Valley Knoll Drive man charged with murder after mother's body found in duffel bag

A welfare check at a home on Valley Knoll Drive in west Harris County ended with deputies finding a 73-year-old woman's body zipped inside a duffel bag, wrapped in bloody sheets and a rug, while her son lay unresponsive in a bedroom across the hall, according to court records.

Arman Malik, 34, is now charged with murder and tampering with a human corpse in the death of his mother, Dyna Guadalupe Sorto De Malik. Harris County Sheriff Ed Gonzalez said in a post on X that deputies responded to the home in the 17900 block of Valley Knoll Drive on Sept. 1 after relatives asked for a check on Sorto De Malik.

Family members told investigators they hadn't been able to reach her since Saturday, Aug. 29. She hadn't answered phone calls, texts or the door, and Malik had recently been living with her, according to the sheriff's office.

Deputies forced entry into the home around 10 p.m. on Sept. 1. Court records describe finding Malik asleep in one bedroom while an odor resembling a decomposing body came from the room across the hall. Inside that room, deputies saw a bloodied sheet on the floor. When they lifted it, they found a large duffel bag that also smelled of decomposition. Deputies unzipped the bag and reported seeing human skin and what appeared to be an arm inside, according to the records.

That discovery stopped the initial security sweep, and investigators obtained a search warrant to process the rest of the scene. Underneath the duffel bag, they found carpet soaked in blood along with what appeared to be dark, coagulated blood and blood spatter on a nearby dresser, records show.

Investigators also found that several home security cameras had been tampered with. The batteries had been removed from the camera facing the front door, and it had been left face down. An outdoor camera had been turned to face a wall instead of the yard, and an indoor camera meant to stand upright and rotate had been tipped on its side and blocked by a glass vase, according to court records.

The victim's iPhone was recovered inside the home. When investigators tried to unlock it, the phone displayed a message saying it was unavailable and to try again in an hour, a lockout that typically follows repeated failed passcode attempts. Investigators wrote in the records that this led them to believe Malik may have tried to access the phone to delete or hide evidence.

When deputies detained Malik, he was unresponsive and needed sternum rubs to rouse him, appearing to be under the influence of an unknown substance, according to the records. He was taken to a hospital, where investigators noted what looked like dried blood under his fingernails along with scratches and scrapes on his hands.

Investigators believe Sorto De Malik's body had been concealed inside the home for some time before the welfare check, though it remains unclear exactly when she died. Her cause and manner of death are still pending, according to court records.

Malik was initially booked only on the tampering charge. Late Monday, Sheriff Gonzalez announced on social media that the charge had been upgraded to murder. Court records show Malik has a prior conviction for robbery causing bodily injury and received four years of community supervision in that case in 2010.

Malik is due in court Tuesday morning for a preliminary appearance, where a judge is expected to address bond on the murder charge. The Harris County Institute of Forensic Sciences has not yet released findings on Sorto De Malik's cause of death.