Avondale salon owner accused in double murder found dead in jail cell, deputies say

PHOENIX (3TV/CBS 5) -- The Maricopa County Sheriff’s Office has confirmed that the Avondale salon owner accused of killing his wife and her suspected lover appears to have taken his own life in a Phoenix jail cell.

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According to deputies, detention officers found Jose Jesus Rodriguez Parra unresponsive in his jail cell around 7 a.m. on Monday. Correctional staff tried to perform CPR but efforts were unsuccessful. Phoenix firefighters arrived and pronounced him dead seven minutes later. No other information has been released, but investigators are treating the death as a suicide. MCSO’s jail crime detectives and MCSO’s professional standards bureau are now investigating, which is standard procedure for in-custody deaths.

Parra was accused of shooting his wife, Ema Maldonado, and another man at the Ema’s Barber and Beauty Salon near Central Avenue and Western Avenue on Sept. 11. Court documents revealed Parra admitted to the shooting and it appeared to have resulted from flirting between the two victims that began several months earlier. He had been booked on two counts of second-degree murder, one count of disorderly conduct, and one count of aggravated assault.

The second man’s name has not been released. A fundraiser for Maldonado has raised nearly $6,000 as of Wednesday morning, according to the family’s GoFundMe page.