victim made any other statements or whether emergency dispatchers recorded additional remarks before he was transported. His identity has remained withheld in the reports reviewed for this article.
The second witness provided police with a different part of the timeline. He told detectives that he lived in the same home as Rivas Rizo and the victim. According to police, that witness recalled Rivas Rizo leaving the residence and chasing after the other man. After the confrontation, the witness said, Rivas Rizo returned to the home carrying the machete and put it somewhere inside. That account gave investigators information about the weapon’s movement before they obtained authority to search the residence. Police later said they found the machete wedged or stored between doors in a rear storage area.
Investigators also reported seeing substantial blood inside the residence during the search. They said the recovered machete appeared to have blood on its handle. The public accounts reviewed for this story do not describe laboratory results tying any biological evidence to a particular person, and the arrest report itself represents the investigative basis for the charge rather than a final determination by a court. Still, the recovery of the weapon where a witness said Rivas Rizo had taken it provided police with physical evidence to compare against the surveillance video and statements from people at the scene.
Rivas Rizo offered his own version of the encounter when questioned. Police said he told detectives the victim had emerged from his room, hit him near the eye and threatened him while carrying a knife. He said he feared for his life. Investigators reported that Rivas Rizo also claimed the victim had been holding the machete and that the fatal injury occurred accidentally when the victim fell onto the blade. Police said he did not offer a reason the victim would have attacked him. That account conflicted with portions of the evidence investigators said they had already gathered.
Detectives then confronted Rivas Rizo with surveillance footage. Police said he initially denied pursuing his roommate but acknowledged the chase after seeing the recording. Investigators said he then told them he had intended to strike with the broad side of the blade rather than the cutting edge. The progression of those statements is part of the prosecution’s evidence, but the allegations have not been tested at trial. The sources reviewed for this story did not include a statement from a defense lawyer explaining how Rivas Rizo intends to answer the charge or whether he will seek to suppress or contest any statement made during questioning.
Authorities charged Rivas Rizo with first-degree murder, a charge that requires the state to prove the elements alleged in the case beyond a reasonable doubt. The arrest report and news accounts describe a violent encounter and an accusation of premeditated killing, but they do not establish guilt. Nor do they explain what caused the dispute between the roommates. Police reports cited by local media did not identify a motive, describe a documented history of conflict between the men or explain whether anything significant happened earlier that day. Those unanswered questions could become relevant as the criminal case develops.
Federal immigration officials entered the picture after the local arrest. The Department of Homeland Security announced Aug. 11 that Immigration and Customs Enforcement had lodged a detainer with the Broward County Jail on Aug. 3. DHS identified Rivas Rizo as a Nicaraguan national and said he entered the country through California in April 2022 before being apprehended by Border Patrol and released. The detainer asks local authorities to give ICE an opportunity to assume custody if he becomes eligible for release from local detention. It does not replace or resolve the Florida murder prosecution.
The later federal announcement added a national immigration-policy dimension to a case that began with a neighborhood emergency call. DHS officials criticized the prior administration’s handling of Rivas Rizo’s entry into the United States, but those political assertions are distinct from the evidence Hallandale Beach detectives gathered about the homicide. The central factual questions in the criminal case remain what happened between the two roommates, whether Rivas Rizo acted with the intent alleged by prosecutors and how jurors or a judge ultimately assess the surveillance footage, physical evidence and witness testimony.
The two men who stepped into the confrontation may prove especially important as the case moves forward. One was with the victim after he was wounded; the other described what happened to the machete afterward. Their accounts cover different parts of a sequence that no single camera or witness appears to have captured in full, leaving prosecutors to assemble the case from overlapping pieces of testimony, video and physical evidence.
Author note: Last updated September 9, 2026.