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Callaroga Shark Media. Good morning, I'm Read Carter, and welcome
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to celebrity trials. Four days ago, in a Harford County courtroom,
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Judge Yolanda Curtain looked Victor Martinez Hernandez in the eye
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and told him exactly what he is. You are not
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a candidate for rehabilitation. Then she gave him life without
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parole plus another life sentence plus forty years for the
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rape and murder of Rachel Morn, a thirty seven year
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old mother of five who went for a jog on
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the Ma and Paw Trail and never came home. The
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jury took less than fifty minutes to convict him back
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in April. Fifty minutes. That's not deliberation, that's paperwork. That's
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how overwhelming the evidence was. That's how obvious his guilt was,
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and that's how brutal this crime was. Today we're breaking
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down how a wanted murderer from El Salvador ended up
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on a Maryland hiking trail, waiting in the woods with
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a shovel, ready to destroy a family. Saturday, August fifth,
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twenty twenty three, six twenty nine pm, Rachel Morn stops
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at Ahawa, then target at six forty two, normal Saturday
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errands for a mother of five. She's got her workout
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clothes on. She's heading to the Maw and Paw Trail
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in bel Air, Maryland. It's her routine. She goes there
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almost every day. She's training for marathons. She lifts weights
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at thirty seven. She's in the best shape of her life.
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Six fifty pm, security cameras catch her car pulling into
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the William Street parking lot by the trail. She puts
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in her air pods, checks her Apple Watch, starts jogging.
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Seven pm. Kyle Stacy is walking his dog with his
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girlfriend Olivia. They're about half a mile from the trailhead
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when he hears it a branch snapping in the woods.
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He looks left. There's a man standing there, gray sweatshirt,
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hood up, sunglasses in August at seven pm, and he's
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holding something what Stacy thinks is a walking stick with
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an orange cap. The man is big, broad shouldered. They
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lock eyes for two seconds. Two seconds that made Stacy,
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a big guy himself who doesn't scare easily squeeze his
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girlfriend's hand and say this is really weird. No one
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should be over there. We got to get out of here.
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Stacy testified, I think he felt like he got caught,
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so to speak. He was acting sneaky. Thirty seconds later,
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Stacy passes Rachel Morin. She's jogging air pods in alone,
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the last person besides her killer to see her alive.
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Seven four pm, Rachel's oldest daughter, Fay, texts her mom.
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No response. Seven seven Rachel's Apple watch records her heart
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rate spiking to one hundred and fifteen beats per minute.
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Seven h nine pm, her heart rate drops to sixty
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nine beats per minute. Twenty six seconds later, it's at
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sixty two. That's when investigators believe she died. Think about
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that timeline. Five minutes from the moment her heart rate
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spiked to the moment it stopped. Five minutes of terror,
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five minutes of fighting for her life, five minutes that
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left her children motherless. What that walking stick actually was
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a shovel? Police found it later on the trail, a
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black shovel with an orange cap. Victor Martinez Hernandez had
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been hiding in those woods waiting. This wasn't random, this
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was hunting. Let's talk about who Victor Antonio Martinez Hernandez
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really is, because this isn't his first murder. Hell, it's
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not even his first murder warrant. January twenty twenty three,
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El Salvador, a young woman is murdered. Authorities issue an
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arrest warrant for Martinez Hernandez. He flees. But here's the
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beautiful part. He tries to enter the United States and
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gets caught three times. January nineteenth, caught near Santa Theresa,
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New Mexico, deported, February sixth caught at the same spot,
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deported January thirty first, caught near El Paso, deported the
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fourth time February twenty twenty three. He makes it through.
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March twenty twenty three, Los Angeles. A nine year old
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girl and her mother are in their home. Martinez Hernandez
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breaks in, assaults them both, but they survive. They fight back.
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His DNA gets collected, it goes into the system. Summer
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twenty twenty three, he's in Maryland, living with relatives in
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Temple Hills, working at Popeyes, then Barrett's on the Pike.
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Both restaurants are near the Maw and Paw Trail. He
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learns the trail, studies it plans, His phone tells the story,
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searches for the bel Air area, photos of the trail,
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photos of Rachel Morin, Yeah, photos of his victim on
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his phone. He'd been watching her, following her routine. She
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ran that trail almost every day at the same time,
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he knew exactly when she'd be there, but he told
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police he'd never been to Maryland. When they arrested him
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in Tulsa, Oklahoma, in June twenty twenty four, he insisted
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his name was Juan Carlos, said he'd never heard of
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Rachel morn never been to Maryland. Suggested someone planted his DNA.
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Someone planted his DNA on her body, on her neck,
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her chest, her wrist, her Apple watch. Someone planted it
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under her fingernails where she fought back. Someone planted it
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in the most intimate places where he violated her. The
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prosecution laid it out perfectly. You don't accomplish a race, sape,
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and a murder in four to six minutes unless you
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have a plan the crime scene. Let me paint you
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the picture the jury saw. Fair warning. This is brutal.
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One hundred fifty feet of blood. That's the trail from
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where he attacked her to where he left her body.
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She fought God did She fight defensive wounds on her wrists,
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bruising where she tried to block the blows. The medical
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examiner testified she was struck in the head at least
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fifteen to twenty times with a blunt object a rock.
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He beat her with a rock fifteen to twenty times.
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Her skull was fractured. Her face was so destroyed that
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Justin Knapp, the man who found her body, said I
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couldn't recognize her face. He dragged her to a drainage
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culvert that runs under root twenty four concrete tunnel, dark isolated.
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Her feet were twenty four feet into that tunnel. Her
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left shoe was missing, her clothes were torn. One AirPod
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was found fifty two feet from the entrance. Her iPhone,
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smashed to pieces, was two hundred and twenty five feet
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into the tunnel in shallow water. Detective Michael Wilsinski, first
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on scene with a drone, testified it was obvious this
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was not a slip and fall injury. This was a
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serious attack. This was a massive attack. Back in a moment,
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Welcome back to celebrity trials. I'm Red Carter, and we're
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discussing the sentencing of Victor Martinez Hernandez for the murder
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of Rachel Morin. The manhunt for ten months. He was
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out there free, working in restaurants, living with relatives, a killer,
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walking around Maryland like nothing happened. The investigation was massive,
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over one thousand tips. Every lead went nowhere. They interviewed
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everyone in Rachel's life. Her boyfriend, Richard Tobin, gave DNA,
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surrendered his phone cooperated fully. He'd actually thought she was
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cheating on him that night, went to local bars looking
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for her before realizing something was really wrong. The break
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came from California. Remember that assault in Los Angeles, the
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nine year old girl and her mother that DNA was
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in the system. When Maryland ran the DNA from Rachel's body,
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it matched. They had a profile, but no name, just
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unknown Hispanic mail. Then came the relatives. June twenty twenty four,
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detectives tracked down his aunt in Temple Hills, his cousins.
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They'd been wondering where Victor went. He'd left suddenly about
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a month after Rachel's murder, left behind shoes, a toothbrush,
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dirty clothes. The FBI collected it all, swabbed everything. June fourteenth,
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twenty twenty four, the DNA matches. They have their killer,
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but where is he? They ping his phone through T
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mobile Tulsa, Oklahoma. At a bar, Tulsa police detective Stephen
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Sanders testified about the arrest. Martinez Hernandez kept insisting his
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name was Juan Carlos, over and over. Finally he gave up.
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They had him. The trial nine days in April twenty
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twenty five. That's all it took. The prosecution's case was devastating,
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DNA on her body, photos of her on his phone,
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searches of the trail area, witnesses who saw him near
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the trail, the timeline from her Apple Watch showing the
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exact moment of death. The defense tried to argue mistaken identity.
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Kyle Stacy had described the man in the woods as tall,
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muscular with a blonde beard. Martinez Hernandez is five feet
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nine inches one hundred and sixty pounds with black hair,
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but Stacy only saw him for two seconds, two seconds
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in fading light, and when shown the shovel, Stacy said
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that appsence sslutely was what the man was holding. The
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defense suggested other men might have been interested in Rachel,
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that she attracted male attention, that her relationship with her
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new boyfriend might have upset someone else. The jury didn't
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buy it, less than fifty minutes, guilty on all counts,
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first degree murder, first degree rape, third degree sex offense, kidnapping.
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When they read the verdict, Martinez Hernandez didn't react, stone faced,
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like he expected it, like he knew the evidence was overwhelming.
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The family, Let's talk about what this monster took away.
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Five children. Fay, the oldest, who texted her mom at
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seven o four pm and never got a response. In
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her victim impact statement, she said, before my mother was murdered,
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the world made sense to me. Violet fourteen, who testified
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at trial about the last text she got from her mom. Octavia,
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Declan and Lilah the youngest ones. They'll grow up with
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memories that fade more each year, graduate without her, get
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married without her, have children she'll never meet. Rachel's mother,
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Patty Morin became the face of this tragedy. She spoke
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at the Republican National Convention. Trump called her personally, not
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because this should be political, but because it became political.
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An illegal immigrant who'd been deported three times murdered an
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American mother. The border debate in human form. Her brother
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Michael said at the convention, Rachel's murder was avoidable? Was it?
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If we'd kept him out the fourth time? Yes? If
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l Salvador had extradited him for murder. Yes. If he'd
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been caught after the Los Angeles assault, yes, if, if, if,
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But here's what kills me. Even if none of those
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systems had failed. He still chose to hide in those woods.
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He still chose to wait with a shovel. He still
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chose to attack a woman who was just trying to
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stay healthy for her kids. The sentencing Monday, August eleventh,
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twenty twenty five, four days ago, Prosecutor Alison Healy didn't
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mince words. The defendant is completely and entirely unamenable to
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treatment or rehabilitation. If he is released, our community is
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in grave danger. It's not a matter of if, it's
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a matter of when. Judge Yolanda Curtin agreed. Arguably, Harford
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County has never seen a case or a defendant more
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deserving of every single day of the maximum sentences. This
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court imposed life without parole for the murder, plus life
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for the rape, plus forty years for the sex offense
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and kidnapping. He's twenty four years old. He'll die in
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a Maryland prison. He'll never walk free again. His family
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tried to argue he had a difficult upbringing, that he
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deserved a chance at parole someday. The judge wasn't having it.
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You don't get rehabilitation after what he did. You don't
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get second chances after you beat a mother to death
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with a rock. You know what haunts me about this
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case Kyle Stacy's testimony. I wish I said something. He
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saw Martinez Hernandez in the woods, felt something was wrong,
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got scared enough to leave, walked right past Rachel Moran
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thirty seconds later. What if he'd warned her, what if
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he'd called nine to one one? What if? What if?
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What if? But that's not on him. That's survivor's guilt talking.
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The only person responsible for Rachel Moran's death is the
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animal who got three life sentences this week. Here's what
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we know. Evil exists. It crosses borders, It hides in woods,
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It works at Popeyes. It looks normal until the moment
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it doesn't. And sometimes, despite all our systems and safeguards
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and deportations, it finds a thirty seven year old mother
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on a jogging trail and destroys everything. Rachel Moran ran
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that trail almost every day. It was her peace, her
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fitness routine, her moment away from the chaos of raising
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five kids and running a cleaning business. She was in
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the best shape of her life. She had a new boyfriend,
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her kids were thriving, She had plans, marathons to run,
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places to travel, grandchildren to meet someday. Five minutes, that's
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all it took to end all of that. Five minutes
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between a spiking heart rate and silence. But here's the
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other side. It took the jury fifty minutes to convict him.
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It took the judge thirty seconds to sentence him to
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die in prison. It took a community ten months to
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track him down, but they never gave up. The system
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worked eventually, too late for Rachel, but in time to
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prevent the next victim, because there would have been a
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next victim. Prosecutor Heally was right. It wasn't a matter
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of if. But when men who beat women to death
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with rocks don't stop at one. So Victor Martinez Hernandez
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sits in a Maryland prison tonight, life without parole, no appeals,
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likely to succeed with that DNA evidence, No chance at freedom,
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no possibility of redemption, just decades of concrete and bars
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and remembering what he did. Meanwhile, five kids in Harford
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County are growing up without their mother, not because of
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a car accident or cancer or any of the random
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tragedies that strike families, but because a man with a
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murder warrant from El Salvador decided to hide in the
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woods with a shovel. Monday on celebrity trials were back
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to the Addleson Matriarch murder trial. Jury selection begins for
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the seventy five year old grandmother accused of orchestrating her
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son in law's murder. Plus updates on the Menendez brother's
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parole hearing. But today, remember Rachel Moren. Remember that she
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fought back. Remember that she left DNA under her fingernails
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that caught her killer. Remember that she was more than
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a victim. She was a mother, a daughter, a sister,
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an athlete, an entrepreneur. And remember Kyle Stacy's words, I
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wish I said something. If you see something, say something.
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If someone makes you uncomfortable enough to leave, maybe warn