Law&Crime Sidebar - Murdered TikToker's Body Parts Identified by Creepy Clue

Episode Date: June 30, 2025

Authorities in Lima, Peru were able to identify a body found dismembered in black bags as Fabiola Alejandra Caicedo Piña, 19, who had been missing for several days. The bags had washed up at a water treatment plant on two separate days. Law&Crime's Jesse Weber discusses the identification and investigation with Tom Smith, a retired NYPD detective and host of the Gold Shields podcast.PLEASE SUPPORT THE SHOW: Check out Odoo to take your manufacturing process to the next level! Get a free 15-day trial today at: https://www.odoo.com/lcsidebarmanufacturingHOST:Jesse Weber: https://twitter.com/jessecordweberLAW&CRIME SIDEBAR PRODUCTION:YouTube Management - Bobby SzokeVideo Editing - Michael Deininger, Christina O'Shea & Jay CruzScript Writing & Producing - Savannah Williamson & Juliana BattagliaGuest 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.

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will keep you on the edge of your seat. Don't let your fears take hold of you as you dive into this addictive series. Love thrillers with a paranormal twist? The entire Oracle trilogy is available on Audible. Listen now on Audible. A horrifying end to a mystery surrounding a rising internet stars disappearance. The teen's body was found dismembered, stuffed into bags, and dumped at a water treatment implant. And there were rumors that her death could be connected to her ex-boyfriend's killing years ago. We're digging into the details and how an investigation like this would proceed. Welcome to Sidebar. Presented by Law and Crime, I'm Jesse Weber. Fabiola Alejandra Sassado Pena, just 19 years old. This is when she went missing in Lima, Peru.

She last shared a TikTok with her followers on June 5th under her nickname, China Baby. Two days after that, on June 7th, her cousin reported her missing, according to Latin American news outlet El Nacional. And days later, there was a shocking discovery. Mutilated body parts inside of black bags at a local water treatment plant in nearby El Augustino. El Nacional reports that police believe the bags had been thrown into the Remack River with the current dragging the body to the water treatment plant. And the outlet also says that it was workers who discovered the bags and the body parts during just a daily inspection of water capture systems at the plant. Can you imagine what it was like for them to see this? Now, because of the state of the body, authorities weren't even sure who the victim was. In fact, El Nacional reports that not all the body parts were found.

And according to Peruvian Al at El Camercio, a torso was found first along with one leg. Then on June 15th, a call to the National Police came in reporting that the victim's head and other leg were found in the same area of the water treatment system. Now, police, they released details about these distinctive tattoos, according to local media. A lotus flower, a butterfly, a phrase in English that was tattooed on her arm, love me for who I am. El Nacional reports that in just the last few days, Fabiola's friends and family were able to identify her base. on those clues, those distinctive marks. Now, details about the state of Fabiola's body that have been released are nothing short of horrific. It is believed that Fabiola was strangled before being dismembered, but there are signs of torture,

including cigarette burns on the body. This is according to the mirror. But because her body was dumped into the river, it is difficult for investigators to pinpoint exactly where the crime may have occurred. Detectives are asking the public to come forward with any information about this, as well as any security camera video they might have had or might have that could show what led up to all this. By the way, this water treatment plant, its services Peru's capital, Lima, and Global News Agency archive reports that the plant's leadership issued a statement to assure the public that it had initiated protection protocols and that the quality and safety of the water wouldn't be affected. But they did ask for people to contact them if there were any unusual changes in the water. So the question now is, what happened here?

Why might Fabiola have been targeted in such a brutal way? Well, to talk about the current theories, let me bring in retired NYPD detective and host of the Gold Shields podcast, Tom Smith. Tom, thank you so much for coming on. Really appreciate you taking the time. Thank you, Jesse. Pleasure to be here. Horrific, horrific case. out to you initially when you hear about the discovery of this body and the initial signs that this body shows. Yeah, the brutality of it is just what jumps to mind and what could possess

one person or a group of people to do this to one individual and what is the circumstances surrounding it is just unimaginable to think of what this poor girl went through leading up to her death. And it does give you an idea of a time frame, right? So if she was tortured, That's a period of time. Someone would have had to be able to hold on to her, find an isolated place to be able to do this and also be able to dump at this very specific site. What does this all tell investigators? That it was planned, that it was coordinated, that they were in a remote area.

You know, in order to do a horrific act like this with torturing someone, it has to be out of earshot of anyone who, you know, where it could bring attention to. and then much less what is taking place with this memberment of the body has to be in a specific location as well. So this wasn't just a, you know, spur of the moment thing. This was coordinated and this was planned. Hey, so I know you guys might be into true crime, but a little side note, anybody out there also in a business of some kind? If so, let me tell you real quick about Odu, our sponsor. Why? Odu is a powerful all-in-one business software that helps you manage everything from sales to accounting, and yes, inventory.

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Do you want an inventory software that comes fully packed? we'll listen to this check out odu for a free 15-day trial at odu dot com slash sidebar inventory and then wherewithal to be able to do that not everybody could be able to do that no not at all i mean it's you know you don't want to go as far as to say professionals because to even think someone has the professional thought to do something like that is horrific but it does lead to a group of people who might have done this before and that's what you're what I think investigators are going to be looking at, you know, past crimes that are unsolved with similar details, with torture with dismemberment, and maybe the same area. So that is one thing

investigators are certainly going to key on. The fact that they can determine there was strangulation and there was mutilation of the body, if you're talking about cigarette burns. Are you surprised they're able to discover that based on the condition of the body and the way it was found? Yeah, very not so, I don't want to say suspicious, but that's that's very detailed in looking at a body that is so dismembered and so torn apart by just being in the water. You know, water does horrible things to a human body after a certain amount of time and it is very difficult to pinpoint certain things. So I would gear towards waiting for a full report to come out where they dictate what was done to this girl and to determine how she died and whether the torture,

or had something to do with it. Yeah. And, I mean, especially in a water treatment plant like that. And you think about the complicated factors of what might happen to a body. 19 years old, it's different than a 40-year-old, right? You wonder who might be in her life at that time. You wonder who might she have been around. Being on TikTok, having a following, not sure.

How do they investigate a death of somebody that young as opposed to somebody who might be older? Yeah, well, you nailed it. You know, you're going to start with the influencer that she is on TikTok and go from there. Were there any suspicious or dangerous tweets or conversations she had back and forth with someone? But when you're running, you know, in those circles as a young person, your group is much larger than, like you said, a 40, 50 year old. So it's going to be, you know, just narrowing down who our friends are, who does she associate with, what clubs does she go to, what other events or things? things that she do, you know, on her off time from being on TikTok all the time.

So all that is going to, you know, compel the investigators to maybe go down one certain path. So right now, the most prevalent theory is that Fabiola's murder is connected to the death of her former partner, Maynard Jimenez Castillo, according to El Nacional, Fabiola, who's originally from Venezuela, left the country in 2022 when she was 16 years old with her boyfriend Maynor, who was reportedly 37 at the time. This is according to the Daily Mail, so 21 years older than her. Fabiola's family told multiple media outlets that while the two did cross the border into Peru illegally, Fabiola chose to go with him and wasn't forced. And just a few months after the move, Maynor was found dead in their home. Three years later, that case

is still open. And there have been multiple theories associated with that one too. Police have previously said they believed Maynor's death to be self-inflicted, but other reports say he was beaten. Latin American news outlet Info Bay reports that Maynor's family believes she had become involved with another man and that he'd killed Maynor. They even reportedly accused her of that publicly back when she was still a minor. So now there have been rumors circulating that Maynor's family may have been involved in Fabiola's death as revenge. El Nacional reports that Fabiola was never formally investigated in relation to Maynor's death. So now, Tom, this becomes a lot more complex, a little bit of a different, interesting avenue. It's three years later. Does any of

this make sense to you, or does it seem like conjecture and innuendo? No. Listen, when you're running an investigation, especially a homicide of this brutality, everything is on the table. You know, you don't disregard anything, especially when you have other deaths that are involved in this young lady's life, you know, and groups that were involved with her were possibly causing that death and arguments and rifts and all that. So all that certainly plays a role in any further investigation, especially when it comes to her now, was this a revenge hit? Did it have something to do with that past murder? So all of this is on the table, and these are the things that investigators have to go through. Yeah. Is that makes sense, though, if this was some sort of

familial dispute something of this nature. I mean, do you see this typically in such a gruesome crime? Oh, sure. I mean, revenge is bad. You know that. You've done enough shows on revenge killings. It can be brutal. And, you know, another thing with that is when there's a revenge factor involved,

there's no time frame. You know, sometimes it goes for years or months or whatever it may be, you know, in stewing or preparing for something like this. But this is certainly something that investigators are going to deal with. And this is a tough one because there's so many tentacles to this and so many different avenues that you can go down. But that's the job of investigators to coordinate this and corral it into some sort of, you know, maybe arrest or subjects that may be involved in us. Let me be very clear. I don't know the full details of this case.

I don't know the full details of what happened with Maynard either. But I have to ask from a general overarching view, is it strange there was a lack of answers in that prior case? Yes, there is. You know, you always want in any investigation, you always want an answer. You know, when you don't have an answer, you start, you know, kind of thinking why. You know, is there a corruption level here? Is there a cover up level here? Not to get into the weeds of that.

But those are certainly things that will come up when you don't get. answers to something that's in any case even here in the united states you know or abroad when answers don't get aren't there for certain investigations then people's imaginations start to go and that's what leads to conspiracy theories and why aren't we getting answers you know another suspicion involves human trafficking and prostitution the daily mail reports that multiple young women have been found dead in lima and the surrounding area especially along that river, which I mentioned before, some of them found zipped up in suitcases. According to La Republica and Peru, Fabiola had been working in local nightclubs may have been lured or forced

into a human trafficking scheme. The same publication notes that brutal violence is often doled out when victims don't follow commands or try to escape. And Peru's national police had its homicide unit handling the case, but it's now been referred to the human trafficking division. This is per info bay. A lot of Republic reports that more than 100 women have been victims of femicide in Peru in the past year. A lot of different aspects to this too. Tom, talk to me about the human trafficking potential angle. 100%. You are spot on, Jesse, because that is so prevalent in this world today. And sad to say it is, but it is. And it's something that has to be looked into. And like I said earlier, that patterns are going to be looked into the age of the

victim where they were found, what the condition of their bodies were in, places that they hung out. All of that is going to lead into it. And that's a great point with the human trafficking because, you know, it's a pattern when it comes to human trafficking of where they're sent to, to, you know, deal with that type of world and what they're involved in, which is horrible and sad. But all of that is certainly it shouldn't be looked into anyway. We're not sure if it is, but hopefully that is an avenue that investigators will go down. How do they investigate a human trafficking potential operation? The background of the victim and other, you know, like you said earlier,

hopefully some people, some witnesses come forward with a kind of media blitz that they're capable of doing down there. But maybe, you know, this young woman who is being trafficked in those circles is scared to death now that the same thing will happen to her. So hopefully there's a break in that with someone stepping forward and telling investigators what is going on down there, people that might be involved. When a lot of public reports that more than 100 women have been victims of femicide in Peru, I'm not entirely sure if that's in relation to, you know, a specific set of crimes or whether it's domestic violence. But that's a large number. It's a large number of women to be killed in general, right?

oh it's horrible you know but again when you're dealing with certain parts of the world they're not generalizing but you know there's a certain lawlessness in certain parts of the world and law enforcement not doing their job because of a corruption issue so all of that does play into this and who you know where it goes from here you and i can guess all we want but you hope that someone steps forward and does the right thing for other victims that you know are are popping up and this young lady but human trafficking rings they they can be that violent like if i if we take the assumption that this is a result of this you would say is this an outlier or this is something that you've seen before oh no this is something you've seen before because

you know to human traffickers the victim is property they're not a human being they're not people they're just property and can be discarded as easily as maybe this young lady was and then they just go on to the next one. It is a heartless, heartless world and dark world of human trafficking, and the people doing it that are running this don't care one bit about these young ladies or how they feel or what they're going through, not one bit. So as of June 30th, no arrests have been made, no suspects have been named in connection with Fabiola's murder. Is that you wouldn't expect in a typical investigation for law enforcement. any law enforcement agency to update the public or the media as to what's going on, right?

That's not unusual. No, not at all because, you know, you don't, if everything is done doing and being done the right way, you know, you don't want to tip your hand into certain groups that you're looking into a subject that you have. So being silent and kind of running under the radar is pretty much the norm. It happens here. I've done it, you know, in investigations that that I've conducted. that isn't, you know, out of the ordinary. What do you tell the families? What do you tell the families of these kind of victims?

What do you tell Fabiola's family in a time like this? So, you know, not only reeling from what happened to her and the discovery of her body and trying to make sense of that, but now trying to get answers and trying to know when those answers will come, what do you tell the families? Yeah, that's tough. You know, we've discussed this before with talking to families and keeping them in the loop. And you just do the best you can. we're trying to update them and showing that you're doing everything possible to get the people

responsible for their family, you know, their victim's death, you know, and it's just a matter of keeping them in a loop and trying to stay as positive as possible with you doing your job and concluding this successfully. It's a really, really disgusting and horrifying case in so many different levels. I'll keep a careful eye on it and see what might develop. Tom Smith. I want everybody check out the Gold Shields podcast for anybody who doesn't know what do you talk about on gold shields what we do is we bring you we highlight high profile cases and bring law enforcement military vets and victims of crimes onto our show to explain and talk about their own stories of what they went through in certain cases and investigations and we've also done numerous shows on human

trafficking we've had victims on we've had investigators on to explain the horrors of it but But overall, it's a great show with amazing guests that fuel our show into telling their stories of their careers and what they've gone through in their life. Well, you are a wealth of information, a wealth of expertise. I hope everybody can check it out because you're really bringing definitely important commentary to the subject. So again, Gold Shields, check it out. Tom Smith. Thank you so much for taking the time. Thank you so much for that, Jesse. I really appreciate it. And that's all we have for you right now here on Sidebar.

everybody, thank you so much for joining us. And as always, please subscribe on YouTube, Apple Podcasts, Spotify, wherever you should get your podcasts. I'm Jesse Weber. I'll speak to you next time. or Spotify.