Clues with Morgan Absher and Kaelyn Moore - MURDERED: Esmeralda Gonzalez

Episode Date: July 23, 2025

When popular Las Vegas influencer Esmeralda Gonzalez mysteriously vanished, the clues left behind told a dark story. Morgan and Kaelyn examine surveillance footage, anonymous tips, suspicious U-Haul rentals, and store receipts to uncover the disturbing truth behind her disappearance. What secrets surfaced when detectives finally pieced it all together? Show Notes: 46:25-47:25 - TW: Description of Esmeralda's assault and murder Episode Sponsors:Stay sharp and fuel yourself with Ka’Chava. Go to https://kachava.com and use code CLUES for 15% off your next order. Welcome to the new normal in health. Not the outdated version you grew up with. Your baseline. Your body. On your terms. Learn more and join using our link. Visit https://www.functionhealth.com/CLUES. Make your summer enjoyable and delicious by signing up for HelloFresh at https://hellofresh.com/CLUES10FM and get ten free meals with a free item for life. Clues is a Crime House Original Podcast, powered by PAVE Studios. Listen wherever you get your podcasts. Don’t Miss out on all things Clues! YouTube: @CluesPod | @crimehousestudios Instagram: @cluespodcast | @Crimehouse TikTok: @Crimehouse Facebook: @crimehousestudios X: @crimehousemedia Clues is hosted by Morgan Absher & Kaelyn Moore  Instagram: @morgsyabsher | @itskaelynmoore TikTok: @twohottakes | @heartstartspounding To learn more about listener data and our privacy practices visit: https://www.audacyinc.com/privacy-policy Learn more about your ad choices. Visit https://podcastchoices.com/adchoices

I'm Dr. Hrini Bot, host of Hidden History. Every Monday, I go where history gets uncomfortable. Vanished civilizations, doomsday prophecies, and events that science still can't fully explain. Listen to and follow Hidden History, available now wherever you get your podcasts. This is Crime House. On that same trip, he also bought wood, screws, silicone culk, WD40, lime, and an ocean mist air freshener. Quickery is what Scott Peterson had, too, right? And justice for Esmeralda Gonzalez is just within reach.

Hello, Cluminati. Welcome back to another episode of Clues, where we sneak past the crime scene and tape to explore the key evidence behind some of the most gripping true crime cases. I'm Kayla Moore, and I'm going to be looking into the backstories, the timelines, and the court files released on these cases.

And I'm your internet sleuth, Morgan Absher. I am diving into the internet and pulling out all of those forums and threads that add up or really don't. And each week on Clues, we're going to look into how even the smallest pieces of evidence, think a doorbell camera, an anonymous tip, or even a rental receipt could lead to groundbreaking discoveries and may even bring long away to justice. At Crime House, we value your support, so please share your thoughts on social media

and remember to rate, review, and follow clues to help others discover our show. Okay, today we are diving into the chilling case of Esmeralda Gonzalez, an up-and-coming social media model born in Mexico who vanished in Las Vegas back in May of 2019. Despite their best efforts, police ran into several dead ends until a series of hot tips and a few lucky breaks blew the case wide open. It led to a shocking discovery hidden deep within the Nevada desert, uncovering killers no one saw coming. More on the case and the clues that defined it after this quick break. One of this week's partners is Peloton. There's a specific kind of joy and freedom that comes from a truly great workout.

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You got a haircut? I cut all my hair off. It looks great. It was a game time decision. I literally was on social media immediately before I sat down to get my hair cut and I saw a bob that I liked and I was like, let's do it.

That is really brave. Yeah, I mean, I've had short hair before so it helps. Yeah. But yeah, it was a game time decision. I actually think I want to keep it this length probably forever. Do you ever change your hair often?

Mm-mm. Always same color, same length. I used to have peekaboo back in the day. What's that? It's where you dye it really dark underneath and then it's like light on top. Oh, is that what like Duelipa had? It used to be black under the day.

I was feeling a little sporadic lately. I made the decision, you guys. I did, I did chin lipo. Technically it's a deep neck contour. I don't know. But I decided to do that within like a month. And then like, I decided one day and then a month later, I'm like, nope, okay, I'm doing it. It's a little bit bigger than a Bob. It has a bigger thing than Bob. To do as a game time decision. How do you feel about it now that you've had it done? 10 out of 10 recommend would do again tomorrow. Are you still in pain at all? No. I'm chilling. It just feels like I have a little corset on my neck. Oh, you like feel like there's something on your neck? Yeah, I feel snatched.

Oh, interesting. Yeah. Okay. We'll talk about it more overall. Yeah, you said the recovery wasn't too bad. It wasn't. You're going to talk about it on two hot takes, too. Yeah, I'm going to do some plastic surgery stories that kind of lead into it.

But I think this is going to be an interesting case today because this person, Esmeralda, was very forward-facing online. Oh, yeah, there's like a deep internet component to this story. This story is internet, you guys. So, without further ado. Yeah. let's get into it. And just as a quick reminder, anyone who's watching this episode on YouTube, you're going to see some images that help paint a picture of this case. But if you're listening, you can find those same photos we upload them the day that the episode comes out on our social media.

That's at Clues Podcast on Instagram. Okay, so today's case takes place in Las Vegas. And as a lot of us know, Las Vegas has earned itself a nickname Sin City, this place where anything goes. It's like a playground for tourists and gamblers. there is the saying what happens in Vegas stays in Vegas. We've all heard it. We've all heard it. But beyond the neon lights and tourist traps, Las Vegas metropolitan area is also home to 2 million regular people just going about their lives. There are neighborhoods filled with families, raising kids, people who are busy building careers and chasing dreams. Vegas is also a really popular destination for immigrants who arrive looking for work seeking the American dream.

Yeah, and that is the version of Vegas where our story starts. It starts with a hardworking family that came to this country to build a new life, and Esmeralda Gonzalez is really at the center of it. She was born in Michoacan, Mexico on May 26, 1995, and they settled in the West Side neighborhood. And Esmeralda really grows up in a pretty diverse area, and she loves her new life here. And plus, people really describe her as, like, the total package. She's very smart. She's very beautiful. She was the only girl in her school's chess club, and,

she would participate in beauty pageants. Like she really had both sides of the coin. And people who knew Esmeralda said that she was driven and ambitious, but she also knew how to have a good time. Her older brother, Juan, described her as being the playful sibling. She was both goofy and generous. But at the end of the day, she just had a really good heart. She was less than five years old when her parents moved here and her two brothers. They all came over to Las Vegas. She loves her family. She has this adorable toy poodle named Bonita. And when she's not in college studying for her, her degree in communications. She's carving out time to volunteer with the Clark County Law Foundation's trial by peers program. So that's when Esmeralda starts to kind of set her sights on law school,

which is kind of a big transition from the type of life that she lives in that moment because she is very entrenched in the Las Vegas social scene. I mean, when you look at pictures of her, she's always dressed to the nines. She always has designer clothes on. She's always out on the town. She's definitely taking advantage of the fact that she lives very close to the strip and can kind of all the glamorous Las Vegas things. And as she's living this life, she's also, you know, taking pictures of herself and putting them on Instagram. And she gets a huge following from doing that. She gets over 300,000 followers by 2018, which 2018 Instagram was also a different time. Like 300,000 followers was very, I mean, that's huge. It was a lot of, I mean, even now it's a

even now. I'm like, that's pretty good. It was a lot in 2018. Yeah, that's a big following. And in her bio on Instagram, as Morelda describes herself as a real estate investor, humanitarian, a social scientist, an anthropologist, and a foreign model. She drives a BMW, and she bought her own house when she was just 23 years old. She's very clearly doing pretty well for herself. At least that's what it looks like on social media. As we all know, it's not always like that. And it's around this time, too, that she starts dating this new guy, Luis Merrillo. And even though she's living the high life during this time and her social media looks great, she has a new boyfriend, everything kind of changes for her on May 31st, 2019.

Because that day, Asmeralda's older brother, who we talked about earlier, Juan, he swings by her house after work. He's just going to check in on her. He actually hasn't heard from her all day, which is very unusual. So he decides to kind of go over and see what's up. He's a little bit worried. When he gets there, he sees that her car is in the driveway, but the front door to her house is unlocked.

And like the part of Las Vegas they're in, you don't really leave your door unlocked. Yeah, this is also 2019. Like I think we as people, I feel like we've kind of got on the board of locking our doors. Yeah, it's very in a lot of communities in America. People lock their doors. Yeah. Definitely. Especially she's like single woman living by yourself also hasn't contacted him all day. I would be panicked if that were my sibling and I went over. I couldn't get a hold of them. And there's also the fact that Juan knows that Esmeralda is this public facing figure. but he also knows that privately she really enjoys having her private life. Like there's a lot that she doesn't put online.

And so when Juan walks into her house, he notices that all of the lights are on in the house. And he figures that maybe she's in the home somewhere. But he also notices the more he walks around that the house is a total mess. Things have been tossed around. It's in complete disarray. He starts wondering if Esmeralda was the one that did this or if someone else got into the house and was rummaging around, looking for things. So that really starts to worry him.

And he runs from room to room. He's calling her name, but there's no answer. And Esmeralda is nowhere to be found. But one thing is interesting about the scene. And that's that Juan sees her purse is still in the home. And her wallet is inside that purse. So now the idea that this was maybe a robbery kind of starts leaving his mind. And that's when he decides to call his younger brother.

And the two of them together agree that something is wrong. They need to take this to the authorities. So they dial 911 and they officially file a missing person's report. Now, there's something we haven't mentioned about Esmeralda yet that will explain exactly why this situation is also extra alarming for her family. You see, her brother Juan went over to Esmeralda's house that day to check on her because Esmeralda was dealing with some serious mental health struggles. According to her family, Esmeralda had been diagnosed with both schizophrenia and bipolar disorder. And according to Juan, her mental health was usually well controlled with medication. but other relatives said that she had stopped taking her medication in the weeks leading up to her disappearance.

So when she celebrated her 24th birthday just a few days before she disappeared on May 26, 2019, Esmeralda told her family that she'd really been struggling with her mental health again. And so her brothers agreed to check on her daily and make sure she was doing all right. Like she really had a good support system around her. It's also why Juan immediately panics when he sees she's not there and her house is in this disarray. Because to him, that's indicative of how her mental health really is doing. And thankfully, the police do really take this seriously right away because when they hear about Esmeralda's mental health,

they realize that something really bad could be happening. So that day, the police come over and they decide to canvas the neighborhood. And they speak to a couple of Esmeralda's neighbors at this time. And some of these neighbors say that they do remember seeing her the day before. So that would be May 30th. Apparently, at least according to these neighbors, Esmeralda looked pretty disheveled. She was walking around, just kind of asking strangers for rides, which was very strange behavior from her.

And investigators don't find anyone that helped her that day. So they don't find anyone who said, hey, she asked me for a ride. She got in my car and we like went to this place. So they keep canvassing the neighborhood and they're looking for essentially any clues they can. And then they're talking to one of the neighbors. And that neighbor says, oh, well, I have a security. camera that I keep up by my garage. Maybe there's something there. And when they go through this

footage, they actually see Esmeralda in some of the footage. Which brings us to our very first clue, some home security footage. This neighbor ends up telling police that Esmeralda actually knocked on his door at 2.30 in the morning, early on May 31st. When the homeowner answered, they say they noticed something a bit strange. Asmeralda was wearing nothing but high heels and lingerie. The neighbor ends up telling her that she had the wrong house, to which Esmeralda responds something like, quote, I do. Okay, thank you. And then she just turns around and walks back into the night.

Now, since all of this is captured on that neighbor's security footage, police can't confirm the time and the details, like everything is lining up with how the neighbor is describing that encounter. But the footage also shows something else. It's Esmeralda wandering around in their driveway in what can only be described as a state of complete confusion and distress. And this then tells investigators two things. One, that Esmeralda was alive at least until 2.30 a.m. on May 31st, less than 24 hours before she was reported missing, which is super helpful because we all know how important early on is in these

investigations. And two, Esmeralda might have been experiencing a mental health episode that night. While both of those pieces of information are helpful, it was. not a lot for the police now to go off of. It didn't really point in a direction of where she could have gone. So detectives decide to dig deeper into Esmeralda's life and they really start to look where any good investigator would begin their search and that's with the people who are closest to her. And one of the first people that comes up as police are thinking through what could have happened to Esmeralda is her current boyfriend, Louise. But Luis is not making this necessarily all that easy for the police. He arranges everything through his lawyer, immediately gets a lawyer, and he refuses to speak directly to the investigators. Now, that's not suspicious to everyone, but definitely to the police. It made him seem suspicious. And then they eventually learned that Louise had a fight with Esmeralda the night before on May 30th, just hours, really, before she was last seen. During the fight, he did admit that he took her car keys and her cell phone, so it did get pretty heated. And when the cops press him on this,

Luis tells them, through his lawyer, that he really did that for her own safety. He said that Esmeralda appeared to be in a very emotional state. He could tell she was having some sort of mental health episode, and he got really worried about what she might do. And it's unclear here if he knew exactly what Esmeralda's diagnosis was, but it's clear that he was very worried about her. And it's totally understandable to not want someone to operate a vehicle in that state. taking the phone is a little bit different. I don't know if there was someone he didn't want her to contact or if he thought maybe if I have her phone, she's not going to leave the house. It's strange.

But so the police were like, well, why did you have to take her phone if you were just having a fight? And they really, as are, the more that they're talking to him or at least to his lawyer, they just don't feel like he's being entirely altruistic. Because they also learned that two weeks earlier, there was a domestic disturbance call to Esmeralda's house involving him. And while the details of that report have not been really. It was enough to set off some red flags for the investigators. And now they're thinking with like so many investigations, like boyfriend, doing a couple weird things, there were some fights happening. It really seems like maybe he had something to do with her disappearance.

Yeah, I mean, taking a 24-year-old adult woman's phone from her is extremely strange. Yeah, it's a choice, especially when she disappears without a trace just a couple hours later. But I will say here, just doing the research, the more that the police dug deeper into the timeline that he was giving them. His story actually does start to check out, especially because they get some additional security camera footage, and when they review it, it really corroborates what Louise was saying. Another clue we have in this case is footage from within Esmeralda's home. So you see, Esmeralda had installed her own security cameras in her house, and these cameras ended up showing that Louise did indeed leave her house earlier on May 30th and never returned.

Didn't come back. And police get a little bit more info because when they review all of these tapes, these cameras don't show any strangers in the house that day. No robbers, no intruders, only as Marilda, which means that whatever happened to her likely didn't happen inside the home. That also means that maybe Louise isn't the last person to see her after all. Now that doesn't completely rule them out, but the cops know they have to start looking at other. their potential suspects. So they turned to this wider pool of suspects that they think they should look into, and that's as Marelda's 300,000 followers on Instagram. At this point, they're really trying to consider if she had maybe a stalker of some kind, someone who was watching her wander

around the neighborhood that night. And maybe it was a person who initially took interest in her online and then wanted to turn this into some sort of real relationship or thought that they were in a relationship with her, you know, as sometimes happens, sometimes people get very obsessed with people they see online. So they start going through Esmeralda's Instagram account and they read through all of her DMs. And they do find a couple of DMs from people saying things like, you should marry me, we should go out. There's a couple more colorful messages that were thrown in there, a couple that are pretty creepy. But there's nothing that necessarily indicates any specific person was like particularly fixated on Esmeralda. And so they eventually turn away from looking at

our Instagram followers and continue the investigation while at the same time Esmeralda's family are doing their own kind of detective work trying to find her. The Gonzalez's post flyers all over their community. Her brother, Juan, creates a Find Esmeralda Gonzalez's Facebook page and they try to basically get her face everywhere and urge anyone who's had any contact with her at all to call the police immediately. And this kind of does work because tips start flooding in from all over Vegas. And despite this, it seems like even though they're getting all these tips, nothing really comes from a lot of them or there are a lot of dead ends because things do eventually start cooling off, at least for the next few weeks in the investigation. And then, almost two months later,

after all of those tips didn't really lead anywhere, near the end of July, police receive a phone call from a local BMW dealership. An employee there says that they actually remember Esmeralda coming in on the afternoon of May 30th, the day before she disappeared. Apparently, she was looking for a replacement key for her vehicle since her boyfriend, Louise, had taken hers. The dealership footage shows Esmeralda arriving at the business again in that outfit of heels and lingerie, just like she was wearing on the security footage,

the one that was taken outside of the neighbor's house that night. But while her outfit is maybe a little bit surprising to us, one of the employees did say, quote, don't get me wrong. It was weird, but you know, it's Vegas. So here's what really catches the cops' attention, though, out of this whole interaction. Esmeralda wasn't alone here. There was a man walking around the dealership with her, and it wasn't her boyfriend or anyone else that the investigators recognized. So then the police have another potential person of interest, but they just don't know what this guy's name is. On July 31st, the Las Vegas Metropolitan Police Department puts a screenshot from that security footage on Twitter, and they get a hit as to who it is. They ask the community, do you know who this guy is? And immediately, someone messages them and it's like, I know exactly who that is.

And that's because it's the guy himself who reaches out to them. And it's like, that's me. He turns himself over to the police and says, hi, my name's Brent Smith. I'm one of Esmeralda's neighbors. Brent then tells detectives that Esmeralda approached him and asked if he would give her a ride to the dealership to get a new key that day. Being a good neighbor and a good Samaritan, he could tell that she was in some sort of distress, so he offered to help her. Brent says that ultimately the trip was a bust, though, because Esmeralda couldn't get a new key without having the proper paperwork on her. So Brent just drove her back home, and that was the last time he saw her.

When detectives check Brent's story against the security footage from the inside of Esmeralda's house, all the timing lines up. This guy is not lying about this. The cameras show her returning home alone after the dealership trip. Brent never goes inside. So this is just another dead end. And so far, nothing in this case has necessarily led them anywhere. But it does keep getting stranger and stranger.

The cops were about to get a huge break in the case that would change everything. Hey, before we jump back into the show, let's take a quick break. But not just any break. This is a refreshing break with Snapple. We all know about Snapple's iconic, real facts, so let's take a minute to go over some of my favorites. Snapple Real Fact, 964, it is illegal in the United Kingdom to handle salmon in suspicious circumstances. Snapple Real Fact 1013, it is illegal to sing off-key in North Carolina. Snapple Real Fact 2033. Americans consume 150 million hot dogs on July 4th. Snapple Real Fact 705.

Every ton of recycled paper saves about 17 trees. So grab a Snapple, take a second, and enjoy the moment. Because let's be honest, this might be the most refreshing part of your day. Snapple. Make your break more interesting. All right, now let's get back to clues. This episode is brought to you by Quince. So lately, I feel like I've wanted to be more intentional about the stuff that I've been wearing every day.

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They stand the test of time. And I needed a closet refresh. So I've got my quince bodysuit on some of the softest, most flattering body suits. I know. I was just rubbing your arm. And I felt how soft it was. I also love my linen dress for summer. It's so lightweight. Breedable is cute with everything. I just put it in a new order. I'm so excited. I'm getting the Bella stretch, relax, straight leg jeans. And also the 100% organic cotton boyfriend crew sweater, which looks so soft and like slouchy. Perfect for recording. Perfect for recording. refresh your everyday with luxury you'll actually use. Head to quince.com slash clues for free shipping on your order and 365 day returns. Now available in Canada too, that's QI-N-C-E.com slash clues for free shipping and 365-day returns. Quince.com slash clues. Big break indeed, because on July 18th,

a homicide detective named Tate Sanborn gets a phone call. And that becomes kind of our second big clue in this case, because it takes this case from trending seemingly about to go cold to cracked wide open. Detective Sanborn gets an anonymous tip, but the caller has some very specific information they think might be connected to Esmeralda's disappearance. They tell Sanborn that a man named Christopher Prestapino and his roommate Cassandra Garrett killed a woman back in May. Then Christopher rented a U-Haul truck and used it to dump the woman's body in the desert. But in his panic, he accidentally left the U-Haul dolly at the disposal site. According to the caller, Christopher and Cassandra were still worried that someone might find

this dolly out in the desert and then be able to trace it back to them. Now, tips come in all the time in missing person cases, and a lot of them do turn out to be dead ends, but this tip, the investigator thought it just had like too many specific details to ignore. So Detective Sanborn knows that if it's not a hoax, the caller could have been an actual witness to the murder. Or know the killer personally. So Sanborn follows up on this. He learns that Christopher works as a stagehand at the Paris Hotel and Casino, and he makes a request to see any files the police have on Christopher.

It turns out, he does have a criminal record. He'd been arrested a few times in the past for drug-related offenses, but nothing violent. Still, something in Sanborn's gut tells him it's worth digging a little deeper, which leads us to clue number three, those U-Haul records. When Sanborn calls around to different U-Haul rental facilities to check on Christopher Prestapino, he finds something interesting. Sure enough, Christopher had rented a 15-foot U-Haul moving truck from the location at 8620 Las Vegas Boulevard South,

and this rental contract showed that he picked up the truck on June 8th, 2019, just a week after Esmeralda's disappearance, and he returned it the night of June 10th. But what really catches Sanborn's attention, the rental contract has Prestapino's full address, phone number, and all of his personal information right there, black and white. And when Sanborn looks up that address, this is when the dots really start connecting, because he realizes that Christopher and Asmeralda are actually neighbors. Christopher actually lives just three blocks away from Esmeralda's house. And now Sanborn has proof that Christopher rented a truck shortly after she went missing.

This is the break that like detectives have just been waiting for. And finally, with a suspect, a name and address, a clear connection, now he just has to prove that Christopher Prestapino had actually. use that truck to get rid of evidence. So this case is clearly picking up momentum. And just as this is all kind of connecting and coming together, Sanborn actually receives another anonymous tip. This one tells him that he needs to speak to one of Christopher's friends, a woman named Trisha Ott, which brings us to clue number four. When Sanborn tracks down Trisha in Las Vegas, she actually agrees to talk to him about what she knows. And she tells a story that makes his blood run cold. She says that in early June,

Right around the time Christopher rented the U-Haul, he called Trisha in the middle of the night asking for help. And when she got to his house, she immediately knew something was wrong. Christopher was acting super paranoid. She could barely hear him when he talked because he had the TV and music just blasting at the top of their volumes. And there in his driveway was that rented U-Haul truck. But the really disturbing part was like this massive box that Trisha saw Christopher had in his garage. It looked like a crate, but it was made out of wood and concrete, and it was about the size of a freezer chest. That's got to be so heavy, too, if it's made out of concrete.

Insane amount of weight. Meanwhile, Trisha said that Christopher's roommate, Cassandra, was frantically cleaning the garage around it. Trisha kind of implied in this that Cassandra was possibly using substances, and she was just scrubbing everything down like she was trying to erase evidence. Christopher didn't tell Trisha what was in that box, but he asked for help getting it out of the garage and into the U-Haul. Only it was way too heavy. I mean, as you mentioned. Right, of course.

Reiser-sized chest concrete. Made out of concrete. Here's my phone of scientist button. How much would that way? Making that in your garage and then being like, okay, I'll just move this out at some point. Not a lot of forethought. Sir, you're going to need a forklift.

This is when Trisha said that like at some point, she got so spooked that she got out of the truck and just refuse to help him anymore. Like, concrete box, okay. Desperately needing a forklift. I'm out. And it wasn't until later when Trisha saw all of this news coverage about Esmeralda Gonzalez

that she started to put all of these puzzle pieces together on her own. The timeline matched, the location matched, and Christopher's paranoid behavior all made this make sense. And this, Trisha's statement, was exactly the tip that Sandboard needed to really get this ball rolling on. a formal investigation into Christopher. One of the things that he really latches on to teeing up this investigation is this box that

Trisha describes seeing in Christopher's garage. She said it appeared to be homemade, which gets the detective wondering, where would he have gotten all these supplies from? Which brings us to clue number five. Surveillance footage from inside Home Depot. This footage shows Christopher, clear as day, going on a shopping spree at a local Home Depot on June 6th and June 7th, about a week after Asmeralda disappeared. And on June 6th, he actually bought 300 pounds of QuickCrete concrete mix.

Pain and cash, too. Really wanted to make sure, no trace there. QuickCreet is what Scott Peterson had too, right? I think that's what he had. Quite the little tie there. Yeah. On that same trip, he also bought wood, screws, silicone culk, WD40, lime, and an ocean mist air freshener. The next day he returned to buy a drill and a concrete mixing paddle.

And I think it becomes very clear to detectives at this point, given the statement from Trisha, given the Home Depot receipts, given this U-Haul receipt, it's really painting a picture for this detective about what happened to Esmeralda. Yeah, they really start zeroing in on Christopher. They really think that he might be their guy. But they do have kind of a big problem in this. And that's that it's really hard to prove in court that someone was murdered if you don't have a body. If the things that you're seeing are this guy made a weird box in his garage and drove around in a U-Haul for a while, not really enough to convict someone of murder. So they really have to find more evidence.

But we talked about in Clue 2 when the anonymous tipster said that Christopher had dumped Esmeralda's body in the desert. So when Sanborn pulls Christopher's phone records, he learns through the location data that Christopher had made a trip to the desert near the California-Novada border on June 8th of 2019. He spent several hours out there before turning back, but cell reception in the desert can be pretty spotty. And we talked about this when it came to Adia Shabani, right? If the reception is spotty, sometimes it's pinging a tower that isn't necessarily where you are. So it can look like you're in a different location than you actually are. And because of this, Sanborn feels like he has a general idea of where to look, but there's not like a solid pinpoint of exactly.

where he was. So the detectives assemble the search team and they just start combing through hundreds of miles of desert. They're looking for really any sign of disturbed earth. If there's any indication that someone had been digging out there, it's like finding a needle in a haystack. I was just going to say, like needle in a haystack. And again, this could have been a point where this case ran really cold, but like the efforts that these investigators are going to, I mean, hundreds of miles. Hundreds of miles. I am so impressed that we have not had to scratch anything onto the botch board today. Nothing. But yeah, pretty impressive detective work. They're combing through all of these miles and miles of dirt. And they just have multiple failed attempts. Every time they go out there, they come back empty handed. And days turn into weeks. The search teams have still found nothing. Like nothing out of place, nothing that looks like overturned dirt, nothing that looks like a piece of clothing, anything. And Sanborn, despite all this, doesn't feel. like he's ready to give up, though. He knows that the key to finding Esmeralda's body is getting

one of the suspects to cooperate. And he has an idea about how he's going to make that happen. And he wants to turn Christopher's accomplices against each other. This episode is brought to you by Instacart. I have a four-month-old at home, which means I don't leave the house unless I absolutely have to. Going to the grocery store is a really big deal for me these days, which is why I love Instacart so much. I hate grocery shopping. I always. I always forget things. I get overwhelmed. I have decision paralysis or I shop hungry and then I get way too much, which is why I love to use Instacart. Keep me out of the store. I'm going to sit at home reading my book instead. And Summer is all about saying yes to last minute plans, a friend's backyard barbecue,

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It's time for a trip to Ross. Work your magic. After finding the fifth clue that we talked about at the Home Depot videos and tracking Christopher's phone to the desert, investigators start to feel like they're getting close. They're like honing in on someone. But without Esmerald's body, it was going to be really difficult to get a conviction. So Detective Sanborn decides he's going to take a different approach. And instead of going after Christopher directly, he pulls a kind of.

Top trick. One that goes bad a lot of times. But one that we're hoping goes very well at this time. And what he's going to do is he's going to put pressure on the people around Christopher. And his first target is this woman, Lisa Mort. It's actually Christopher's girlfriend at the time. She's already in jail on unrelated drug charges. And in mid-September 2019, Sanborn shows up at the Clark County Detention Center, totally unannounced. And he walks into the visiting room. And he sits down across from Lisa. And he asks her, point blank if she knows anything about Esmeralda. Lisa doesn't give up anything. She says she doesn't know what he's talking about. She's never heard of this woman before. Why are you asking me? Sanborn then decides he's going to pivot a little bit. So next, on September 17th, he flies all the way to Milwaukee, Wisconsin, where Cassandra Garrett is staying with her boyfriend. Remember, that's the roommate. And when he knocks on the door, Cassandra is immediately hostile towards him. In a recording, you can actually hear her shouting, quote, I don't care what anyone says. I didn't see anything out of the ordinary. I didn't know anything about a U-Haul truck, and I don't care to know. It's an awful

lot of information that she offers up in just that one sentence. She also denies everything from Trisha's statement, and she insists that she never went into that garage that night that Trisha stopped by. She doesn't know what box anyone's talking about. But here's the thing about Detective Sanborn. He's really persistent in these investigations. And even after Cassandra slams the door in his face, he's not going to give up on her. Because he has this theory. He believes that Cassandra's lying and

she knows exactly where Esmeralda's body is. And if he could just get her to trust him, somehow, maybe she would be willing to talk. So for the next month, he keeps reaching out to her. He texts her occasionally. He gives her a few phone calls.

He's always friendly. He's always patient. And slowly over time, he kind of starts building this relationship with Cassandra. And eventually, Cassandra does start talking to him. And can we just give this detective, like, some snaps, like a little clap. Like, it reminds me a little bit about what Denise Huskins talks about with her evidence-based interview techniques. Like, it just goes to show, like, how these techniques can be successful. This is, like, the part of detective work I find the most interesting is interrogations and questioning when you are using it for good

and you are trying to get to like the nugget of truth. If you ever watch the interrogation of Chris Watts, who starts in the interrogation saying, I didn't kill my family, I don't know where they are, I don't know anything. And then this one woman just works on him over time and eventually gets him to confess to everything. It's like incredible what some of these people are able to do

and how they're able to get people to trust them and give up information. Yeah, absolutely. And just has like a little side note here, guys. Like if that is a case you want to see us cover, please put it in the comments now. Like we do see your comments about like making sure we're hitting lesser known cases. But like that is a case that like personally really just has stuck with me.

So if you want to see that, please let us know in the comments, obviously really receptive to your feedback. I know. I know that one's been done a lot, but it is such a complicated one. But like putting it out there now. Like let's really be sure. Definitely. And I want to add here too. If you are interested in a podcast that does a really interesting deep dive.

into one of the craziest interrogations I've ever heard of, Detective Trap. She's this badass detective in Orange County, and she finds two serial killers. And the way she gets them to confess is really cool. Wow. Really, really smart woman. So anyways, by early October, Detective Sanborn has been working with Cassandra for weeks, gaining her trust. And that's when he kind of goes in for it.

He makes his move. And he tells Cassandra, listen, we're just inches away from. getting an arrest warrant for you. I know you know where Esmeralda's body is, but he tells her, he kind of offers her this like olive branch almost. If she cooperates, he's going to give her time to get her affairs in order before they make an arrest. And that might not sound like a big deal to you and I, right? Like you're going to arrest me anyways, who cares if you're letting me get my affairs in order? It's a huge deal. I actually found this article from prison professors.com. That's all about how to get your affairs in order if you are going to prison, which if anyone listening ever

is in this predicament, prison professors.com, they have a lot of good information on what to do if you are going to prison. But like think about all the things that you have to do. Like, if you own a business, you have to start shredding parts of it down. You have to get your money in order. Talk to your family members about stuff. A lot of people just get sent to jail so quickly, they don't have time to get anything in order. So really when Cassandra hears this, she agrees to cooperate. That is enough for her to be like, okay, fine, I'll talk to So she flies back to Las Vegas on October 8th, 2019, and she gets right into a police car with Detective Sanborn. And Cassandra starts directing them out to the desert right near the California-Novada border.

But during that drive, she starts getting really confused. She would say things like, turn left here, and then they'd go down, and she'd be like, wait, no, I think we need to go back. And this kind of goes on for hours. Sanborn starts getting really annoyed because he thinks that this might all just be this wild goose chase. Like Cassandra's actually not going to cooperate. She's just messing with them. Pull on my leg.

Exactly. Which totally, I mean, that's something that people do, like serial killers will do that. They'll just like lead cops on all these like chases and they'll waste all these resources. But eventually, Cassandra does spot something. Over in the distance, there's this stack of rocks that look just out of place enough. And Cassandra actually recognizes. those rocks. So they pull over, Sanborn gets out, he climbs over to this small embankment, looks down into the ravine below, and that's when he sees it, the top of that concrete structure,

and it's buried partially in the sand. And he knows at that moment he has just found Asmeralda Gonzalez, and now they're going to just work on getting her home. After finding that box in the desert, Sanborn calls someone from his squad to drive Cassandra back to the city. And he waits there with Esmeralda as the team comes and recovers the box. And in an interview that we found with Sin City murders, you can really hear him getting choked up just remembering that moment that he found the box and knew that Esmeralda was in there. He said, quote, she had been alone enough, which is so heartbreaking to hear. It's really, really heartbreaking. Getting the box out of the desert was not easy. I mean, they needed a forklift just to get it onto the U-Haul. So,

So to get it out of the desert, they needed a crane. A team of firefighters arrived with special equipment, and they were able to actually carefully just break through the concrete structure instead of just trying to get the whole thing out. And when they finally get inside, they do find that Esmeralda is in there. And she is almost unrecognizable. A lot of time had gone by. She was in the desert.

But there are a few things that immediately catch the forensics team's eye. Because even though they know in their hearts that it's Esmeralda, they do have to, like, get actual forensic evidence that it is her. Yeah, confirmation. Exactly. So wrapped around Esmeralda's wrist is a gold Rolex watch. And Detective Sanborn asks Esmeralda's brother, Juan, about it. And he finds a receipt and a serial number that does confirm this is Esmeralda's watch.

But to be extra sure, investigators extract bone samples from the remains and they compare them to DNA samples from Esmeralda's parents. And those are a match. But the medical examiner still has to rule that this cause of death. is undetermined because she's so decomposed, you can't really look at the remains and decide what happened to her. There are ropes around her wrist, though, that they see. So it is very clearly a homicide. I mean, she was found in a concrete box. It would be hard to rule that as natural or accidental. Yeah. So now the police are finally in a place where they can make an arrest for murder. But there's one problem. And this is maybe going to be like half of a tick on the botched board.

Christopher Prestapino is not in the country anymore. I mean, we talked about this with the day of Shabani as well. No. It's like those moments where you are not watching them, they vanish. They just leave. That's when people can escape. So pretty much the minute that Detective Sanborn left his meeting with Lisa Mort, Christopher's girlfriend, she straight up called him.

And she obviously knew that the prison phones were tapped and they were going to be listening into her conversations. So she was really careful with what she said. on the recording, you can hear her say, quote, I got a visit today. I think you should go. Not really specific in what she's suggesting, but we can kind of like use our imagination here and figure that out.

So when he hears that, Chris books a one-way ticket to Belize. Oh, yeah, he was really traveling. It's going to be hard to get it back from Belize. But a few days after they find Esmeralda, they actually get incredibly lucky because Lisa calls Christopher in Belize. to tell him that she's about to get released from jail,

and he promises to come back home to get her. And this is, like, kind of cosmic timing. Like, the timing is just so perfect. Because on October 11, 2019, Christopher Prestapino lands in Las Vegas, thinking that he's going to be reunited with his girlfriend, and instead, the cops are right there, like, at the gate, just waiting for him to get off the plane

so they can arrest him. Detective Sanborn is there to make the arrest personally. he deserves it. And prosecutors charged Christopher with first-degree murder, first-degree kidnapping, and conspiracy to commit murder. And two days later, on October 13th, Sanborn flies back to Milwaukee and arrests Cassandra Garrett for the same exact charges. And Lisa Mortch, who has been sitting in jail this whole time on drug charges, finds herself now facing additional charges as an accessory to murder after the fact. So after nearly six months of investigations, all three-suffer. suspects are finally in custody. And justice for Esmeralda Gonzalez is just within reach. And while this is

such a win for, you know, Detective Sanborn and it's really bringing closure to Esmeralda's family, it's not fully closure because they don't really know what happened to Esmeralda yet. Yeah, there's so many questions like, did Christopher know Esmeralda? Did he just see her out walking that night and it was an opportunity? Like, they kind of know who did it, but they don't really know what happen? Yeah, how did we get here? How were they connected? And how did she go from, you know, trying to get a car key, the dealership walking back in her house to then this... In the desert. In the desert. Apparently, on the night of May 31st, after Esmeralda was last seen on her other neighbor's security camera, she kept wandering the neighborhood. And that's when a friend of Christopher

saw Esmeralda and invited her in to party with him, Christopher, and Cassandra. A little while later, the friend left, but Christopher, Cassandra and Asmeralda continued the party. until things took a dark turn. Christopher had given Esmeralda methamphetamine, which goes without saying very dangerous substance, but especially for someone who is already struggling with their mental health. Even if you're not struggling with your mental health, even if it's your first time doing the drug, you can get this thing called meth-induced psychosis. It is so dangerous to mess with. I had quite a few patients that had drug-induced schizophrenia at the mental health facility I worked at. Oh, wow.

It is a very real thing and it's just, it's not something. You have to be so careful. You do. You have to be very careful. Christopher later admitted he didn't really know the state, Asmeralda was in when she came in to their house to party. And after giving her these drugs, Esmeralda began, quote, acting bizarre and speaking in the devil's tongue. He also said she threatened to call the cops on him for giving her drugs. And so that's when Christopher tied Esmeralda to a strong.

stripper pole in his room thinking that would, quote, calm her down. He left her there for a while. And then when he came back and untied her, Asimalded ended up punching him in the face. And things from that point turned really, really violent. Trigger warning for those listening, this could be very triggering if you have issues surrounding assault. Please skip if you can't handle that. Markers will be in the description. At this point, Christopher absolutely lost it.

He began beating Esmeralda, strangling her until she stopped moving. And at this point, he just, like, threw some blankets over her and went downstairs and then came back with a syringe. A syringe that he had filled with pool cleaner. Where in your brain do you come up with that idea? Pool cleaner. Specifically, hydrochloric acid. and then he injected it into Esmeralda. He said it wasn't until later that morning that he even knew she was dead.

I'm just confused as to what he thought would happen if he did that to her, if he knew it was going to kill her, if he thought, I don't know. This is also coming from him. He was on a lot of drugs at night. He clearly had other mental health issues. So take it with a grain of salt. Like we don't know that this is the actual way that this went down. But pool cleaner.

Like just terrible. That's absolutely. torture to do that to someone. So police were really adamant about putting all three people involved in this behind bars. Obviously, they are a huge threat to society. But the first person that cut a deal was Lisa Mort in February of 2020. She was charged with accessory after the fact. And to get a lighter sentence, she did plead guilty and she was sentenced to two to five years in prison with 151 days credit for time served. So she was released in February of 2022. And even though Cassandra Garrett initially did cooperate with the police,

she entered a not guilty plea to the charges of murder, kidnapping, and conspiracy. In March of 2023, over three years later, she accepted a lesser charge of voluntary manslaughter. As part of the agreement, she confessed to helping Christopher kill Esmeralda and cover it up. In May of 2023, a judge gave her 20 years in prison with the possibility of parole in eight, And that just left Christopher Prestapino, who also, you know what, pleaded not guilty, really thought that he could convince people he didn't do this. Get real. And he seemed really ready to fight these charges. But in March of 2023, he totally changed his tune and he entered into an Alford plea.

There it is again. Meaning that he didn't admit guilt, but he did acknowledge that the prosecutors had enough evidence to convict him. And what we know about Alfred Pleas is sometimes it is a great way to get. get out of serving much time at all. So he ends up pleading guilty to second degree murder, first degree kidnapping, and conspiracy to commit murder. And in exchange, he got 25 years in prison with the possibility of parole in just 10 years. Hell no.

Hell no. I don't think someone like that's going to learn their lesson in 10 years. Ever. Ever. Yeah. To inject pool cleaner into someone, throw blankets over them. and then you have them in your house for a week. And you make a concrete box.

And then you make a concrete box. Drive them out to the desert after you locate a forklift and go about your life. That's not really like a situation where, oh, I wasn't really thinking clearly. I just like I'm not going to do anything like that again. Like you're a monster at that point. Hell no. And you are a danger. But with that, the case was officially closed.

And although Asmerald's family still grieved her loss, at least they knew that the people responsible for this were going to be behind bars for some time. I guess at least eight years they were going to be behind bars, which it's hard to say that that's a long time or enough time, but it's at least some time. It's quite sad. There's not a lot on this case, on Reddit, on subs. It's pretty cut and dry. And because of, you know, these detectives hard work, Sanborn being so persistent and patient and just dedicated to helping solve this case, at least we have. justice, we have some closure, but people are just left sad and really disgusted at how Esmeralda was treated. I mean, I tried to keep it together for you there, guys, but it's clear.

Like, this is just devastating. I think she was someone that people would have seen as an easy target, right? She's a woman of color. She was having a really bad mental health issue. She's walking around in like heels and lingerie, not really sure of her surroundings. On the street, I could see how like a predator would see her and maybe think that she was an easy target. And one thing that's nice is like how hard the police pursued finding her killer. To let other people know, if you want to find easy prey out here in Vegas, like, no, we're going to come find you. You know, because I think a lot of women like Asmeralda tend to kind of slip through the cracks. I'm very, very thankful for the detectives on this case.

Absolutely. I think that's really all we have on Asmeralda's case today. I do just want to add that there are resources out there. you or a loved one is struggling with mental health. We really want to highlight the national hotline for mental health crises and suicide prevention, which can be reached at 988. This is a difficult thing to navigate when you or a loved one, like how do you get them the help they need without having them hurt themselves further?

So we just want to highlight that and let you guys know that there are resources out there. Now we have our missing people of the week. This is one that a lot of you have messaged us about. Yes, we have seen your comments on these missing children, and we really want to highlight this in hopes that someone has information, or if you live in this area, you could help. So we want to highlight Lily Sullivan and Jack Sullivan. They've been missing from their home in Lansdown Station, Nova Scotia, since May 2nd.

There has been extensive searches from police, search and rescue teams and volunteers that have yielded no sign of them so far. The RCMP are investigating this disappearance, including the possibility of foul play, and a reward of up to 150,000 is being offered for information leading to their safe return. The Sullivan siblings were reported missing after family members could not locate them on their property. The last confirmed sighting of them was on the afternoon of May 1st, with Lily being seen inside the home and Jack heard outside. The RCMP have stated that they are not ruling out abduction, but also haven't found evidence to support it. Lily Sullivan is described as four feet tall and weighing 60 pounds with light brown hair and hazel eyes.

At the time of her disappearance, Lily was believed to be wearing a pink Barbie top, pink rubber boots with rainbow print, and carrying a cream-colored backpack with strawberry print. Jack Sullivan is described as three feet six inches tall and weighing 40 pounds with dark blonde hair and hazel eyes. At the time of his disappearance, Jack was believed to be wearing a pull-up diaper, black underarmor jogging pants, and blue rubber boots with dinosaur prints. And we will include some pictures so you guys can see what they were wearing. Anyone with information should call 1-888-7109090. And if you would like to remain anonymous, you can call Crime Stoppers of Nova Scotia at 1-800-22-8477. Thank you guys and keep your eyes peeled.

Yeah, that is a really... bizarre one. There's a lot of bizarre stuff happening with that case, but we just wanted to highlight where the kids were seen and what they looked like in case anyone has any information. Absolutely. They're so little. Six and four and to just... I know the parents are saying that they potentially walked, what was it, like walked out of the sliding glass door in the back of the house and just into the woods. And a lot of people are not really believing what the parents have to say, but it's still an open investigation. So we're just hoping for the best. Yeah. And search efforts, you know, so far, they're doing their efforts, right?

Like home searches, surrounding property, heavily wooded areas. I don't think they found anything. Nothing so far. No success from everything I'm seeing online at the date of today's recording. Yeah. Hopefully that changes soon. Yeah. Maybe with the help of some of you.

Absolutely. Well, that is all we have for this episode of Clues. Thank you for helping us unravel the case. It's definitely a very impactful one. But now we want to hear from you guys. Your thoughts, theories, feedback, all of that makes this community really special. At Crime House, we really value your support. So please share your thoughts on social media.

And remember to rate review and follow clues to help others discover our show. And if you're hungry for even more content, we've got you covered. For more exclusive content monthly bonus episodes, early access, and ad-free listening, join our Crimehouse Plus community on Apple Podcasts. We will be back next week with another case to unravel. Until then, keep searching, and we will see you next time on Clues. Bye, guys. Bye.

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