True Crime Vault: Killer on Campus

Murder in the Heartland explores real crimes across small town America,

“towns that might look a lot like your own.”

Every week uncover shocking stories of murder and betrayal, from a suspicious hunting accident, to a college student who disappears after her shift at the local bar. Here from investigators, witnesses, and family members as they share the chilling details behind each case.

If you're interested in true crime with a small town twist, you might love this podcast. Listen to Murder in the Heartland, wherever you get your podcasts. Welcome to the 2020 True Crime Vault, where heart-stopping headlines come to life.

We were living in the bottom of happiness. Somali, our life just... change forever.

A one little second, everything was gone.

After nine days, University of Florida, freshman, Christian Aguilar, Miami has not been found. And our really started panic, because I'm like, "Where was he all mine?" Once a student is officially reported missing,

all hell breaks loose. It seems like you knew pretty early on, but something terrible that happened to Christian. Where do you think Christian is right now? But I just really hope he is lost.

We had been searching and searching. The 80 promised Queen of America, as far as their relationship goes. As far as I know, I don't think so.

“I think they just started, so I don't think there would be problems right away.”

This is a drawing of Eric and Eric, yeah.

Has Eric as soon as it's? We were very happy, just the two of us. Everything was doing fine, and then all this chaos came forward. And at that point, we saw a hitchhiker just around and got in. But this kind of scene, according to Pedro,

scene harmless. My guilty is missing. That was the last time anybody had seen Christian alive. They couldn't find a single-hinder hair of this man. He'd finished.

Just doesn't feel real. I don't think the human mind can truly comprehend something that traumatic happening, which is a full call, really. University, please. Yes, I've looked.

My name is Carlos Aguilar, and I'm the part of Queen of the Anaguilar. And he has not been answering our call. I started asking all my friends. Now, have you seen Christian on campus? Oh, I'm like, no, no, I haven't seen him.

I haven't seen him. And I'm getting more anxious. He grew up and just let us know that he hasn't seen him or talked to him things he has today. She asked me when was the last time that you talked to Christian.

I didn't understand what she said. Why do you ask? Assimida. I mean, I take out a sense of urgency that I needed to get in contact with Christian, no answer.

The University of Florida, students, has been missing since Thursday. Thank you, Sophie. Still, no sign of the missing team. Search teams have been looking for Christian Aguilar for days now. We do suspect foul play.

That feeling that you cannot do anything that you don't know where he's at. Please say, time may be running out. It's every parent's worst nightmare to send their kid to school, which they think is going to be a wonderful, happy experience, and then have them vanish without a trace.

What was Christian like as a kid, likes to read a lot, study, play music, drawing. He was very shy like me, but at the same time, he also got a pretty funny guy. He used to make the family laugh. A lot, he was pretty funny.

Christian was a very charismatic person. He loved to make people laugh, he loved to make people smile. Christian was just absolutely brilliant,

but most importantly, always aspiring to be someone

and looking out for his future. Carlos and Claudia Aguilar made their way to the United States from Cali, Columbia, and they made a life for themselves in Miami. Christian was born in the United States in 1993. A few years later, his younger brother Alexander was born.

Were you guys close growing up? Christian, I were absolutely close. Being the younger brother, obviously you want to hang out with the older brother as much as you can.

“As an older brother, would Christian protect you more?”

Would he pick on you a little bit? Combination of both? Yeah, Chris would definitely pick on me, but since your brother, you're a lot to kind of get away with it. The Aguilar is one of the best for their sons,

so they enrolled them at Doral Academy in Miami. Christian had a very tight knit close group of friends that included Erica Freeman and Pedro Bravo. Pedro was somebody that Chris thought was just hilarious.

In high school, he was a quick with the jokes, very kind.

Mocha talent. Very talented, very intelligent. I tell you, very intelligent. Very responsible. Pedro is very creative.

He's into moth painting. He also journals a lot. And really, really enjoys drawing in art. What was Erica's relationship to Christian in high school? They were just good friends.

They participated in a lot of events together. Both Pedro and Christian saw in Erica a smart, sweet, shy, kind, and beautiful woman who had goals for herself and was a really good friend to everyone around her. We hang out a lot and Christian had the car.

So, you know, we would just hop in his car. Christian hung out with his friends a lot. He would drive them around town on a regular basis,

but he always found time for his studies.

Even making honor of this group, one of their separate ways for college. Christian was accepted to the University of Florida. Florida was his dream school.

“Why do you think being a florid kid or was so important to him?”

You know, we were kids of Emma Grinsa. He would have been one of the first cousins or a family to graduate from a university. And he wanted to challenge himself. Did you ever get a sense early on with Christian that he was destined to do something great

with his life? He told us that he wanted to become a biomedical engineer because he wanted to help people to rehabilitate and to accommodate them to have a better life. And he couldn't wait to move all the way up to North Florida and go to Gainesville.

After graduation, what was Pedro planning on doing? He was planning on going to the... ...if I knew he was very, very smart. He had a good future. Erica Freeman wasn't a student at the University of Florida,

but she was a student at the college nearby. And very often people will do a few years at Santa Fe and then transfer over maybe their junior year.

“Do you remember how excited Christian was before going off the college?”

You couldn't wipe the smile off that kid if you tried. So he moved to Gainesville in the summer. Yes, of course moved to Gainesville in the middle of June of 2012. Five hours from Miami, that made you a little bit afraid that he was going to be a little farther away.

He was the first song. I was very proud, but the same time. He was hard. Latin families are very tight, especially Miami. People don't necessarily move until they're married.

So I can imagine Christian being nervous, but also feeling kind of relieved that a few of his friends, including Erica, were also going... ...some familiar faces, you know, to see when you move. I think it's comforting. Shortly after Christian moved to Gainesville,

he started hanging out with Erica again. She was a little buffer against all the home sickness he was starting to feel. And before long, that relationship blossomed into a romantic one. It was just something really strange. It's like when you have a crush on someone for so long, I guess.

And then you find out, oh, they also have that huge crush on you. Christian got accepted into his dream school. And at the same time, has this relationship. He was on top of the world. Christian is doing so well in school.

He has a girlfriend, everything seems like it's perfect. We were living in a bubble of happiness. Somali, our life just changed forever. It's been three days since Christian Aguilar was last seen. After nine days, universally afford a freshman.

Christian Aguilar of Miami has not been found in one little second.

Everything was gone. Here's some Gator football. If you live in Florida, the University of Florida is the big dream school. The academic's are great. The partying is great.

The atmosphere is intense. It's nothing but I can feel it here. Here is a ton of University of Florida pride. It's a sea of orange and blue. The place comes absolutely alive on Saturdays for a football game day.

In 2010, 2011, 2012, football was massive. One of my first stories for the alligator was about weathered. Tim Tivo was going to be named Saint.

“I think Chris was excited for a few things like football season.”

He got his season tickets. That might have been a part of why he chose Florida. But I do think academically is kind of what drove him the most. I was very proud but at the same time, I was afraid because he wasn't leaving our way for a nose.

We told him every day you communicate with us. Every day did he communicate with us every single day?

and is now attending Santa Fe College when they get up to gain so.

By September, they were dating. The way he looked at me. I don't know how to explain it. Someone just gives you that much, just with their eyes, just with the way they looked at you. Like, you know, I don't need anyone else I need you.

And that's how he would describe it. That's how I felt.

“I think they loved each other in a way that a 18 year old would fall in love over a summer.”

The fact that they were both in a new city was kind of an accelerant, almost to the relationship. But down in Miami, Pedro Provo's parents say that he felt increasingly isolated. And that prompted him to move the Gainesville that August and enroll at Santa Fe College. He saw his group of friends were going up there. So he decided from one day to the next mom, I'm going to Gainesville.

And I told him, "But how?" And he said, "No, because my friends are going." For Erica and Christian, it was just very normal to talk every single day, particularly at night, kind of checking in on each other. And on the night of September 20th, Erica wasn't able to get a hold of Christian.

My friends were like, "You know, maybe he's phone got wet, you know, maybe he'd fall asleep somewhere. There's a perfectly beautiful explanation for this."

“She called him and texted him and called him and texted him over and over and he never responded.”

Erica decides to just go out there to his dorm to check in and see if she finds him. He lived on the first floor, so I just go up to the window and I started knocking the window and his roommate comes out and I'm explaining to him, you know, like, Christian's lying answering me. I'm really concerned. Like, I don't care what time he gets in, just please can you ask him to call me. Christian was hanging out with Pedro all day, but he didn't touch space with Erica that night,

and she got worried. She started calling Pedro and at one point Pedro picked up. Around four o'clock, I called Pedro and it starts raining. The first thing I asked me was like, "Where's Christian?" And he's just like, you know, "Listen, you know, it's late. I'm sure he made it home. He just didn't call you." When she wakes up the next day, she calls the roommate again to find out where Christian is.

He still hasn't seen him. Christian never came home.

He was like, "Oh yeah, Christian never came to the apartment." And now I really started to panic because I'm like, "Where was he all my?" I received a phone call in my, in my work.

“And was Erica almost screaming? What was she saying to you?”

She asked me, "When was the last time that you talked to Christian?" Because I'm trying to call him since yesterday he's not answering me. Carlos, what was it like getting that call from your wife, telling you that his girlfriend can't find Christian? I immediately hung up with her called Christian. No answer. No answer. When Erica became concerned because she couldn't get in touch with Christian,

she went to the university police department to report him missing and she took Pedro Bravo with her. At the same time, Christian Aguilar's parents were calling our communications center. His girlfriend has been trying to contact him for years today, and he's not responding. He normally respond to his girlfriend right away, and if he's still concerned about it, we are concerned right now. This is not his normal behavior.

Kids get reported missing on college campuses all the time. Sometimes it's just as simple as going to the classroom where he's supposed to be seeing that he's in there and saying, "Hey, can you please call home?" We had checked his residence hall on campus. He wasn't there. Christians roommate told police, "It wasn't strange that he didn't come home that night,

but what was out of the ordinary was that he'd left his laptop on his desk."

We had checked his classes. He never showed up to him.

I did advise you to talk to that he shows up to have him call station. We can't get a hold of him by cell phone. There's something really going on here. That day before he got in contact with Claudia. He was at that mess, he got to the thing for the flu. Nothing seemed out of the ordinary.

Nothing. While at the campus police station, Pedro tells police that he'd been hanging out with Christian the day before. Simply can locate Christian, figure out where he may have been, please. When I first met with Pedro, I asked him to take me through his last meeting with Christian. We went, he took his flu shots at campus and I'm like, "Oh, do you want to go get something to eat?"

And I used to go, "Okay, sure." So we went to the end of my car, and we went to Zach's piece, chicken. And then he's like, "Oh, God, can we go into the best bite?" And I was like, "Sure, because you want to get the new county west east so we left around." And we found the new county west city and you got it, and then we left. Pedro went on to tell me that as they were driving, he and Christian got into an argument.

So I stopped the car and I let him get off and I drove away because I didn't want to do like

deal with any more. But like, as I was driving away, like, I really regretted now because I wish I could have gone back. I wish I could have kept driving and be like, "No, screw you. We're going to, I don't care. You're not going to get off." Like, I wish I could have kept driving and then like, you can be home right now, or you can be doing something right now. You know, that's the last day I heard of him. My whole intent on interviewing Pedro was give me some indication that, you know, some lead that we can follow up on. What do you know about

what Christian was thinking, what his plans were? You think, Chris would have been upset enough just to make a hurry and some about you guys having the argument. I really hope not. I don't think so. Police also talked to Erica. Pedro, of course, it's a case that we work about. I was telling them, "No, no, no, we're doing just fine. We're doing great, actually," and he's not wants to not even answer me. So it's been very strange. I don't know where he is.

Scrambleing for any clues. Police learned from Pedro about an impulsive decision he says he in Christian made. They picked up a hitchhiker along this road. While they're in the course of driving around, Pedro tells me they pick up this hitchhiker. It's two of us against one person if anything happens, then he'd be in the backseat. So we don't empower him if anything bad happens.

“We can't help but think that could this third person have anything to do with Christian's disappearance?”

I was in my AP English class at the road. It was about 11 o'clock in the morning, and the PA system goes off. My father's there to pick me up. When I finally got to my father who was waiting in the waiting area of the high school, he was in tears. How'd you ever seen your father

in that state before? No, I've never seen my father anywhere close to that. He didn't have

the words to tell me anything. We just knew something had happened to Chris. We vaguely know that he's just missing. From there we picked up my mother at her work, and it was a stray shot from the rouse rates again. That's normally a five hour drive from Miami. How long did it take you to get there three hours? You were what fast? That was quite impolistic. As Christian's family rushed to Gainesville, Pedro Bravo was here inside the University of Florida

“Police Department tried to help them find his missing friend. Where do you think Christian is right now?”

I don't know, I really go. I had a feeling that maybe he's walking somewhere, maybe he took around direction because he doesn't, he doesn't know the place as well as I do right now. You spoke to Pedro on the way up to Gainesville. What did he tell you? They they got into an argument and they Christian opened the door and got out of the car and he left that. And yeah, so that made me feel peace, say probably Christian got lost. As Pedro was talking to police,

he tells them he and Christian decided to pick up a hitchhiker while driving around the day before. Yeah, it's done. It's like why not? Because it'd be an interesting experience to pick up

someone like that on the road. He's never done that before. But this kind of seemed

according to Pedro, seemed harmless. This guy just looked very tall and very like like a sort of a gentle giant sort of thing. Do you ever think about the city on a hat? Yeah, cowboy hat. Pedro tells me they drove around. Listen to this hitchhiker story about what brought him to Gainesville for approximately 10 minutes. He's like just dropped me off right over there and I pulled into like

“this storage place. What looks like a storage place? I remember seeing storage somewhere and I'm like”

I pull in there. He gets off and I do a you and leave there. He sat in the back seat of Pedro's car and courted Pedro was playing with a roll of duct tape. I check my car and see if there was like if there's anything missing is out of a bunch of my art supplies in the back. My duct tape is missing. Police collect security video and they're able to piece together much of Pedro in Christian's day. Although it doesn't capture that hitchhiker that Pedro claims they picked up,

the footage largely matches Pedro's account. The police got security camera footage from all over the place. You see Pedro and Christian together on campus at the hub. You also see them

The next time security camera footage caught the two of them, it was in Pedro Brevo's car inside

in nearby Walmart parking lot. At almost seven o'clock in the evening, the surveillance cameras catch, the car leaving the Walmart parking lot. That was the last time anybody had seen Christian alive. Christian's mother and father, Claudia and Carlos Aguilar, raised up for Miami and arrived in

“Gainesville, last name afternoon. Did you start searching immediately admittedly? Where did you go first?”

We started walking around the trails. The trails? Screening Christian. Christian, we are here. We are you, you ride you hand. Please answer your mom's here. We know Gainesville. Gainesville

is full of swamps. It was a swamp. We went inside and it was a alligator nearby and we were not

scared at all. We just wanted to find Christian. The last place that Christian was seen was in the Gainesville city limits. So we felt it was necessary to turn this over to the Gainesville police department. I got a telephone call from our lieutenant and he said the University of Florida Police Department had a missing student and asked if I would respond to the University of Florida Police Department. The University Police Department contacted us about Christianness and we are going to be

taken over the investigation. Hydro seemed to be a young man who was a little bit meek and mild. How long have you known Christian for four years all of high school? It has been one of my really good friends that brought in with me and started class. After interviewing Pedro for 15, 20, 30 minutes, he explained the relationship between

“Erica Freeman, Christian Agua and himself. What's your relationship with Eric?”

I dated her for two years and from then I just became friends. Erica Freeman dated Pedro Bravo while they were in high school. Eric broke it off before she moved up to Gainesville. When she got up to Gainesville, she started dating Christian. So Christian really came. Christian's been dating her for what I know from three weeks for the month, I guess. He's the one that told me. That was kind of rough, but then after

I'm like I'm the way I was glad it was Chris and not someone I didn't know because I knew Chris and I knew what type of person he is and I knew if anything happened he could take care of her. Pedro says he's happy for Erica in Christian. It's very like so proper like. But it turns out they had been keeping the relationship a secret. Erica shows me some text messages between her and Christian from the previous day.

About don't tell him, are you going to tell him? Everything was so in fine and all this chaos came forward and we didn't, we didn't, we didn't know how to handle it. Three decades ago, a young woman named Angie Dodge is found brutally murdered in her bedroom in Idaho Falls. It was the probably the worst case I've ever seen. It is the one that sticks with me. Please zero in on a suspect and put a man behind bars.

I don't know what the hell you guys want. Do you think we'd be wasted in our time and wasted in your time if we didn't think you're involved? But as the years pass, doubts emerge about whether the real killer was ever caught. That's when Angie's own mother in barks on a decades-long mission to uncover the truth. 23 years I've been trying to put this puzzle together and

this center's missing. I've always been told the truth will come out. You can't hide the truth.

Listen to the snare, the new series from ABC Audio, listen on Apple Podcasts, Spotify or your favorite podcast app and add free on Amazon Music. Who won Disney Plus? There are three victims we know of. The suspect is female, white,

“late 20s. Female serial killer is killed for power and troll. I believe there's a deeper motivation”

here. You have no idea who you're telling us and you're gonna end up dead. I've been waiting for you. Watch the Hulu original series, Furious,

Tonight authorities in gamesville are searching for a missing university of Florida student who could be a danger. University of Florida's student Christian Agilar is still missing. Agilar was last seen by Miami Native Pedro Bravo at a best-by-in-game film. Once a student is officially reported missing, all held breaks loose. In 2012, I was the University editor at the Independent Florida alligator, which is the student run newspaper that covers

UF and the gamesville community. The first notice that we got about Christian came from GPD.

We got it online as soon as possible. The student who was going missing, one of our own, we knew that we had to cover it immediately. We have multiple detectives respond, start checking information on telephones, on apartments, just where if anybody's seen. Upon speaking with Pedro, police learned that he and Erica dated in high school.

“Erica was now dating Christian. In your friends dating your ex-girlfriend?”

I don't know, but I don't have hair with that because I like, I know he's a good guy. I didn't buy that at all. It's just in the way that Pedro talked about it. You could tell that he was not real happy about it, but he was telling me himself.

It was crucial for the police to try to understand the dynamic between these friends,

Christian, of Pedro, and Erica. Okay, so I understand that you and Pedro were dating all through high school. And basically, it was going to be three years and October. So about three years, yeah. Who would go out with Monday, so we texted all the time. He was a little funny. He was very sarcastic. He was kind of a class clown a little bit. He was able to make it laugh so easily. In high school, Christian, Erica, and Pedro were all part of the same circle of friends,

they even went to prom together. But as graduation approaches,

“Erica and Pedro break up. I started seeing problems in a December last year.”

It was it was simple things that they would kept adding up and I kept making up excuses for him.

And I just I didn't like the fact that I had to keep making excuses that, oh no, it's not his fault.

Erica Freeman ended up breaking up with Pedro Bravo right before they graduated. He was very emotional about it. He cried a lot. He was very, I mean, it was not what I was expecting at all when I broke up with him. Not only do they break off this relationship, but they also part ways. Erica decides to go to Santa Fe college and at the time Pedro had a full ride at a university in Miami. He decided to stay home. As police try to learn more about Pedro and Erica's past,

they bring in other friends from that tight knit circle at Derral Academy. She had long with Erica. Yeah, they were not three year relationships, almost three year relationship. And she broke up with him before this summer because she was going to come up here. And so he came here kind of to like got her back. Pedro couldn't accept their breakup. He couldn't accept that things were over. And that culminated in him driving up to Gainesville

and going to school there so he could be closer. He decided to move here two days before classes started because he was visiting and he was like, hey, Erica lives here and I might as well stay to see if she'll take me back. What was the relationship with Crystal and Erica? As far as I knew, they were just really close friends. After moving to Gainesville, Erica Freeman runs into Christian and they develop a relationship. But they were keeping it secret because they didn't want her, Pedro.

“Were you telling other people about this or were you hiding that?”

No, we were. We were keeping it quiet and we were trying to just see we were just trying to keep it between us. I mean, that's just we had a problem saying like we we would walk around campus holding hands and stuff. We didn't have a problem with it. When you people in my hand, we were not become terrible with the idea of a standing because again, I had just broken up the Pedro. But Erica and Christian's relationship wouldn't stay quiet for long.

Pedro found out about Erica and Christian through mutual friends. Some of whom from Daral Academy had also gone up to University of Florida and Santa Fe. Christian talked to Nadia and said, "Yeah, Erica and I aren't being." That. That worried and like she's my girlfriend.

So then in turn, Nadia tells Alyssa what she heard from Chris. Right. So she goes and she tells Pedro. It's it's very like a soap opera like we don't we don't like me. Christian, we're very comfortable with all of it. We didn't want them to come to game until we were very happy and just the two of us um everything was doing fine and then all this chaos

came forward and it was just it was surprising and we didn't we didn't we don't know how to handle it. One of the rumors got out that Christian and Erica were seeing each other. He would say that it would like that he was sad about it.

On September 7th, 2012, Pedro and Erica met here. He wanted to confront her

about dating Christian. He showed me a picture of me standing next to Christian and I was just like listen we're friends you know we're hanging out we know we're not dating we're just hanging out.

“But you lied to him. I did lie to him. Yes. I. Why did you lie?”

I just felt like it wasn't the appropriate time to tell him that you know I don't want to push this kid at all. I don't want him to think anything you know that might throw him over the edge. Pedro was okay. We didn't like that point. Yeah. He didn't indicate to you. He was angry or that she's lying or that you know. Not her. He believed that he really good. He told me that he wanted to talk to Christian to like

kind of clear the air. His motivation was to get with Christian to talk to him about the relationship he started with Erica Freeman. So he had mutual friends call Christian to arrange this get together. Once Christian was with Pedro, I had not heard from him. The last thing he told me was have a great day in class and and I'm going to go talk to Pedro and I'm like we're not dating.

“That was the last time she would ever hear from him. After they met up, Erica did not hear”

from Christian again. I'm kind of hoping that he kind of got lost in a way and then they'll find him because he got lost and couldn't get out. It's great to talk to you. Yeah, certainly. I understand that. The location where Pedro Bravo was living had its own surveillance cameras at the very front. So we were able to see him come and go which direction he turned. Hoping to establish a timeline of his whereabouts after dropping off Christian,

Elise talked to one of Pedro's roommates. He came in around night. He stayed for he couldn't have been at home longer than five minutes before he left again. I was able to see like very last of like his shoulder to his head, leaving. He didn't look dirty. He didn't look sweaty. Was he carried anything? Was he? I didn't. I didn't notice him. I didn't notice anything in his hand. And what he left was the last time I've seen Pedro.

With little evidence to go on, Elise asked Pedro for permission to search his car. There were some suspicious items that were located in there. And what they find fuels the investigation. When Claudia and Carlos Christians parents first got here, they were determined. They weren't going home until they found their son.

The search for Christian Aguilar started small, like most missing persons cases do. I distinctly remember Claudia and Carlos Aguilar Christians parents coming up and walking through the woods looking for their son. On the search, Christians family was on the front lines. I remember seeing their interviews leading for hell. I'm looking for people's heart. They can come and help me. I'm looking for somebody that can walk with me.

Aha, that's the only, you were never going to leave gamesville. No, I told my wife we're not living.

We don't care if we lose the house, we don't care if we lose everything, you know, Christian is missing. We're going to find Christian. You go out every day. My son is missing. I don't know what's happened to it.

“I don't know where he's at. Can I imagine how I would deal with that?”

I don't know that anybody could. The search efforts continue. And police are encouraging more people to volunteer to help find Chris Aguilar. Once words started getting around Gainesville, the outpouring of support from the Gainesville community in the University of Florida was completely mind-blowing. The family needs help out here. We need volunteers.

Community volunteers on foot, fanning through the woods of Gainesville. Why do you think the community responded to Christian's disappearance the way they did? I don't know what about it. Just kind of sparks something in the people. University of Florida, freshman. Christian Aguilar of Miami has not been found dead or live.

The problem is we didn't know where to search. There was really no boundary of where our search

was because we didn't know what we didn't know. So we sat and looked at everything. Matt Gackle was our digital forensics expert detective at the Gainesville Police Department at the time.

Christian where he might be, what might have happened. The initial review of the data was to

reconcile the phone data with Pedro's statements to then hopefully be able to find where Christian may have been. Matt Gackle was able to determine that the two of them were together for long period of time. Directions they went. As we continue our coverage of the missing 18-year-old University of Florida student, it's been three days since Christian Aguilar was last seen. The search for Christian was one of the biggest searches in Florida for any missing person.

Hundreds of volunteers this weekend calming through the woods of Gainesville. Still, no sign of the missing team. There was dogs, helicopters, horses, robots, there were law enforcement

from all of the state helping the system to search. We had people from Miami. We had people from

South Florida. We had people from their home in Colombia coming to Gainesville to look for Christian.

“How involved was Erica in the search and how was she holding up during this time?”

Erica was extremely involved. I do feel like we felt like we had to stick by each other. She is such a sweet person, so sincere and she was with us from the very beginning. We had been searching and searching, you know, screaming out his name, every forest without too every road we got to, every river we passed. There were tips that were coming in, people claiming to have seen Christian. What did you make of them? Every time that somebody says,

"We saw Christian in this area." That's a matter if they were right or wrong. We immediately

dispatched a search of group to that area, to search from that area and we'd pour back to us. We're going to run everything down, we're going to investigate everything. There were some tips but nothing that led to anything that would help in locating Christian.

“I think that most difficult part for me was seeing every day the faces of my family”

completely and pain, crying, with no hope. And I couldn't do anything about it. Hundreds of people coming the woods every day looking everywhere and they couldn't find a single-hinder hair of this man. It's like he vanished. I asked Pedro over the time, "Would you mind if we went through your vehicle to see if Christian maybe left anything that might give us an indication of where he might be?" And Pedro volunteered

to allow us to take a look inside his vehicle. Pedro's blue Chevy Blazer is a mess. There are wrappers, bottles and old paint cans all over the place. And on the floor, in the back of the SUV, police find a bunch of crumpled up receipts, including this one for a late-night big Mac. I ended up finding a McDonald's receipt that was dated when he had told Sergeant Wilder he was in bed past out because he had taken a sleeping pills. Mr. Bravo has told the investigators

that he is in his apartment from seven o'clock the evening before, until he leaves to a company Erica, two to the gate to a police department in early morning hours of the next day. That kind of blows his alibi being at home at that period out of the water. And what did you tell him at the

“first time? I forgot. Honestly, I'm sorry, but I forgot. I might have been driving from the pills”

and I don't remember. So Pedro changed his version because of the receipt. And every time that we would ask him questions and go through, it seemed that the version would change in the bed. As Pedro's story evolves, there are more and more red flags for detectives. There's nothing I'm looking at. I haven't to tell you that. I don't tell you, it's okay. You're right. I can't keep everything from here. I have to tell you one thing.

What detectives would eventually find with practice case wide open? One police found that journal. They thought that was as good a motive as you could get for what happened to Christian. The search for Christian Agularch continues today for police say, "Time may be running out." The University of Florida student has been missing since Thursday.

You're just walking around a wooded area screaming your brother's name. We know that he's not coming back. I know what's going back when they can come back. It says essentially to him, "I don't want parents to find a pile of bones." And so I recall we found a journal. It sounds like the mind of a sociopath.

make it seem like there was a serial killer. It was just mind-blowing.

“Remember, Chris has to disappear. Chris has to go missing. This is the plan.”

You believe that he lowered Christian to his death. A eyewitness has come forward, verifies that Christian got up and walked away.

Now you're speaking out for the first time.

Did you kill Christian Agularch? Throughout the day, as Pedro Bravo was questioned, his story wasn't adding up to investigators. Venomic Donald's receipt is found in Pedro's vehicle. And there are raises more questions about exactly what he was doing

late the night before. One of the other things that we located was some security footage from Scrub's Car Wash. Of Pedro at one in the morning, power washing the underside of his blazer.

I like a clean car like anybody, but I'm not sure that one o'clock in the morning is going to be the

time that I'm going to get out and spend 10 minutes washing the underside of my blazer. At some point, I had to confront him and say, "Look, this doesn't make any sense whatsoever." What really happened? There's nothing that's looking at that. I have to tell you that if I don't tell you it's going to be. It's one thing I have to tell you because you're in a can't keep everything from you.

I have to tell you one thing. He said, "He didn't ask me to let him out. I told him to get out." Because he said something nasty to me. At one point, I made the comment about his, "The girl that he has a crush on,

“and he got angry at that, but then he came back with, maybe you should just, like,”

maybe you should just (bleep) kill yourself." And that's what I turned around and punched him straight into the face. And that's what I saw. He went, like, "He got out, but I told him to get out of the car." And then it changed to, "Well, I got out and we had a fight and I beat him up and then I left him." I saw the car, I got out and then I started a small fight with him and then I left.

That evolved to, well, I beat him there, but he was still a lot. Was he breathing? Yeah, but barely. Andrew, I'm really happy to Christian.

And then I finally confronted him as, like, Christians not coming back, isn't it?

If that's all it happened, he would have fallen somewhere called the police to get his fall and to get his stuff. We know that he's not coming back, okay? I know he's not coming back. I've been doing this for too long. I've been doing this for 30 years. I know what's going back when they ain't coming back, he ain't coming back. You know, you know he's not coming back.

He's just kind of moved his head, he didn't say anything, he didn't say no, he didn't say yes. He's pressed by Detective Randy Roberts who says essentially to him, "I don't want parents to find a pile of bones. Can you show me where he is?" "Why don't we do this again? I don't know this." "I don't mean you and somebody take a ride. Let's go see if he's still here."

"Okay." "You're going to be honest. Yes, we're exactly where he was."

“We drove the route with Pedro, we're him to show us, where did you pick up the hitchhiker?”

Where did you drop off the hitchhiker? Where did you leave Christian? After hours of searching for Christian, we still didn't find anything. Police don't find any sign of Christian, but they do find something interesting in Pedro's apartment. The search of Pedro's apartment produced a lot. It produced a journal. Pedro was an avid artist and journaler. He kept a lot of notes and quotes about his life in his thoughts

in a diary, and he wrote very often about how sad he was about how he was wanted to hurt himself. He wanted to die. Pedro's journal provided a glimpse into his mind and a glimpse into what he was thinking and planning. Drawings and statements made inside this journal clearly indicated that Pedro was struggling with dealing with his breakup with Erica and loss of communications with his friends

and showed a mindset on his part of being very determined to win Erica back, to remove any obstacles that would prevent him from doing that.

I don't know, but I have paid off that because I like, I know he's a good guy.

He's telling me he's happy for Erica, he's happy for Christian. And this journal is completely opposite. He was so totally obsessed with him. At this point in the investigation, we're doing everything we can to try and find Christian. As part of that, I requested his self-site records.

Unfortunately, his records stopped on the day that he disappeared. One of the things that Detective Geckel was able to find is that Pedro's phone was put into airplane mode for quite a bit of time on the day that Christian went missing. That told us a lot of things. The other big piece of information that we discovered on the device was the app usage log.

It's a log that an iOS device keeps that shows the amount of time that particular applications were used.

He was able to determine that the flashlight mode was used for 40-some odd minutes in the middle of the line.

And police say that running a forensic searcher, Pedro's computer hard drive yields chilling results. We analyzed that computer for evidence of the crime. It had searches all related to getting away with murder, giving people sleeping pills. How would you kill people with sleeping pills at some point viewed a mean of someone asking Siri, "Where can I hide my roommate?"

The evidence is indicating that something bad has happened to Christian. He hasn't called as we've seen.

“How concerning was it when you learned that he'd purchased a shovel?”

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In a sunny California in summer, one family's home is unusually quiet. When detectives walked into that house, they said that it was like time just stood still. It's 2010 and the mixed-day family is nowhere to be found. Inside the home, no clear answer where the family could have gone. Has been wife and two children?

Oh, gone? Like, puff disappeared. The search for the mixed days quickly captures the nation. But for years, the search for answers only brings more questions.

“Who's ever heard of an entire family going missing?”

A family of four doesn't just drop off the face of the earth with no contact. Is this a family on the run? Or is the truth far more sinister? From ABC Audio in 2020, this is what happened to the mixed days. Coming August 11th wherever you get your podcast.

Or subscribe to 2020 True Crime Plus on Apple Podcasts for ad-free episodes, early access to new episodes, and so much more. (whistling) Now, a South Florida family is searching for their loved one and police say, time may be running out.

The University of Florida's doing has been missing since Thursday. Yeah! As the search continues for Christian, authorities are conducting a search of their own at Pedro's apartment, looking for clues that might help in the investigation. In his bedroom, there was a closet, and in the closet, there was a suitcase.

Sort of like Russian nesting dolls. Inside the suitcase, there was another suitcase, and inside that suitcase was a backpack. Inside the backpack was Christian Agulars. Wallet, his Florida driver's license, his University of Florida identification card.

“The backpack wasn't the only thing that you guys found inside Pedro's apartment, right?”

Correct. We actually did three search force at his apartment. We ended up finding receipt from Lowe's. The company security footage there of Pedro purchasing a shovel, some insecticide, and a bottle of gatorade.

How concerning was it when you learned that he'd purchased a shovel? Well, it was very concerning because I knew that he would probably only use that to hide evidence or a body.

One of the first charges that was brought against Pedro was the February to render aid.

Under his own admission, he got into a physical location with Christian, injured him,

Horror was impounding at the game, but police department didn't download.

Where we got a search warrant for it. And inside the car, we found a journal. His blood would paint board on it.

“The evidence is indicating that something bad has happened to Pedro.”

He hasn't called, he hasn't seen. He's not where Pedro said he'd left him. Eric went to jail and visited Pedro. And she thought he had done it, and he knew where Christian was, so she just kept pushing him.

I need your help, because we have nothing. So you're in a sense, nothing tells how it's possible.

How did you just send it?

But the whole time, Pedro just denied it. Eric, I don't know what happened after I left him. Friends and former classmates, teachers all came out to Miami's North Trail Park. They were all praying and hoping that young man will be found safe soon.

So far, absolutely no sign of him. About eight days into the search, we had enough evidence. We had enough reason to believe that this was making a turn from a missing person's investigation into a murder investigation. The evidence continues to mount in the murder case

of missing UF student, Christian Aguilar, Miami. His friend, Pedro Bravo, wearing the suicide protection vest,

while making his first court appearance Saturday on the charge

now of first degree, pre-meditated murder in the case. I think when Pedro was arrested, there is some level of disbelief, like, no, this can't be paid, because this is one of Chris's close friends. At the time that the decision was made to place Pedro Bravo on her arrest for the murder of Christian Aguilar,

Christian Aguilar's body had not been found. As Christian's parents, how did you manage to cope with the stress, the uncertainty during the search? Only God can answer you that question. You see your family members crying and you cannot do nothing about it.

We're a period of time. They came to realize that they may not get him back alive, but they were going to get him home. The search itself, it felt eternal. You forget to eat. You forget to drink. You don't know what's the last thing

“to use the bathroom. We don't even know if you have to use the bathroom. It's such a weird feeling.”

Personally, I drop like 20 pounds just because of how the little IA you go days without taking a shower, you go to bed, exhausted, but nerves and anxiety keeps you going. On October 12th, Christian had been missing for three weeks. Two hunters are out in the woods and they come across what they think is a dead deer. They saw bones and thought, "Oh, maybe just a dead animal, but as they got closer,

they realized it was a human skull." I got a telephone call that they believed they found a body in Levy County and that from the preliminary information of the clothing that was found, they believed it may be Christian. About almost the hours drive, west of Gainesville,

where it is very remote, very heavily wooded. The forensic team, the medical examiner, were on the scene, trying to exume these remains from a shallow grave. So that conversation with Randy Roberts retells you that they found a body. I ask him, "Randy, in your experience, you know, the body that you guys found in there,

matches the clothing, everything that Christian was wearing, and he says 100%. So, you know, at that moment we all start crying. Claudia, you wanted to go see the body after it was recovered? Why? Because I didn't believe that he was, he was, he was, he was, he was murder.

Even the Randy said that he found the Christian body. I didn't believe that. It's hard to do a death notification for anybody. It's hard to tell them that their loved ones not feeling alone. For me, I've been 30 years, I've been to it.

And that was the only time that I ever probably broke down with the family. That was the hardest one I ever did. You'd just spent more than three weeks searching for your son.

“You must have been exhausted physically and mentally.”

What was it like when you had to bury him? My brain was not there, my heart was not there, my physical presence, yes.

There was a huge outpouring of grief once Christian was finally discovered.

This case ended like we, like nobody wanted. What touched me about the funeral was just seeing like how many people loved him. Everyone was crying.

“Did your focus shift to now getting justice for Christian?”

Somebody has done our own doing and you know it. And it's really bad that person is to be brought to justice. We asked for justice. We didn't ask for revenge, which is different. Justice.

What was it like when you finally saw Pedro walk into the courtroom?

There's no words for it. You're betrayed. I have to have this monster staring at me. While I'm on the sand, I don't want him to look at me. The investigation into Christian Aguilar's disappearance and murder

only lasted a few weeks. But it would be almost two years before Pedro Bravo would finally go on trial here, charged with killing his best friend, with the case making national headlines, all eyes were on this courthouse in Gainesville. Now underway in the trial of Santa Fe Student Pedro Bravo.

Bravo is charged with pre-meditated murder. The trial itself was just such a huge deal in Gainesville. And every single day, Christian's parents were there. His brother was there. They sat right up in the front.

For us, this was our way of representing Chris and all this, because he didn't have voice anymore. So we had to be there for him.

“What was it like when you finally saw Pedro walk into the courtroom?”

There's no words for your betrayed. I mean, this is somebody that's been to your house. This is somebody who's house you've been to. It doesn't process as real. They were saying, "My strategy in the opening statement in this case is to really tell the jury exactly what

you're doing." When you piece all of the evidence together, all of the statements together, it gives a pretty good picture of what happened. Pedro was jealous of Christian and developed a plan to kill him. Getting starts collecting the items to commit the murder. And really engages in the planning that leads up to his contacting Chris,

asking for the meeting. Chris pushing it off him, continuing to ask for the meeting,

and finally agreeing to the meeting.

They travel around Gainesville and eventually end up in the parking lot of Walmart. The vehicle is observed under closed circuit camera surveillance, parked there for about two and a half hours. Based on the medical examiner's information and the autopsy,

“I think that what they did was surmise that he had probably drugged,”

Christian by giving him a laced drink, waited for him to lose consciousness, and then climbed into the backseat while Christian was unconscious in the front seat. And then we have evidence that Pedro strangled Christian while they were in the car with a movie strap. Police say that Pedro drove all the way out to the Woods and Levy County, Doug a shallow grave and left his friend there with his body type of duct tape.

Remember, Chris has to disappear. Chris has to go missing. This is the plan. Can't get air to back. Chris is here. I'm going to tell them that from the standpoint of someone who saw it all, right, to give them that bird's eye view. Then I'm going to go back and I'm going to tell them how are we going to prove that all of these things have.

In his opening statement, Pedro's lawyer argued that Pedro may have heard Christian, but he did not kill him. He did hit his friend. He didn't get in the fight and he left his friend. That is what he did not want to tell, police. The first few days in this trial were all about statements from people who have had contact with Pedro Bravo today. It is all about the evidence. We had so many pieces of evidence that we

believe proved Pedro was responsible for this from the McDonald's receipt to the scrub's car wash footage, to the low security footage, to the best-by-security footage. We had a timeline

in searches of Pedro Bravo's car and apartment in the days after his friend went missing.

“The forensic evidence from the burial site includes the duct tape that is around Christian Aguilar's ankles,”

his hands and his mouth. That duct tape will be forensically matched back to the duct tape that was in the car. The prosecution calls a parade of witnesses to the stand, presenting evidence they say they collected over the course of the investigation and recounting Pedro's interactions with police. Erica also took the stand. Erica provides us a lot of context. She provides a lot of background.

She provides a lot of time frames and communications. I don't know why you read this far. You have the greatest person on this bloodier, so I won't let you fall. We took down the time

“to write down his plan and his, you know, what he was thinking of me or what he was thinking of”

Cruz. It sounds like the mind of a sociopath. She had to take multiple breaks and at one point she had to identify items from Christian's backpack. She just couldn't hold it together and started crying and they had to take a break. And now I have to have this person, this monster, you know, staring at me while I'm on the stand. I don't want him to look at me, I don't want him to see me ever again. I did lock eyes with Pedro once and there was nothing there.

It's just kind of a dark emptiness in his eyes. You know what? He was the worst part of that trial, seen Pedro, seen him in front, seen somebody so sarcastic, no regret, no remorse. Was there a particular testimony that was difficult for you to sit through? Michael Angelos.

Michael Angelos was a jailhouse niche who was crucial for the prosecution in this case.

The story he tells, prosecutors say, illustrates just how far the Angel Bravo would go to get away with murder. No one really knows what happened on September 20, 2012, the night that Christian Aguilar disappeared. However, one witness testifies his side of the story as told to him by Pedro Bravo, the suspect in this case. Michael Angelos was Pedro Bravo's assigned self and Mr. Bravo opened up to him about what he had done and how he had done it. How would you describe him as a witness? It definitely feels like he was by far the most unexpected witness.

He was unexpected because we knew nothing about him until his lawyer disclosed to us that he had

“information about the Pedro Bravo case. Did he cut some kind of deal? Did he get a more lenient sentence?”

Michael Angelos agreement with us was that he would testify truthfully and that we would then appear at his sentencing hearing and provide the court information about the help that he had provided in the case. As a result of that, what would have been a life sentence was reduced to 25 years. I think originally he said that he was going to try to poison him with a mixture of sleeping pills and pesticide and mixed with soda or something like that. His main plan was to token with a

moving strap. He even provided my new details what time was on the clock, how long it took

Mr. Bravo to Margaret Christopher. He basically put a moving strap around the kid's neck and

raised himself against the seat. He said he remembers watching the radio, the clock on the radio, so it took like 13 minutes for the kid to, you know, I guess die. But perhaps the most alarming part of Michael Angelos testimony recounting what he said was Pedro's plan to redirect suspicion for Christian's death. That plan was that Michael Angelos whom Pedro Bravo believed had the ability to procure martyrs of additional UF students on the

outside. They were both incarcerated. Those martyrs would look similar to the martyrs of Christian Aguilar and then it would appear that the actual killer was some zero killer who was on the loose. Was it ever brought up about the shovel and what you would need to do with the shovel

that murder to make it look like somebody else had did it. And in order for you to do that,

“would you have to know where the shovel was then currently located? Yes, sir.”

We went out there to the location. He said that Pedro was off the shovel. We found the shovel, didn't underneath the boardwalk. Finding the shovel was a big deal, principally because it verified what Michael Angel was saying that he actually had obtained this information from Pedro Bravo. On cross examination, Pedro's lawyer argued that Michael Angelos was getting a deal to testify and attacked his credibility. And the deal you are seeking is to get

that life mandatory sentence off your back. That's the least that you wanted, then. Yes, sir. Stay with us. Gainesville hadn't seen a case like this in a very, very long time. You didn't just have the local media covering this as a story, but you know, you had national media. It was huge. The young man on trial for allegedly killing his best friend, driven by jealousy,

taking the stand in his own defense. Today we're hearing what Pedro Bravo says happened the day his friend and UFC and Christian Aguilar was last seen a lot. It was just, my boy, what is he possibly going to say? Pedro testifies as to why he says he bought the Gatorade, Z Quill, and shovel. You bought all those things? Yes. For what purpose? It was to kill myself. And why he says his flashlight was on for so long. I get out the car. I'm it's pitch black outside.

I can't see anything. So I turn on the flashlight and I go to a certain tree. I find it. I'm okay with it. I put Pedro and as well nine, there's 20, 12. And what did you mean that to me? The last day that I was alive. He admits that he hit Christian repeatedly. I strike him with my, with my open palm in the face. And then I strike him again. So as I watched him testify his answers seen, he could try and they seemed to be styled to charm the people who were on the jury. What is

“Chris's condition when you leave? What I remember, I can't, I can't give an accurate statement”

because I'm, I'm not a doctor or anything like that. So I can't tell you if he was, if he was unconscious or he was knocked out, but that he was still moving. And as for buying the shovel, Pedro had an answer for that as well. Tell the jury why you bought a shovel. It was going to be part of my idea to kill myself. In a way, I was going to go find a spot. Now I'm going to mark my tomb and I was going to dig it. All right. Thank you, Cross. Mr. Browrow, I want to start by asking about your

timeline that you described to Mr. Rupert. When you start to cross exam in someone, you catch them in lies and you catch them in things that can't possibly be true. Now you're on your way to

kill yourself, right? Correct. But you got to get gas first, right? Correct. Okay, because you can't,

kill yourself without a tank of gas, correct? Correct. You point out contradictions that ultimately, they can't get out of them. All right, we adjourned. All right. Hey, Joe, seem to have an explanation for everything. The question was, would the jury believe them? The Christian's family was very nervous

“and I think that they believed in the jury, but I don't know how you get into the mind of a”

parent who's had their child murdered, you know, doubt the worry. There's a two-week trial and only a few hours for the jury to come back when he heard it. Ladies and gentlemen, the jury foxes follows us to the defendant. The general Andreas Browrow in this

case. The defendant is guilty of first-degree murder, felony murder, first-degree.

What was your reaction when you heard the verdict? guilty. It's not a victory. You won the case, but Chris is still gone. And I think all of us unanimously just got hit with sadness. We were happy the case went the way it did, but we were done reminded why we're there in the first place. It was just a sense of relief. I kept thinking, you know, the last time I ever have to see him. I don't have to think about him. I don't have to even worry about him.

happening to him. He's destroyed to families. He's an hours. Nobody won that day. Haydor was ultimately sentenced to life without the possibility of parole.

“You have to sit back and ask yourself why. You know, it's just, it's so senseless.”

What could possibly drive this young man to bend his abilities at his talent and his motivation in such a negative direction? It's early in the morning in Central Florida. I'm heading to prison to speak with Pedro Bravo, where he's been behind bars for a decade. Now a new witness for the defense has come forward with a bombshell claim that could turn the case upside down. And Pedro's old

cellmate is talking again. You know I decided to take care of it, too. Did you kill Christian Agua? Pedro Bravo is currently being housed at a prison here in Okatobi, Florida.

“He's serving a life sentence without the possibility of parole. To date, all of his appeals”

have been denied, but there are new developments in the case that could move the needle in Pedro's favor. I recently sat down with Pedro for an exclusive interview to talk about the case. You've been behind bars for more than 10 years in prison for murder of your best friend. Now you're speaking out for the first time. Why? It's easy to lose hope. It's easy to go through a peel after a peel and not get a chance to be heard in the courts. And after all this time,

we almost gave up, but we decided to give everything a last chance. I have these new developments

given you hope. I'm never lost hope.

And I witness has come forward who specifically supports Pedro's version of what happened between him and Christian, the fight, and also most importantly, verifies that Christian got up and walked away. According to an affidavit signed by this witness in 2012, she was in town trying to get tickets to a university of Florida football game, and was supposed to meet someone in this parking lot while waiting. She says that she saw

two young men having a fight. She insists it was Pedro and Christian. What was your reaction when you heard about this new witness? I couldn't believe it. And it felt vindicating to finally have someone that can corroborate what I said. And at the end of that fight, Pedro gets in the car and leaves Christian. And she goes to approached Christian who basically tells her to move on. He's okay. I couldn't imagine why 10 years later,

when there was such a huge media frenzy around this, someone would just pop in and say that they saw something new. The witness is reason for not seeing anything about the trial. I would attribute that to her age at the time. She was 19 years old. Just traveled up to Gainesville for this one game. I had no reason to think that this would be something significant

“for a murder trial. Maybe someone's in Kankham, I don't know. I don't know. Are you hopeful?”

I have learned not to be hopeful, and since you can say it's going to happen,

do never know. What are your thoughts on this new witness that has come forward?

What was your reaction when you heard what she had to say? In order for it to be something that would concern me, it would have to somehow lead to the conclusion that it isn't possible that Pedro Bravo is the person who committed this murder, and the evidence that he did is overwhelming. I don't know what's happening with this new witness. I haven't had an opportunity to speak with the witness. This case is closed, right? So my authority to start subpoening witnesses,

it doesn't exist in this case. We've reached out to this new witness, but she has declined to comment. The second piece of newly discovered evidence is the recantation testimony of Michelangelo. 2020 spoke with Michelangelo, who's still

incarcerated to ask him why he's recanting his testimony. It's always been in the back of

my head in time that they didn't have anything about everything. It wasn't that during a trial and that investigation, and I would contact it by a woman who's loved to move to a certain thing about this trial. She told me if I had anything that I wanted to get off my chest,

take care of the truth. Your former Selma Michelangelo gave very specific testimony.

How do you explain that letter that note that he came forward with? He brought me in a corner cell and he had me on the ground crying and he told me you're going to write this, and I was going to kill myself anyway. I was going to take my life so I didn't have any more. I had to come up with something to give their detectives so that they would help me out in my case, and that's when I was pretty much put pressure on the figure, and

I had came up with a little just crazy letter that I made in the right.

“More than a decade later, now Michelangelo is recanting his testimony. What do you make about?”

There are many reasons why people recant the problem for Michelangelo and that recantation

is that we proved what he said was true. Without Michelangelo, would you guys have ever found that shovel? Maybe not. We may not have found the shovel, but he still wouldn't have been convicted regardless of Michelangelo. The prosecution highlighted some of your internet search history, things like murder and kidnapping. How do you explain that? I was a kid watching television shows, reading books, and the prosecution decided to highlight a handful of things. Do you understand

why those things were chosen? Because you looked up murder and kidnapping, and then one of your best friends goes missing. I understand, but they didn't have to do anything with Christian. To me, I was watching a show and made a search. I was looking up something. Based on the witness statement and Michelangelo's recanted testimony, Asia was filed a new motion for post-conviction

relief, the first step of many in the hopes of getting a new trial. What are the next steps in this

“case when do you have to respond to this motion? Whether or not the state has to respond to the”

motion is up to the court. First, the court would have to determine that the motion on its face is valid and meets the legal standards for post-conviction relief, and right now the court hasn't made that determination. What's the likelihood that it would be granted? This is a motion for successive post-conviction relief. That motion is granted less than one tenth of one percent of the time. Do you think Pedro has enough to reopen the case? Hard to say, especially 10 years

removed, knowing the vote, if any of this even holds true? There's one person saying, "How was there?" And he was still alive. That's not going to cut it. Did you kill Christian Aguilar? No. I did not kill Christian. Pedro, if you didn't kill Christian Aguilar, who did? Who would have wanted him dead? If I would have known those answers, then there would have been 12 years that I would have spent in prison.

There's just an overwhelming amount of evidence that Pedro did this. The blood of DNA that was found in Pedro's car that he tried to cover up with paints. The dirt on the bottom of Pedro's car that matches the region of Florida where Christian's body was found. And then the shovel in the apartment complex, right? When you put all of that together, there's no question as to whether or not Pedro is culpable for Christian's death. I remember getting home late that night,

and thinking to myself, "I'm looking at this kid and there's no remorse in this kid. What's the well? No feelings, no culpability, no guilt, and I'm confident that what the state's attorney presented or the true facts of the case.

“Erica, Christian's parents, they think you are a monster that you have no remorse. What do you say to them now?”

So what is this? This is Christian's sketchbook. That's Gator. That's a Florida Gator. We think this is Erica. We think that this is a drawing of Erica. Erica, yeah. Has Erica seen this? We don't know. That was brought up to us when we recuperate on his illness from the bodies. Christian's belongings, once seized by police as evidence and as murder investigation,

they are now prized possessions for his parents. That's Christian's iPod. iPod, yeah. We record. This is the case where Christian went to get with Pedro. And you wanted to keep that. Everything. Everyone knows to my son, but he knows to me.

that CD, which Christian's so excitedly purchased with his best friend turned killer.

The video from the store, now the last images, the eggoulars have of their son alive. Erica, Christian's parents, they think you are a monster that you have no remorse. What do you say to them now? I can't come close to understanding what it feels like to lose a son.

There's no words that I could offer to try and make things better or make that pain go away,

because it maybe that pain shouldn't go away. That pain should stay there because at least when you have that pain that person is still in your life. Do you have any doubt that Pedro killed Christian? No, this one now. No. He did kill my son. I wish he can repent. I wish he can realize that he destroy his family and my family. I'm unable to once say the truth and accept what he did.

I always pray for the soul of their son. That's very painful for the parents to lose a child.

I know as a mother how painful it is. Me with my son. Look, her pain is harder because she lost

“her sister. The two painful to think of her. It is two painful. What is future might have been?”

Yeah. Especially when I saw the picture of Christian faith having his lies with the new careers, with the families, I prefer doing a thing too much about it. How do you want Christian to be remembered? I want Christian to remember by how sweet and kind and genuine of a person he was. He just had like so much potential for anything that he wanted to do. Although Christian was only a student for a couple of months, the University of Florida presented

his family with a positive mystery in biomedical engineering, symbolic of a promising future.

“Cut too short. If Christian were still with us, what do you think he'd be doing today?”

That's a question that we ask every day. If it were going to be having grandkids, if it was going to be with Eric, I'm happy. I think we would have gotten married eventually. I feel like he was not going to stop loving me. I can't imagine where his life would have ended up kind of leading him to, but I know it would have been great things.

How did you choose this photo because he looks so happy there? Was that on prom night?

“No, prom. We won him, but people to remember him is smiling.”

One of the most beautiful things he's his wife. That signature smile of his, and you know deciding to follow in Christians, footsteps, his brother Alex also went to the University of Florida, Christian's dream school. And you can find all new broadcast episodes of 2020, Friday nights at nine on ABC.

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