Snapped: Women Who Murder - Rosa Medina

Episode Date: August 3, 2025

A family demands answers when the body of an Arizona woman is discovered in a remote area of Texas.Season 32, Episode 14Originally aired: May 21, 2023Watch full episodes of Snapped for FREE on the Oxygen app: https://oxygentv.app.link/WatchSnappedPodSee Privacy Policy at https://art19.com/privacy and California Privacy Notice at https://art19.com/privacy#do-not-sell-my-info.

Hi, I'm Lindsay Graham, the host of Wondries American Scandal. In our latest series, a family of religious fanatics moves to Ruby Ridge, Idaho to wait out the apocalypse. But their paranoia and suspicion of authority lead to a confrontation with federal agents and their own personal Armageddon. Follow American Scandal on the Wondria or wherever you get your podcasts. Hey, I'm Mike Corey, the host of Wondries podcast Against the Odds. In our latest episode, competitive swimmer Ali Truitt tells her story in her own words. How she was attacked by a shark while vacationing in the Caribbean and her remarkable journey of recovery.

Listen to Against the Odds on the Wondery app or wherever you get your podcasts. A hunter in hill country stumbles upon a shocking scene. She was nude and there was a bag overhead. The first thing that came in my mind was being so close to the border, you know, there was a cartel. Investigators' antennas quickly go up. His first comment was that he did not kill her. There is something suspicious about him.

But an unexpected twist reveals a decades-old romance. It was during high school that she found him out there. They kept coming back to each other. Behind the devotion, investigators find a single-minded killer with a deadly plan. She promised a life. I mean, a wife, kids. In 2019, the technology to really take a deep dive into these phones had advanced. It opened up a very, very deep and painful moment. I was able to rebuild the web pages, deleted text messages, phone calls.

The house of cards started to collapse. A hundred miles from San Antonio, Edwards County, Texas is worlds away from city life. It's very, very sparsely populated open land, sagebrush desert really out in the middle of nowhere and it's mainly ranchers and hunting leases. Labor Day weekend 2012. On the afternoon of September 2nd, an emergency call comes in to the Edwards County Sheriff's Department. The Sheriff's Department received a 911 call from some guys that were out at a hunting lease. This is basically a big ranch that was split up into multiple tracks of land for the purpose of hunting. The caller, 45-year-old Mark Bauer, makes a frantic report.

One of my guests, Tommy, went to go check all our pig traps that we had set on our place. The next thing I know, he came back to camp and he said, there's a dead body up there. So I got my cell phone and called it into the sheriff's department and they told us to just hang tight at camp and the sheriff would come out. The first responders were the Edwards County Sheriff's Department along with the Texas Rangers. Officials find Mark and the other two hunters, 30-year-old Tommy Darity and 38-year-old Troy Ryder.

As soon as they pulled in, they said, who all has been up there? And Troy said he was up there and my guest Tommy. When the sheriff got to the camp, they asked general questions if I saw anything out of the ordinary up there. At the time, I was still in shock. They asked us to take them up there to show them. So we went up all the way up to where the body was. The body was just off the dirt road and it was right there in the bar ditch area.

There was a woman that was found that was nude. There was a bag overhead. They said, okay, y'all can all go back to your camp. We'll come see y'all when we're done up here. Investigators carefully removed the plastic bag from the victim's head. It was clear that she had been shot. The gunshot wound was to the back of her head.

The blood had not coagulated yet, and that suggested that the body had not been there for very long. The fact that she was nude and there was a bag over her head, it was definitely not a hunting accident. It was a homicide. If you're dealing with a naked female, then there's always going to be the thought of a sexual assault. But a new discovery throws this theory into question.

The deputies found the clothing separate from the body, but very near. Looking at the clothing, it was consistent with somebody receiving a head wound and bleeding downward all the patterns they matched. So whoever shot her took her clothes off after she was shot. The picture starting to form how this crime played out was a planned execution. With the clothing, deputies locate a wallet and an Arizona driver's license.

They found a wallet with a military ID with the name of Ines Santa Cruz. They call it a presumptive ID at the scene because Ines Santa Cruz. They call it a presumptive ID at the scene because the picture looks like her. Investigators turn the victim's body over to the medical examiner for an official autopsy. Then, they head back to the camp to get more information from the three hunters. This is all privately owned land. The main road leads you into your property. That's where you would have the campground.

These men brought out their four-wheelers, their guns. They had set hog traps. So they were out there just boys being boys. They were all separated and interviewed individually. Tommy Darity explains that he and Mark were at the camp for the holiday weekend. The evening before, things were winding down when Troy Ryder, a guest at a neighboring camp,

drove up around 7 p.m. I realized it was Troy who I'd met twice before because he's been a guest of another property owner out there. He said, well, he was just out driving, and we're on the ranch, comic courtesy. Anybody that shows up, we offer them a beer, a Coke, a soda, whatever. Welcome to hang out with us, eat dinner with us. That's just the way we are.

Dinner turned into a raucous night of partying. I was the only sober one there. I don't drink. They were pretty hammered. The party wrapped up around 3 a.m. Troy wanted to leave. He had a lot of stuff to do and he was gonna stay at his friend's property about a mile or so away from Mark Bauer's property. And Mark Bauer told me to grab his keys so he doesn't drop drunk.

Troy relented and agreed to stay the night. He slept in his suburban. The next morning, I guess about 8 o'clock maybe, he got up. I gave him his keys back. He left. And then I want to say about an hour after he left, I decided to go see if he made it to his camp OK. I got up to his property.

That's when I kind of crested the hill and I saw the suburban. According to Tommy, Troy was outside his vehicle looking at something on the ground. As I got closer on the ATV, I could tell that it was a body. As I got closer on the ATV, I could tell that it was a body. And I saw him right outside of his vehicle looking down. The first thing that came in my mind

was being so close to the border. You know, there was cartel. So I kind of panicked and told Troy, jump on the back of my ATV. I said it about two or three times, and he wasn't moving. So I made the decision to get out of there as quick as possible. I went back to our camp, Mark Bauer's property,

and told him that I found a dead body. I called it into the sheriff's department, and Troy came in his Suburban after that, back to camp. When investigators speak with Troy, they ask if he knows anyone by the name of Inez. Mr. Ryder said that by the name of Inez. Mr. Ryder said that he did not know Inez. He had just been out shooting and just happened to see this body out in the desert.

But it's what Troy says next that strikes detectives as odd. He kept saying that he did not kill her, which I don't think anybody necessarily asked him that. After Troy's interview, Tommy pulls one of the investigators aside. I explained to him that I was listening to the comments that Troy was saying to the sheriff, everything that he was saying was just a little bit off, talking about how she was laying. He just was not answering the questions correctly. He was probably the most nervous of the group,

to the point where at some point he had to go and get some beer to calm his nerves after the interviews. We sat around there kind of still in shock of what was going on. There was a lot of what ifs. I know that I slept with my handgun under my pillow that night.

Coming up, disturbing details from the autopsy. The picture's starting to form how this was a planned execution. A grieving sister shares a concern. He showed up at my sister's and he said, I just wanted to see you. Texas authorities are investigating the shooting death of a woman suspected to be 27-year-old Inez Santa Cruz. They did interview everybody at the scene and they all denied ever meeting Inez. After the witness interviews, investigators get word that the autopsy confirmed the ID

as Inez. The cause of death was two gunshot wounds to the back of the head. It suggests that she was shot in full blood while she was facing away from the shooter. while she was facing away from the shooter. The toxicology report reveals another clue. Inez's system was benzodiazepam. Taken properly in low doses, it's an anti-anxiety medication, but in very high doses it puts somebody to sleep and very, very hard sleep to the point of being unconscious.

With Inez positively ID'd as the victim, Texas investigators must now notify her family in Arizona. About six something in the morning, I got a knock on the door and it's an officer. And his words were, did Inna Santa Cruz live here? And I said, she does. And then he gives me the news, you know, we found your sister in a rural area. And I'm like, what do you mean? I'm like, what happened? Where's Rosa?

And he looks at me and he takes out his notepad and he's like, what do you mean? Erica says she thought Inez was with her childhood friend, Rosa Medina. I told them Inez is out there because she had an event to attend with Rosa. Inez's sister said that she had driven Inez to the airport on Saturday, September 1st of 2012. Erica says she didn't hear from her again, but had planned to pick Inez up from the airport in a couple of days. My sister, you know, was found dead.

And I'm like, was there a shooting? Like, what happened? What is going on? on. Inez Santa Cruz was born on February 13, 1985 in Nogales, Arizona. Inez and her sister were two peas in a pod. They thought they were twins. I had them very close together. I am the oldest. She was the middle child and three, four years older than my brother. Ines was a natural athlete. Whatever they put her to play, she would play and she would play it good. In high school, Ines excelled at basketball and bonded with her teammates, especially Rosa Medina. Rosa, I met her in high school. I really loved her.

She was a nice little girl, respected us very much. When Inez's teammate Rosa had issues at home, the Santa Cruz family welcomed her into theirs with open arms. She was just part of the group that into theirs with open arms. She was just part of the group that hung out with my sister and she lived with us for a while. Eventually, the friendship between Inez and Rosa

blossomed into romance. It was during high school that Rosa fell in love with Inez. I would bluntly say, Rosa, do you like Inez? And she said, of course I like her, I love her. But by the end of high school, the relationship had shifted back to friendship. They tried it out and it just didn't work out. But my sister was one of those who, you know,

I'm always here for you if you, you know, ever need anything. By the fall of 2012, Inez was looking to the next chapter, nursing school. That was her plan. We were going to go together. I was going to try and finish my RN and she was gonna do her anesthesiology. With her eyes on a career, Inez joined the Navy. Inez was stationed all over the place. She'd get these awards and I found them and I go

and why didn't you tell me? You know she never bragged about anything. After she got out of the Navy, my sister got an amazing job at UMC. She was a surgical tech there. So she was super excited. But all of that changes on September 2, 2012, when Inez is found dead in a remote corner of Edwards County, Texas. We found out that she was supposedly flying into San Antonio on the 1st of September to visit her friend Rosa Medina. Born in Mexico in 1987, Rosa moved to the U.S. before starting grade school.

Unlike Inez, Rosa's home life was anything but stable. Her mother got pregnant at a young age and she raised her in Arizona. She was kind of a handful growing up. She said she had nowhere to go, so she stayed with us for a good while. Following graduation in 2003, Rosa moved to Texas for a fresh start with family. She just said she didn't like her mom. She only liked her grandma. So she had to go back to Texas to where she was living with her grandma. Though their romance didn't pan out, Rosa and Inez were able to get along. to where she was living with her grandma.

Though their romance didn't pan out, Rosa and Inez stayed in touch over the years. In Texas, eventually Rosa Medina had children, but even when Rosa was in other relationships, she didn't want Inez to be with other people. I think Rosa always wanted something more. But the person my sister is, it wasn't like, oh my God, you like me, we got to cut off this relationship. It was, no, like we, you know, we can be friends. Rosa was living a normal life, posting pictures on Facebook of her and her daughters.

And she was doing photography. That was her job. In late August 2012, Rosa told Inez that she had booked a job photographing a wedding. Inez said that she would come babysit the children while Rosa shot the wedding. But on September 2, the weekend of the event, Inez's body was found in a remote area of Edwards County, Texas.

At that point, I just thought, did she suffer? Like, what happened? Where's Rosa? Maybe there was an accident or something. I didn't. My mind was just going crazy. Rosa's safety isn't the only thing called into question. Investigators also wonder how Inez ended up in Edwards County,

four hours away from Midland. It was like someone just dropped her out of the sky and she landed, which kind of just didn't make sense. When asked who might have been at odds with Inez, Erica says there's only one person who comes to mind, Marty Chavez. Marty Chavez was in the Navy as well, and he was sweet on Inez. The two became close while they were stationed

at the same naval base. I don't know if they actually dated or if they tried something, but Marty was in love with my sister. I don't know exactly what she felt or what he would tell her. There was a couple of times he showed up that my sister's like,

what are you doing here? Like, I told you I was busy this weekend. He said, I just wanted to see you. And she's like, yeah, but I said no. -♪ I just wanted to see you." And she's like, yeah, but I said no. Coming up, a romantic entanglement gets complicated. OK. I don't think I love trying with something going on. No, I don't.

And chilling footage surfaces of Inez's final hours. It took some convincing to get her to agree to go with him. She could tell that something wasn't right. It's all a lighthearted nightmare on our podcast, Morbid. We're your hosts. I'm Alina Urquhart. And I'm Ash Kelly. And our show is part true crime, part spooky, and part comedy.

The stories we cover are well researched. Of the 880 men who survived the attack, around 400 would eventually find their way to one another and merge into one larger group. With a touch of humor. Shout out to her. Shout out to all my therapists out there. There's been like eight of them. A dash of sarcasm and just garnished a bit with a little bit of cursing. That mother f***er is not real!

And if you're a weirdo like us and love to cozy up to a creepy tale of the paranormal, or you love to hop in the way back machine and dissect the details of some of history's most notorious crimes, you should tune in to our podcast, Morbid. Follow Morbid on the Wondery app or wherever you get your podcasts. You can listen to episodes early and ad free by joining Wondery Plus and the Wondery app or on Apple podcasts. How hard is it to kill a planet? Maybe all it takes is a little drilling, some mining,

and a whole lot of carbon pumped into the atmosphere. When you see what's left, it starts to look like a crime scene. Are we really safe? Is our water safe? You destroyed our town. And crimes like that, they don't just happen. We call things accidents. There is no accident. This was 100% preventable. They're the result of choices by people.

Ruthless oil tycoons, corrupt politicians, even organized crime. These are the stories we need to be telling about our changing planet. Stories of scams, murders, and cover-ups that are about us and the things we're doing to either protect the Earth or destroy it. Follow Lawless Planet on the Wondry app or wherever you get your podcasts. You can listen to new episodes of Lawless Planet early

and ad-free right now by joining Wondry Plus in the Wondry app, Apple podcasts or Spotify. After finding Inez Santa Cruz shot to death in a remote Texas hunting camp, investigators are trying to confirm Rosa Medina's safety while looking into a new lead gleaned from Inez's family. There was a man that was interested in Inez, romantically. We identified him as Marty, but he was going to be a person we were going to have to talk to.

Investigators locate Marty's superiors in the military. He was nowhere even in the state of Texas during the time of the murder, so we quickly eliminated him. Next, Texas Ranger Roger Dixon focuses on finding Inez's friend, Rosa. The family gave us the information to contact Rosa. I called Rosa and she answered. I started discussing Inez with her. I told her about the murder, and I basically asked her what she knew about it.

She was in tears. She said that there had been talk of Inez coming to visit Rosa over Labor Day weekend, but Inez had lost her debit card and couldn't get the money to pay for a plane ticket. Rosa said Inez had told her, hey, I'm not going to be able to come. So a subpoena was issued to Southwest to find out that she was on night flight.

Investigators ask Rosa to meet them at the Del Rio DPS office for an in-person interview. When asked for her whereabouts during the time of Inez's murder, Rosa doesn't hesitate. Rosa had been at a concert in San Antonio during the time of Inez's murder, Rosa doesn't hesitate. Rosa had been at a concert in San Antonio at the time. Rosa also provided photographs to law enforcement showing her and her kids at this concert. Investigators ask Rosa if she knows any of the hunters who found Inez's body. To their surprise, she says yes. She knows Troy Ryder.

In fact, they met and just started dating about three months earlier. She said that she had a romantic relationship with Mr. Ryder, that she met Mr. Ryder every Saturday for lunch at the mall. Was he jealous of you? Absolutely. No, he doesn't want to get married. He's not jealous. You sure? You're sure?

Because I have a hard time seeing a coincidence of Ness coming down from Arizona not knowing Troy and Troy finding her dead at the place where he hunts. I'm thinking love triangle, something going on, I don't know. No, I don't. Well, you know, I wasn't there. Okay. So, that's why I'm wondering What the heck's going on here? The way that Rosa responded was, I don't know why he would have met Inez.

Before she leaves, investigators ask Rosa if they can take a look at her phone. You would expect to see a lot of calls and text messages between Rosa and Inez, but there were not a lot. That indicated to law enforcement that Rosa had deleted some items. We downloaded your phone with your consent and once it's downloaded I'll get back to you. They release Rosa and circle back to Troy Ryder, the first person to discover Inez's body, who also happens to be Rosa's boyfriend. I knew that if Inez flew into San Antonio, there's probably one of only two ways she could have gotten to that location. And one of those ways has a Border Patrol checkpoint. I contacted a friend of mine there and sent him the license plate.

And probably within 30 minutes to an hour, I received several photographs and it showed Ryder in his truck with a small female. I zoomed in and looked just like Inez. On September 7th, investigators pay a visit to Troy's home in San Antonio. He sticks by the story he gave on the scene, denying any prior knowledge of Inez. He does, however, admit to knowing Rosa. Rosa and Troy had just recently met at the strip club.

He was a client. Rosa was claiming to be a photographer. I found that she was actually a dancer at a men's gentleman's club. Investigators press on. They confront Troy with the photos from the border checkpoint. Who's in the car with me?

She didn't give me her name. I didn't ask her name. Nothing. I just gave her my bracket. Troy claims the woman was a hitchhiker. Though the story is flimsy, it's not enough for an arrest. Troy is released. Days later, investigators received the flight manifest from the San Antonio airport. Inez, she was actually on the airplane.

Law enforcement didn't review a video from San Antonio International Airport. The video showed Inez and showed Troy. It just shows that they were together prior to her being killed. That was a huge deal. It seemed like it took some convincing by Troy to get her to agree to go with him. She could tell that something wasn't right. At this point, law enforcement had the surveillance video

from the airport and the border patrol checkpoint video showing Mr. Ryder. Though loose ends remain, investigators now have enough for an arrest warrant. On September 13th, 2012, authorities follow Troy to a restaurant in San Antonio, Texas, and sit down to try and get a confession.

Zebra? Yes. That's the victim, right? You say so. Where do you think Zebra? That's her. Who's that? Zebra.

Investigators showed Troy some of the digital evidence they had, at which time he shut down on them, he was loggered up. You want an attorney? Yeah. Alright, we'll wrap this up, okay? Hey, put your hands on the wall, we got a warrant for your arrest. Mr. Ryder was charged with capital murder and was facing either the death penalty or life in prison without the possibility of parole.

During that time frame, Ranger Lewis was able to get a search warrant of Ryder's vehicle. In the search, he sees Troy's gun. With Troy behind bars but not talking, investigators are left with one very important and unanswered question. The only connection between Inez and Troy Ryder in this tragic, senseless killing is Rosa Medina. And she continued to maintain her innocence. Almost three months pass. Then investigators get a phone call from Troy's attorney. The house of cards for Mr. Ryder started to collapse.

So Troy Ryder was facing potentially the death penalty. Through negotiations between his attorneys and the district attorney's office, he ended up giving a full confession. Coming up, Troy reveals a wicked plot. She didn't care how. She wanted her gone and out of her life. And new accusations bring new questions.

She says Penez started making threats to her. She was scared because she didn't want to lose her kids. Three months after investigators arrest 28-year-old Troy Ryder for the murder of Inez Santa Cruz, his attorneys reach out to prosecutors. We got a confession out of him, and there was a plea agreement to keep him from getting the death penalty. On December 4, 2012, Troy sits down for an interview. He very quickly implicates not only himself, but also Rosa Medina.

She didn't care how. She wanted her gone and out of her life. Those are her words? Yes. I mean, and you're clear that she means dead? Yes. He means dead. Yes. Rosa had approached Troy about killing Inez. Weeks prior to the murder, she says Inez started

making threats to her that if she didn't be with her, she was going to tell her family what she was doing us in working at the gentlemen's club. Rosa was scared because she didn't want to lose her kids, but she didn't want to be with her. The gun that you used? It was my.22. That rifle that we collected?

Yes, ma'am. For Troy, there was another, more enticing reason to help Rosa. Rosa promised a life. I'm a wife, kids, pre-fed family. According to Troy, the day before the murder, he met Rosa at the mall food court for their weekly lunch date. She then handed me, it was like a blue package. Rosa told him the package contained sleeping pills. Rosa had another client who gave Rosa some drugs. it was Benzo's. Talking about the killer to me,

is that the conversation Walnut would kill her by doing this? She has just said she didn't care how, just did not want her recovering in any hospital room. She told Troy that Inez would be arriving on a flight to San Antonio later that day, and together they came up with a plan. The plan was for Troy to pick Inez up at the airport.

Rosa instructed Troy to crush these pills up and to put them in ice tea. Rosa knew that Inez liked to drink ice tea. Rosa knew that Inez liked to drink iced tea. I went over to the airport. How I knew what she would look like was she had shown me a picture. I recognized her, come off, I walked over, I met her, I told her, I asked her, is your name Inez? She says yes. I told her, you're supposed to come over to the land with us. Rosa's over there taking pictures. And she says, OK, she got in the truck.

And I says, there's a nice tea for you. Trusting that Troy was Rosa's assistant, Inez accepted the ride and the tea. She started dozing in and out. And so we drove for a while, hoping that she would be able to get some rest. assistant, Inez accepted the ride and the tea. She started dozing in and out. So we drove for a while, hoping that the pills would take effect. She passed out, fell asleep.

But when they got to the campsite, she was awake. Groggy was still awake. Troy told her that Rosa had stepped out for supplies and would join her later. He then left Inez alone, hoping that she would fall asleep and never wake up. He spends the night drinking, riding four-wheelers, and the next morning Troy goes back. He came back to the trailer thinking he would find, you know, Ines unconscious or dead, overdosed with the drugs. It found her quite alive.

Her cell phone died because there's no electricity, and she was livid. In order to explain what happened next, investigators take Troy back to the crime scene. Troy, explain what happened right here at the crime scene, if you would. I told her that I was going to give her my phone to call Rosa because she said her phone was dead, no juice. We drove up, I got out of the driver's seat. So Ryder told her, you have to stand on that rock and point that way and you can get signal. I handed her my phone, she walked up, I then grabbed the rifle with her back to me and that's when I fired the first shot.

She fell, she was gurgling. I went back, I loaded one more round and was her down on the ground and shot other end in the back of the head. They wanted to make it look like the cartel had got her and raped her and killed her. So he took her clothes off. He also put a trash bag over Inessa's head. His efforts were interrupted when Hunter Tommy Darity stumbled upon him.

Troy's confession fills in the blanks, but it isn't enough to arrest Rosa. Texas law is very clear in that the statement of a co-actor, in and of itself, is not sufficient to secure a conviction. Seven months after Inez's body is found, Troy is convicted of first degree murder. The negotiated plea agreement was for 75 years. Mr. Ryder will not be eligible for parole until he has served 30 years of that sentence.

For Inez's family, Troy's sentence is bittersweet. I got pretty sick because they wouldn't arrest her. I was having faint spells. I couldn't live thinking that this woman was living a normal life after what she had done. But whether or not Rosa will go to jail isn't all Inez's loved ones struggle with. They want to know why. She mentioned to Troy that my sister was going to backmail her, you know, saying she was a stripper, whatnot. But in all honesty, my sister could care less.

Was the real motive unrequited love? Rosa lived in San Antonio and wanted Inez to move to San Antonio to be with her, but Inez ended up finding a good job as a scrub nurse in Tucson, Arizona, where she lived, where her mother lived, and eventually made the decision not to move to San Antonio. I think that's what triggered all this, is that when Inez didn't move, I think it made her mad.

As years pass, Rosa goes on with her life. She moved on, she got a new job, she was working as a manager at Home Depot, she had a live-in partner. And hard proof of Rosa's involvement in Inez's murder continues to elude investigators. But in June 2019, everything changes when investigators are able to look at old evidence through a new lens.

The technology to really take a deep dive into these phones had advanced, and investigators started looking at it some more. The last analysis of the device was detrimental to the case. And so it's actually kind of a really cool thing that technology can be your best friend or your worst enemy at the end of the day. that technology can be your best friend or your worst enemy at the end of the day.

Coming up, will that day finally come? New technology cracks the case. It proved that Rosa did know Inez was coming to Texas. Seven years after the 2012 murder of Inez Santa Cruz, Trigger Man Troy Ryder is behind bars, but the alleged mastermind behind the crime, Rosa Medina, remains at large. But new life is brought back to the investigation when old evidence is examined in a new way.

They brought me Rosa's iPhone data that had been given to the Texas Rangers when they interviewed her initially. And I was able to rebuild the webpages, deleted text messages, to be able to look at them as you would have seen them in their native format. The analysis yields what investigators have been waiting for. A week before the killings, Rosa was doing searches

for date rape drug, slipping a Mickey, how to make untraceable calls. The final thing that we found was a text that said, I'm boarding my flight tomorrow, I'll see you soon. It had been deleted, but with the new technology, it was extracted. That was exceptionally important when it came to showing that Rosa knew Inez was coming in. By June of 2020, the case against Rosa Medina had gotten much, much stronger.

Within a month after we got the last forensic stuff from her, we went to arrest her. On June 29, 2020, authorities locate Rosa at her home in San Antonio. When we first made contact with Rosa, we tried to explain to her we were trying to finish up the case and close it out. She was still acting very nice. At the station, her demeanor changes. and it doesn't seem that way. You opened up a very, very deep and painful moment.

She started to get more upset. She was not willing to talk with any of us after that. I...I...I... There is no evidence because I didn't do anything. Don Targills, I didn't do anything. I'm sorry Rose, I can't talk to you. You've ended the interview. Investigators reveal they have a warrant.

Hey Rose, you under arrest for murder. No, you have this all wrong. You have this all wrong. Why is this happening? Oh, no. You have a fall on. Why is this happening? Prosecutors are confident in their case, but there are other factors they must consider. I believe fully that Ms. Medina would have been convicted, but we also have to weigh

the wants and the wishes of the victim's family. I don't want to go to court. I don't want to hear all this stuff. This thing is going to hear all this stuff. Just saying I'm going to bring my daughter back. Authorities honor the family's wishes and approach Rosa with a plea bargain. She agreed and entered into a negotiated plea

bargain for manslaughter. I was hoping that during that process, she would give a confession in return for leniency, but she never did. In April 2022, Rosa pleads guilty to the reduced charge of manslaughter and receives an 18-year sentence. I wished that she could have been sentenced longer than what she got, but we finally got her arrested and got her convicted. While it is comforting that Rosa is finally behind bars, there is little that can ease the pain of not understanding why. I wrote her a letter, but she's never responded.

That's all I say is why, why? And I guess I'll go to my grave saying why. I see the world very temporary, very limited. I live in the moment, like my daughter taught me. I'm very proud of the person she was. Troy Ryder is currently housed at Memorial Unit Prison. He will be eligible for parole in 2042. Rosa Medina is scheduled to be released in 2038. She will be 51 years old.

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