Law&Crime Sidebar - 4-Year-Old Abused, Bit, and Killed by Mom's Teen Boyfriend: Cops

Episode Date: June 22, 2024

Octavia Aquino, 4, was pronounced dead after being found unresponsive at an apartment in Evansville, Indiana last week. The girl’s mother, Destiny Rhoades, and Rhoades’ 16-year-old “boyfriend,” Christian Gonzalez, were both arrested. According to an affidavit, officers saw bruises on the child, as well as what appeared to be a human bite mark on her arm. Law&Crime’s Jesse Weber breaks down the disturbing allegations from a police affidavit and speaks with the victim's grandmother, Linda Alvarez, about the heartbreaking case.PLEASE SUPPORT THE SHOW: Get 50% off of confidential background reports at https://www.truthfinder.com/lcsidebarHOST:Jesse Weber: https://twitter.com/jessecordweberLAW&CRIME SIDEBAR PRODUCTION:YouTube Management - Bobby SzokeVideo Editing - Michael DeiningerScript Writing & Producing - Savannah WilliamsonGuest Booking - Alyssa Fisher & Diane KayeSocial Media Management - Vanessa BeinSTAY UP-TO-DATE WITH THE LAW&CRIME NETWORK:Watch Law&Crime Network on YouTubeTV: https://bit.ly/3td2e3yWhere To Watch Law&Crime Network: https://bit.ly/3akxLK5Sign Up For Law&Crime's Daily Newsletter: https://bit.ly/LawandCrimeNewsletterRead Fascinating Articles From Law&Crime Network: https://bit.ly/3td2IqoLAW&CRIME NETWORK SOCIAL MEDIA:Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/lawandcrime/Twitter: https://twitter.com/LawCrimeNetworkFacebook: https://www.facebook.com/lawandcrimeTwitch: https://www.twitch.tv/lawandcrimenetworkTikTok: https://www.tiktok.com/@lawandcrimeSee Privacy Policy at https://art19.com/privacy and California Privacy Notice at https://art19.com/privacy#do-not-sell-my-info.

Wondery Plus subscribers can binge all episodes of this Law and Crimes series ad-free right now. Join Wondery Plus in the Wondery app, Apple Podcasts, or Spotify. You want Grandma? Yeah. We can't yet. We'll go see Grandma later. Me. Honey. A four-year-old girl is found unresponsive and later dies in the hospital,

and now police have arrested two suspects, the girl's mother and her 16-year-old purported boyfriend. We sit down with this little girl's grandmother to better understand what's going on here. Welcome to Sidebar, presented by Law and Crime. I'm Jesse Weber. Let's go to Evansville, Indiana, because this is where 4-year-old Octavia Aquino is dead, and her mother, 23-year-old Destiny Rhodes, and her 16-year-old purported boyfriend, Christian Gonzalez, have been arrested. Now, I want to let you know that in a little bit we're going to bring on this little girl's grandmother to get a better sense of everything that's happening here. But we do have a lot of information at this point. We got a lot of information and a lot of details from a case supplemental report filed by law enforcement.

So law enforcement, they receive a call about this little girl not breathing from this past Sunday. And apparently, this call was made by Rhodes' best friend who said that the girl was limp, she was not breathing. When police arrived to this apartment, they find Octavia cold and unresponsive. She's lying on a mattress in the living room. Officers apparently notice bruising on her leg and neck area. There's a bite mark on her arm, and one witness said that this was the 16. year olds doing. We'll get to that in a second. So this little girl was rushed to the hospital. She was alive. She showed very little brain activity and she ended up dying. The cause of death

is not known at the time of this recording. We're still awaiting autopsy results. But we're going to go back to what happened with the house for a second. So it seems that Rhodes and Octavia were living at this apartment where two other people were listed as tenants. And apparently they had been living there for some time. Now initially when police speak with Rhodes, she said that Octavia was attacked by a cat the day before, but didn't disclose any other injuries, and she didn't reveal that the 16-year-old had been living at that apartment, too. Now, one of the tenants told police that this juvenile, this teen, was referred to as Alex, and she was told that he was 20 years old, which was clearly not true.

He was found by police, by the way, in the upstairs bathroom. Everybody in that apartment was taken to police headquarters for interviews. Now, the other tenant revealed, she allegedly said this to law enforcement, that when she saw Octavia on the mattress, not only was she cold and her lips were blue, but her eyes were open, and that this 16-year-old male had been sitting on the bed with Octavia. So police, they end up doing a background check, and they realize this 16-year-old, this juvenile, is Mr. Gonzalez, that he was a juvenile who had been reported missing out of Fort Wayne, Indiana, that Rhodes had been arrested in connection with helping him escape from his guardian

and escaping from a juvenile detention facility. A protective order was issued against Rhodes to keep her away from Gonzalez. By the way, they weren't able to interview him because his guardian couldn't show up to the station. But police do speak to this mother, Ms. Rhodes. And apparently she told law enforcement that she had unofficially been sharing custody of Octavia but had full legal custody. She at first didn't admit that Gonzalez was living there, but then conceded he was, and that he would care for her daughter, that he would discipline her by taking away her tablet

or swatting her hand. Rhodes said that on June 13th, she went to work and Octavia didn't have any injuries, but later the people that she was staying with, her roommates, showed up and told her Octavia did have these injuries and she had thrown up. So she says she left work, she confronted Gonzalez about the injuries.

He blamed it on a cat, so she claims she thought that Gonzalez was lying, So she told him, kind of a ruse here, that there was a camera set up and she would see what really happened. That's when she claims that he allegedly confessed to her, that he did, in fact, bite Octavia after she allegedly bit him. Rhodes even said that Octavia told her that he bit her and covered her mouth. Now, she claims she told him never to do this again. But Rhodes apparently told police that Octavia was acting strange after this, that she would be staring. off into the sky. She wouldn't be responding to adults. She would be sleepy. She wasn't really

interested in playing. Didn't have a big appetite. So at one point, she goes to McDonald's while Gonzalez is watching Octavia. She comes home. Octavia's on her tablet. Octavia goes to bed. She wakes up the next morning. Octavia's still sleeping. And Gonzalez was watching Octavia. So police, they confront Rhodes about this little girl throwing up. And Rhodes apparently responded that this was likely due to the girl's anxiety, but eventually she seemed to admit it could be because of what Gonzalez allegedly did, allegedly abusing her daughter like this. And she claims that she really thought, because of telling him the camera was set up, again, it was a fake camera, that he wouldn't do anything to her daughter. And when Rhodes was asked,

well, why didn't she just call police about everything? She said that she was scared. And she did say she tried to get Gonzalez to go home on multiple times, but he was, quote, manipulative. and she loved him as a son. Rhodes allegedly told police that she knows she made a mistake by leaving Octavia with Gonzalez. She explained that he had cried remorsefully in the bathroom for an hour afterwards, had never left marks on her in the past, and believed that the fictional camera in the living room

would deter any future abuse. So Rhodes, in one of the tenants, they actually tested positive for THC. Gonzalez indicated to police that he too would test positive for THC, And by the way, when they looked at this 16-year-old, he didn't have any noticeable injuries, according to police. He didn't have any bite marks, as he allegedly claimed. Police, they ended up confiscating the phones of everyone at that apartment, including the defendants. Now, Rhodes reportedly had originally been charged with neglect of a dependent resulting in serious bodily injury, but that was modified to neglect of a dependent resulting in death.

That's a level one felony in the state, which my understanding carries 20 to 40 years in prison. Now, Gonzalez, the 16-year-old, he was originally charged with battery, but that was upgraded to a murder charge, which my understanding carries 45 to 65 years in prison. He appeared in juvenile court, but he was apparently waived to adult court. Now, it seems that the reason these charges were modified was because Octavia was originally in a vegetative state, but then she died. And it also seems that authorities are putting more of the culpability, more of the blame on the boyfriend than the mother, by the way, that they're charged. Neglect under the law or under Indiana law is about putting a child in a situation that endangers their life or abandoning them or not providing necessary support. Murder is knowingly or intentionally killing a human being, and that includes killing another

during the commission of a serious felony. When you hear allegations like this, we go back to the question of how well do you know the people in your life? It's a scary concept to think about, But that is why I want to talk about our incredible sponsor, TruthFinder. TruthFinder is a service that can provide actual safety for you guys. And I say that because TruthFinder is one of the largest public records search services in the United States. Their whole goal is to help people like you learn about the people in their lives. And here's how it works. You go on their website, truthfinder.com and you type in a name.

For example, type in Jesse Weber. You type in my name and within minutes and a paid subscription purchase, you can access unlimited reports that can include information. like phone numbers, location history, criminal and traffic records, including possible arrests and criminal convictions. I don't have those, but you get the idea. You can look of information about potential new dates, people you connect with on social media, people you buy or sell to online, new friends. How about the parents of your child's friend?

Look, it can never be too careful. It's really important. Now, here's the kicker. Right now, you can get 50% off of your first month of confidential background reports. Just go to truthfinder.com slash LC Sidebar. So with all of that in mind, I want to bring in right now a special guest. I'm joined by Octavia's grandmother, Linda Alvarez, to talk more about this. Linda, thank you so much for coming here on Sidebar.

I said this to you before, came on. I'm going to say it to you again. I'm so, so, so sorry for your loss for what you and the family are going through. It is unimaginable. Thank you. I appreciate that. How are you doing? How is the family doing?

I know this is incredibly fresh, but how's everybody doing over there? We're doing it as good as expected. My son, I think he's just still not really accepting it. He just kind of is bottling things up. I mean, our immediate family, like my other son and daughters are. are taking it really hard i'm i'm taking it extremely hard i'm not really like just i just don't understand i didn't really sleep last night it's just it's rough we laid out all the facts that we've seen from filings and from reporting but do you have a sense of what happened here um i have a sense of

what happened i just don't understand why um We were aware of an inappropriate relationship with the mom and that boy that had gone on for a while, even when she was here living with us in Fort Wayne. We didn't know that it was like romantic, but nonetheless, we had, you know, expressed our concerns with her hanging out with minors, and, you know, I told her multiple times that I just, I didn't think that. it was going to end well but she just wouldn't listen um when her and my son kind of split up and she went down to evansville uh we were originally unaware that she had taken him with her until the grandmother of him reached out to me and then i did like my own little bit of investigation work and found out that he was there um the initial arrest of her before with the pending charges that she already had was because of me reporting where he was.

I found out that by a mutual friend who was about to like go to surprise her at work when she went to pull into the driveway, she had saw them together and she let me know. And so I sent the police there to pick him up because he was a minor and a runaway. after all that played out with the court and everything she did come back to Fort Wayne for a while and I thought her and my son were going to work things out she had to go back down to Evansville for her court date and apparently she brought him back down but we were unaware the grandmother never reached out to us we didn't know that we just were under the impression that he was living with his family and destiny you know was was doing the right thing, staying away from him because of the charges and the restraining order and whatnot. We didn't know the people that she was staying with the time that she was down there. She was initially supposed to come back home, but the car had had some issues, and so it didn't, you know, she wasn't able to get back here. We know that she was lying

to the people that she was living with, when she stayed with them, she introduced Christian as Alex and told them that he was 20 years old. Everybody, you know, was aware of the situation, but not everybody knew what Christian looked like, the people that she lived with didn't know. Anytime she went and visited other people in Evansville who knew who Christian was, she never brought him around. But she talked about how she had a new boyfriend named. um, Alex. So, um, no one put two and two together. You know, they just thought that she had a new boyfriend. What, um, what was your relationship like with her? She was like a daughter to me. I treated her as such. I loved her, just like she was one of my own kids. We, we, we did everything

together. We hung out. We went on cruises together. We took vacations together. I loved her. Are you shocked by these allegations? I'm shocked that she allowed it to happen. I'm not shocked that he did this because when they were together the first time, he had hurt Octavia. And when I found out about it, I had gone off. And I warned Destiny, and I told her that she better not ever have him around again. And, you know, why would you even have him around?

So I'm, I'm shocked that she chose to continue to be in an inappropriate relationship with him knowing that he was violent. And he, you know, he had a lot of issues. His home life was not good. And, but, you know, her excuse was constantly that she was trying to help him because of his home life. And I understand, but that wasn't your job. Your job was to protect your daughter. You said that he had previously harmed Octavia. What happened? He had spanked her and left some bruises on her before the first time that they had gone down there. And a mutual friend of ours had made me aware of them.

And so I went down there and I got Octavia and brought her back. And she did. She had bruises on her. And so like I said, when all of that played out and I found out where they were staying and I sent the cops there to pick him up and after having all the conversations with her and really believing that, you know,

she was going to do better and that she had learned her lesson and you know, I understood where her heart was because of Chris's home life, but I thought that she understood that this was not her problem.

This was not something that she needed to be dealing with. This was something that, you know, his family and authorities and CPS and all needed to be dealing with. Linda, do you remember the last thing you had a chance to say to Octavia? You know, you were so kind enough to share so many photos of her, and there's a video that we showed too of her asking to see her grandmother. What was the last interaction you had with her?

She called me and told me she wanted ice cream, and she did that often when she was with her mom. And so I was like, anything for my grandbaby, she's my favorite person in the world. So I cashed up to mom, you know, the few dollars that I had in there. And I said, go take her to Sonic and get her a Sunday. And then she called me back later to tell me how good it was and how she loved me and thank you. And that was the last time I talked to her. I am so sorry.

I'm so sorry. What was Octavia like? I mean, from the videos and the picture, she was absolutely. adorable. She seemed like the sweetest. She was. She brought joy to anybody that she encountered.

I just, I don't understand how anybody could hurt her. She was the happiest. Always smiling. She was just a ray of sunshine. Even when she got in trouble and, you know, we had to like discipline her or just

no, don't do that or whatever. She, you know, she'd brushed it off and just went right back to being a happy little girl that she was. She never, like, she didn't have, like, any anger in her or any, like, she wasn't a typical four-year-old. She was so kind, and, like, even when my other son's son here, her cousin, and they would play together, they didn't fight. They always, they got along and they loved each other.

I remember one time when my other grandson, he actually bit Octavia. He's two, and that's like the stage. When Octavia was in that stage, she never, you know, she was never like that. And so when I heard that Christian is saying that Octavia bit him, and that's why he bit her, I know that that's not true because that was not my grandbaby. She didn't have a mean, like, ounce of anything in her at all. And I mentioned this before, but when police looked at him, they didn't see any injuries on him. They didn't see any bite marks on him, so it tends to show.

Because it's a lie. Yeah. Yeah. He, yeah, it's, it's, it's incredibly chilling. And when, you know, there was something, I saw this video of when Octavia was in the hospital and there was a final walk of honor, walk us through what that was about. um me and her dad decided well ultimately her dad's decision um to allow her to be an organ donor and be a miracle to some other children who were in need um i know that her kidneys actually went right away to somebody so she has already saved a life of another child um it was a very hard

decision but we wanted her to live on and be a miracle because you know she was a miracle to us for the time that we had her and so the the honor walk is the walk to the OR where they do the surgery to remove the organs in the hospital like walls are lined with staff members and friends and family to see her as we take her to that to do that and I understand that there was a go fund me that was up in her honor as well there is it's to to help us because what grandparent what dad has that kind of money lying around to have a funeral for a four-year-old nobody expects to lose a child at that age we're going to put it up there so if people can donate and contribute and help

support you guys through this um we'd like to help you can no of course um thank you as this case moves forward now they've both been arrested their charges have been upgraded they're facing years in prison if ultimately convicted this is not going to be an easy journey for you with the family as you go through the process what are you hoping for now i have mixed feelings about what i hope for destiny um i i i don't know i don't I haven't decided, you know, like I said, previously, this is someone who I loved as a daughter. And so I'm just so confused and emotions are all over the place when it comes to her. Christian, I want to spend the rest of his life in prison, for sure.

Do you think when she makes these allegations that she was manipulated by him, what do you make of that? I make of it as that she was a 23-year-old grown woman who could make her own decisions and how are you manipulated by a 16-year-old. Linda Almerz, it is, it's such a chilling case. I am so sorry for what you're going through, for what the family's going through for your loss. She was taken way too early in her life, and I'm so sorry you have to go through this. I really appreciate you coming on. sharing a little bit more about her.

We're going to try to help as much as we can. We'll get this story amplified. Hopefully people can come out and support you guys. But on behalf of us, we're really wishing you and the family all the best because this is such a tragedy and I'm so, so sorry. Thank you so much. It means a lot. Thank you.

All right, everybody. That's all we have for you right now here on Sidebar. Thank you so much for joining us. As always, please subscribe on Apple Podcast, Spotify, YouTube, wherever you get your podcasts. I'm Jesse Weber. I'll speak to you next time.