How Not to Get Rid of a Body S01E05 A Neighborhood of Monsters
The case of a missing 17-year-old pregnant girl goes cold after she’s considered a runaway, but it gets a renewed push after three women escape Ariel Castro’s house of horrors. Once the case reopens, investigators are relentless in hunting down a suspect.
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00:00♪♪
00:08Christina would never have walked away from her family.
00:11She knew she was loved.
00:13Whoever did this really knew what they were doing
00:16and did not want her found.
00:19It seemed like, during this entire process,
00:21we were chasing our ghost.
00:23The person responsible for what happened
00:25was calling trick plays.
00:28We just needed a few trick plays of our own.
00:31And as soon as we saw that opening,
00:33we thought, man, if we were gonna get rid of a body,
00:36this would be a great place.
00:38♪♪
00:48♪♪
00:58♪♪
01:05On January 12, 1995,
01:08at approximately 12.55 in the afternoon,
01:10the Cleveland Division of Police
01:12got a missing person report from Jose Rivera.
01:18Jose was reporting the disappearance
01:20of his girlfriend, Christina Adkins.
01:24She was 18 years old, about five months pregnant,
01:28and lived with Jose.
01:30He was 20 years old at the time.
01:33Jose indicated that he was at work,
01:37and when he came home that night, she was missing.
01:43That nothing unusual had been happening at home.
01:47She disappeared, and that was not something
01:49she had done before.
01:59Christina was gentle.
02:02She was almost angelic.
02:05When she first told me that she was expecting,
02:07she had a big smile on her face.
02:09She was happy about it.
02:10She was looking forward to it.
02:13So when you don't see a person, like, for three days,
02:15and you don't know what's going on,
02:16you don't hear anything,
02:18I was really concerned and really worried.
02:22Any missing person's case is, just on face value,
02:26a traumatic and often potentially horrific scenario.
02:33But when a young woman like Christina Adkins,
02:36who happens to be five months pregnant, goes missing,
02:39that sets off some serious alarm bells with police.
02:46♪♪
02:56Jose and Christina lived approximately two blocks away
03:00from Christina's family.
03:02So one of the first things we did was go to her family
03:06and see if anybody had any information
03:07where she might have gone.
03:09♪♪
03:14Police found out on the day
03:16she disappeared.
03:17The family was preparing for another joyful milestone
03:21in Christina's pregnancy.
03:25They were making plans to go to the hospital
03:26and find out the sex of her baby.
03:28♪♪
03:33But Christina's family told us
03:35Christina was fighting with her boyfriend, Jose, recently,
03:39and was considering breaking up with him.
03:41♪♪
03:44And we learned that she had a very tumultuous relationship.
03:48It was extremely controlling.
03:50♪♪
03:52Her parents also told us
03:54what Christina went missing on that day.
03:56Her and Jose were involved in some type of altercation.
03:59♪♪
04:02I know their relationship was not perfect,
04:04but she loved Jose because she told me that she loved him.
04:10I did tell her,
04:11Christina, let me tell you something.
04:13If there's one thing that I believe in
04:15is that a man should never mistreat a woman,
04:18so if you ever feel that he is mistreating you
04:22in any way, shape, or form, let me know.
04:25Just don't put up with it.
04:29♪♪
04:34What we learned about the relationship
04:36led us to the conclusion.
04:40There was much more to the story.
04:42♪♪
04:44Jose was showing all the indicators of somebody
04:47who was willing to commit violence against Christina.
04:53The only problem was,
04:54what if he did do something to Christina,
04:57and where did he put her?
04:58♪♪
05:05Investigators also found out that night
05:08when Christina disappeared,
05:09Christina had plans, in fact, to meet up with a friend
05:13a block away to the home she shared with her boyfriend.
05:17So we needed to see if Christina did, in fact,
05:20spend the night at her friend's house.
05:22There's the possibility
05:23maybe she was gonna lay low for a couple days.
05:27We talked to the friend,
05:29and Christina was over at her house that night.
05:36The two were playing cards,
05:38talking, watching TV.
05:41Christina was planning on spending the night
05:44at that house,
05:47but she knew that Jose would expect her to be home.
05:50♪♪
05:55So around 1, 1.30 in the morning,
05:59she made the decision that she would walk
06:02just a few houses up the street
06:05back to the home that she shared with her boyfriend.
06:10As Christina was leaving,
06:12her friend did notice that a car had pulled up,
06:17and Christina was speaking with the driver.
06:20♪♪
06:24The friend didn't make much of this,
06:26and nor did she see Christina walk away from that car.
06:32Nobody really knew if Christina had gotten to this car,
06:35and if she did, where did she go.
06:38♪♪
06:47♪♪
06:51The investigation in the beginning took two avenues.
06:54First of all, Jose wasn't too upfront
06:57about the argument that they had had
06:59when he reported her missing,
07:01which sort of shed a little bit of suspicious upon him.
07:03And then second of all is the mystery car
07:06that nobody seemed to know anything about.
07:08♪♪
07:12We needed to talk to Jose.
07:13♪♪
07:16Christina's boyfriend repeatedly told detectives
07:19that he would never have hurt her.
07:22Again, she was the mother of his unborn child.
07:27He loved her.
07:29Based upon his lack of truthfulness
07:31about the fighting, he was considered a main suspect,
07:35even though there was no hard evidence.
07:38♪♪
07:47So as the investigation turned on,
07:49there was still the question of that suspicious vehicle.
07:52The focus was then directed to finding that vehicle.
07:57There was door-to-door canvassing.
07:59To see if anybody had any recollection
08:01or any knowledge of this suspicious car
08:03or had seen anything that had happened
08:05that night with Christina.
08:08We interviewed a neighbor of Jose named Elias Rivera.
08:13He told us at the time, yeah, I saw her.
08:17She was crying and she was upset
08:19and she was saying that she didn't want to go home.
08:24But he didn't remember or recall
08:26that suspicious mystery car
08:27that Christina was seen talking to.
08:30He had no knowledge of that vehicle.
08:32♪♪
08:36It was super frustrating.
08:39There was the fear of being defeated.
08:44That is what keeps me up at night.
08:48♪♪
08:53In a city as large as Cleveland,
08:55it's not out of the question for cars to go unnoticed
08:59or be difficult to find.
09:01♪♪
09:03How do you go about looking for a single car
09:05in a city like Cleveland?
09:08It was just like Christina had vanished off the planet.
09:13It was sort of like watching a movie where, you know,
09:15scenes disappear and, you know, there's a lot of, like, unknowns.
09:21This was like one of those kinds of cases.
09:23It was just a lot of missing parts.
09:27But unfortunately, it's not a movie.
09:28Christina was 5 1⁄2 months pregnant at the time.
09:31We were working tirelessly to try to find her.
09:35But we were left with nothing, like we were chasing a ghost.
09:38♪♪
09:42We were working hard to unravel
09:44whatever mystery happened to her.
09:48But it appeared that somebody had gone to great lengths
09:52to make sure that Christina was never found
09:55and just had some type of joy in befuddling the police.
10:00She looked like such an innocent person.
10:03Things like that, they haunt you when you're a policeman.
10:07♪♪
10:10It's like some type of game, some type of sick game.
10:13And there was a lot we didn't know at that time.
10:15But we did know that that would have to get
10:17into a mind of a killer.
10:19♪♪
10:29The night 18-year-old Christina Adkins went missing,
10:33detectives didn't really have much information to go off of.
10:37Christina Adkins just simply disappeared.
10:41♪♪
10:51♪♪
10:57Her family told us Jose, Christina's boyfriend,
11:01had put all of her belongings out on the curb
11:06and ready to be disposed of in the garbage.
11:09♪♪
11:14He couldn't have been more suspicious if he tried.
11:17♪♪
11:19Could you imagine to just carelessly toss her things out?
11:24That was a very strange thing to do
11:30when it's done by the victim's boyfriend
11:32and the father of this unborn child.
11:36But on face value, that's not evidence of a crime.
11:38It doesn't necessarily point to any culpability
11:42on the part of her boyfriend.
11:44So the question becomes, you know, like,
11:45was he trying to just erase her out of his life?
11:49Was he not being forthcoming about what the type
11:51of relationship that he really had with her?
11:54Was he really the love of her life?
11:56It did, with Jose, have something to do
11:58with her disappearance.
12:00We didn't really know.
12:03♪♪
12:10It was really sad when I heard on the news.
12:13The family was really heartbroken.
12:16Nobody knew exactly where Christina was.
12:19And we were actually hanging up posters.
12:22We were looking for her.
12:25Then, in an incredibly bizarre turn of events,
12:29as the family spent time putting up these flyers,
12:33they were coming down right away.
12:34They were being removed right away,
12:37almost as fast as they were being put up.
12:40The family would walk down West 25th Street,
12:42plastering these flyers on streetlights
12:45and windows and walls.
12:48And the next day, walk back down 25th again,
12:50and those flyers would all be gone.
12:54It makes you wonder, was there someone in the community
12:56who really didn't want Christina to be found?
13:01You know, somebody went to great lengths to try to hide
13:03the fact that Christina was missing
13:04and to do things like tearing down the posters.
13:09That really complicated the investigation.
13:12♪♪
13:20♪♪
13:27As the 90s ticked into the 2000s,
13:31into the 2010s, 2013,
13:35Christina had been missing longer than she had been alive.
13:39♪♪
13:42After time goes on, you know,
13:43there's a pretty good indication that, you know,
13:46Christina was deceased, and whoever was responsible
13:48for her abduction and murder was going through great lengths
13:53to try to hide her body, you know, from the police
13:55and give the family closure.
13:57Christina's family, during that time that she's missing,
14:00they never lost hope that they would see Christina again,
14:04that the case would be solved.
14:05Who do we want? Christina!
14:08When do we want her? Now!
14:10Today, family and friends marched side-by-side
14:12down Clark Avenue to the corner of West 25th
14:15and Kinkle Avenue, the place where Christina Atkin
14:17was last seen.
14:19♪♪
14:26We had always hoped, of course,
14:28to bring Christina home to her family,
14:30alive and unharmed,
14:32and unravel whatever mystery happened to her.
14:35And it's a very difficult thing to do as an investigator.
14:39After years and years of not finding somebody,
14:43it is very easy to start thinking,
14:45well, we'll never find her.
14:48After so many years,
14:49you have no choice but to think the worst.
14:52We all had hopes that Christina was going to be found,
14:57but it was hard.
15:11May 6th, 2013, is a very important date
15:14in the recent history of Cleveland,
15:17and certainly in the story of Christina Atkins.
15:24It was a day that changed me forever.
15:26♪♪
15:30There was an incident where neighbors heard screaming
15:33coming from an address on Seymour Avenue in Cleveland.
15:37♪♪
15:40One neighbor discovered a girl that was trying to kick
15:43and punch her way out of a door of the house.
15:46♪♪
15:49The neighbors helped her pull the door open,
15:53and she ran across the street to get away from the house
15:56and asked somebody for a phone or to call 911.
15:59Help me.
16:00You need police, fire, or ambulance?
16:02I need police.
16:03Okay, and what's going on there?
16:05Amanda Barry.
16:07I've been kidnapped and I've been missing for 10 years,
16:10and I'm here. I'm free now.
16:12At the time, the FBI was involved in the investigation
16:16of two missing persons,
16:18Amanda Barry and another missing Cleveland teenager,
16:23Gina DeJesus.
16:25When I responded to Seymour Avenue that day,
16:28the ambulance was still there.
16:30I immediately recognized the missing teenage girls,
16:33Amanda and Gina,
16:36and there was another adult woman there.
16:38There's a picture circulating right now,
16:40a picture of Amanda and a young girl.
16:43That girl was in the house with her,
16:44but as of yet, we don't know who that girl is.
16:47You know, outside of the news media frenzy,
16:50alarm bells were going off,
16:52and one of the things that family and police were thinking
16:56was, could this third woman be Christina Adkins?
17:00♪♪
17:08♪♪
17:17Three missing women, gone since they were girls,
17:20found alive together a decade later.
17:23The rescued victims from that house were
17:25Gina DeJesus and Amanda Barry.
17:27The name of the third female inside the house
17:30was not immediately released to the media.
17:34After all these years of waiting and hoping and praying,
17:38here was some sort of break
17:41and a chance to finally get some news.
17:47Christina's family hightailed it over to the hospital
17:51to hopefully find some information,
17:53to hopefully encounter Christina there.
17:56Just waiting for some information
17:58about who was in the hospital.
18:02Could this third woman be Christina Adkins?
18:05♪♪
18:10As the night wore on,
18:12the third woman was identified as Michelle Knight,
18:15who had been missing for the last 10 years.
18:20And while Christina's family were incredibly thankful
18:25for that young woman being safe,
18:28they were also heartbroken that this one slim chance
18:32had been taken away, that it was not Christina.
18:37♪♪
18:46Even though we learned the identity of the third woman
18:49was not Christina Adkins,
18:51we still thought her disappearance was connected.
18:54♪♪
18:56Detectives find out a man named Ariel Castro
18:59was responsible for kidnapping and holding
19:03those three women in his home for years.
19:06♪♪
19:15When the girls were abducted, witnesses would say
19:18that they were talking to somebody in a car.
19:22If we go back, the last time anybody saw Christina alive,
19:25she was talking to somebody in a car.
19:28So, same MO.
19:32This is all the same neighborhood
19:33that we're talking about,
19:34this near West Side neighborhood.
19:36Everything involved here is within a square mile of itself.
19:40So, Ariel Castro's house and Christina's disappearance,
19:47everything, it's all just right there.
19:51♪♪
19:56And the timeline was right.
19:59Could Castro have done something with her in 1995
20:03and then reset and started doing it again
20:07in the early 2000s?
20:09♪♪
20:12Ariel Castro was somebody that we all actually,
20:15in a way, grew up with,
20:16because we grew up in a close area
20:19where the Castros were.
20:22We knew that he was scary.
20:24I mean, he was creepy looking.
20:25He would, like, look at you, and you could see it in his eyes.
20:31You could see the creepiness in him.
20:34I mean, he just wasn't right.
20:37♪♪
20:44♪♪
20:51I don't think I went home for days after May 6th.
20:55We spent nights and weekends in the office
20:58poring over every piece of evidence that we collected.
21:04We thought of, you know, dozens of different theories
21:07that would have involved Ariel Castro
21:09and Christina's disappearance.
21:12♪♪
21:17We executed 19 or 20 separate search warrants at his house.
21:24There was not a stone unturned in that house
21:27or on that property.
21:30You know, we looked in every corner.
21:33We searched that house with multiple teams of forensic experts.
21:37In addition to DNA firearms and fingerprint testing,
21:40we're told BCI is also looking at other evidence
21:43to determine if there are any additional victims.
21:47But there was no evidence in that house
21:51that Christina Adkins had ever been there.
21:54♪♪
22:00But then we learned that Christina's boyfriend,
22:04Jose, knew Ariel Castro.
22:07♪♪
22:11So there was that thought that, you know,
22:13maybe Ariel Castro, in company with Jose Rivera,
22:17were responsible for what happened to Christina Adkins.
22:22We said, Jose has been a suspect in this case for 18 years.
22:27Jose was still living in the same house.
22:30He was living there with his mother.
22:34We went back, grabbed Jose one more time,
22:39and was brought in for questioning
22:41in Christina's disappearance once again.
22:44♪♪
22:48He was asked a lot of questions
22:50about his connection to Ariel Castro.
22:53♪♪
22:56He was very uncomfortable, sweating.
22:59I mean, there was a lot of signs that showed, like,
23:02you know, he pretty much looks like
23:04he could be responsible for this.
23:07He was denying all allegations that we were thrown at him
23:10with his involvement with Christina's disappearance.
23:14♪♪
23:20We felt that Jose was not telling the truth,
23:24and so we executed searches of his house,
23:28and we brought cadaver dogs in.
23:31We thought that whatever happened to Christina
23:33was well planned out.
23:35We all thought for sure that he had buried her in the backyard.
23:39We figured that would explain why her body
23:41had not been recovered.
23:43♪♪
23:46What better place to hide a body than a backyard?
23:49That way, no one's gonna see someone
23:52carting a body out of the house and being taken elsewhere.
23:56♪♪
23:58It was not a light touch.
24:00We dug the backyard.
24:02You know, we looked in every corner.
24:04♪♪
24:07But we found nothing.
24:09That was beyond frustrating.
24:11♪♪
24:13Without a body, we didn't even have a crime.
24:16At this point, there was no way to connect
24:19her boyfriend, Jose Rivera,
24:22with Christina Adkins' disappearance.
24:25I keep telling everybody,
24:27I'm an innocent man.
24:29I'm not a killer.
24:31That's my girlfriend.
24:33That's my everything.
24:35I wish she was right here with me now.
24:38The way I feel right now, I lost everything.
24:42We know now, of course,
24:44that no evidence pointed to Christina's boyfriend
24:47as being involved here,
24:49and so detectives questioned,
24:51was law enforcement even looking in the right direction?
24:54Ariel Castro was still on the radar of investigators.
24:58Did Ariel Castro have some sort of involvement
25:01with Christina Adkins' disappearance?
25:03Whoever did this was diabolical.
25:06I mean, I don't know.
25:08Whoever did this was diabolical,
25:10a criminal mastermind.
25:12But in a case like this,
25:14there are a lot of unanswered questions.
25:16♪♪
25:22♪♪
25:30♪♪
25:37All of our investigative focus and attention
25:40was still on Ariel Castro,
25:42so we focused on Christina's case
25:45with a completely fresh perspective.
25:48That was the first time that we said,
25:51what are we missing?
25:53♪♪
25:58♪♪
26:02Law enforcement very quickly began interviewing neighbors,
26:06trying to figure out who Ariel Castro was.
26:10♪♪
26:14One of those neighbors was a man named Elias Acevedo.
26:20And in speaking with Elias,
26:22law enforcement described him as generally nervous
26:26and fidgety, even.
26:29He appeared very uneasy.
26:34That stood out to investigators.
26:36♪♪
26:39Then you start looking, okay, well, who is Elias Acevedo?
26:44And we start looking at his history,
26:47and his history was shocking.
26:50We found a report from 2004
26:52where he was involved in the abduction
26:55and sexual assault of a 14-year-old girl.
26:58♪♪
27:01And that that assault had occurred at his home.
27:06We found that it had been pled to a felony of the third degree
27:10and that he had served a very light sentence on the case.
27:15Elias Acevedo lived a few streets away
27:18from Christina Adkins, was a sex offender.
27:21So that became a major red flag for us.
27:25I just had the feeling that there had to be something here.
27:29I just had a feeling that they were somehow connected.
27:32We start looking at Christina's report again,
27:35and one of the things that jumped off the page
27:38was the original investigators interviewed
27:40a neighbor named Elias Rivera,
27:43and he told police at the time,
27:45yeah, I saw Christina on the night she disappeared,
27:48and I saw her, she was crying,
27:50but he said he didn't know what happened to her.
27:53At the time, there was no reason to connect him
27:57with Christina Adkins' disappearance,
27:59but by comparing photos now,
28:02we discovered that was actually Elias Acevedo.
28:06Back in 1995, he very intentionally gave police
28:10a false identity.
28:12Why would you do that? Why would you do that?
28:15Those are the things that make you say,
28:19now we actually have the right guy.
28:21♪♪
28:26We had a new suspect to investigate.
28:29We learned through interviews
28:31with multiple members of his own family
28:34that Elias Acevedo was committing the atrocities
28:38in his own home.
28:40He was preying on his own children.
28:44He was tormenting, torturing, sexually assaulting
28:47his own family on a daily basis
28:50and exerting just an unbelievable amount of control
28:54and power over his wife at the time
28:58and each of these kids.
29:01The stuff he did, it's just like, it was mind-blowing.
29:06It took a lot of courage for Acevedo's family
29:09to come forward.
29:10They had been victimized.
29:11They had been beaten to a pulp by this guy,
29:14and in so many ways, he lived in fear.
29:17He was a brutal guy.
29:19♪♪
29:22When you finally click into the right track
29:24in an investigation, it feels right,
29:26and after 18 years, this finally felt right.
29:31We had a feeling.
29:33We knew, I guess it was, you know, instincts
29:36that we were close to the end
29:38to knowing what had taken place with Christina.
29:42♪♪
29:46♪♪
29:49We all believe the key to cracking this case
29:51was Elias' family and the cooperation
29:53given what we did to them.
29:56♪♪
30:00And then, as time went on, you know,
30:03Elias' wife was willing to speak on what she knew.
30:08She sat down and talked to us for a couple of hours.
30:12One of the things that made it so remarkable
30:14is that her memory was so clear.
30:16She told us that she vividly recalled
30:20the day of January 10, 1995.
30:24When Christina disappeared,
30:26she remembered Christina Adkins coming to her house.
30:31Then Elias left to go to a bar.
30:34She told us that he didn't come home
30:37until early that morning.
30:40He went into the bathroom, and he smoked a cigarette.
30:44And she braced herself for the assault
30:48that she knew she was going to get.
30:52And it didn't happen.
30:55And that stood out to her.
30:59♪♪
31:04After talking to Elias' wife and poring over the timeline,
31:08we believe that this is when he killed Christina.
31:12One of our original theories was that he must have committed
31:15this crime inside his house.
31:18It was cold outside. It was dark.
31:21So we wanted to search that.
31:24♪♪
31:29We noticed there was an entrance and exit
31:33through a trap door to the outside.
31:36So you could have gotten in and out of that house
31:39without going through a front door.
31:42His wife would not have heard anything.
31:45There was a spot in the basement that kind of opened up a gate,
31:49and you accessed, like, an area under the porch
31:52that was all dirt.
31:56I describe Elias' house as a haunted house
31:59that didn't charge for admission.
32:02As soon as we saw that opening in the basement,
32:05we thought, man, if we were going to get rid of a body,
32:08this would be a great place.
32:12We tore the house up pretty good,
32:16but we didn't find anything.
32:20It did not deter us in any way in our belief
32:23that we were finally on the right track.
32:26Not finding human remains did not mean
32:28that we didn't have the right guy.
32:31♪♪
32:35Everything was pointing towards Elias.
32:38He must have thought of every possible way to dispose of her
32:41and then pick the perfect place.
32:44We just needed a little bit more time
32:47and a few trick plays of our own.
32:50♪♪
32:55♪♪
33:03The job for any investigator
33:05is to move the ball down the field,
33:07and we set out very early in this investigation
33:10to move this ball, even if it's inch by inch, day by day.
33:14♪♪
33:17And we knew that if we could just keep getting first downs,
33:20we were going to solve the case.
33:23It was at that point that we made a decision
33:27to make our move, to talk to Elias Acevedo himself.
33:33Acevedo raped his family daily,
33:37intimidated everybody,
33:39threatened to kill other family members
33:42if they ratted him out.
33:44We knew he would be hard to break.
33:49We took him to the Cleveland FBI headquarters
33:52and really sat down with him.
34:03In the beginning, Elias did not want to talk with us.
34:06He didn't feel comfortable with us,
34:08and he was denying all allegations
34:10that we were throwing at him with his involvement with Christina.
34:14When we gave Elias the opportunity
34:18to take a polygraph, he accepted.
34:21And there's only one reason
34:23that somebody in his position would do that.
34:26He thought he could beat us.
34:33So the questions that you're having trouble with is,
34:35can you take us to where Christina is at?
34:37You are at a 100% failure rate on that one.
34:39And did you cause the disappearance of Christina?
34:42There's a 99% on that one.
34:44So something happened.
34:52When he was confronted with his failures on those two facts,
34:57I think really that's the straw that broke the camel's back
35:01and that he wasn't going to get out of it this time.
35:09We told Acevedo that we were going to give him
35:12a limited opportunity to admit to us
35:15that he killed Christina.
35:18And if he did it, we would not seek the death penalty.
35:22We called it a blue light special,
35:24that the deal ends when the light goes off.
35:27But he was hesitating.
35:38And still wasn't 100% sure he was going to confess
35:41and tell us what we wanted to know.
35:46Elias finally broke.
35:48He confessed to murdering Christina Adkins.
35:58Um, scared.
36:00OK.
36:02Um, I didn't mean to do it.
36:04OK.
36:06Um...
36:18How did you leave her body?
36:20Did you dig a hole and put her in it or just cover her up?
36:24Cover her up.
36:26Or just covered her up?
36:29Right there next to the highway?
36:31Under anything? Did you put her under anything?
36:34A little short.
36:36Oh, yeah.
36:50We don't solve every case with a confession,
36:52but the ones that we do are special.
36:54But we needed proof.
36:56We needed to bring Christina Adkins' body home to her family.
37:00So we asked Acevedo to take us to her.
37:03And he agreed.
37:20So we leg shackled him and belly chained him
37:23and put him in the car.
37:25And he took us turn by turn.
37:28And he said, pull over here.
37:31And he said, just on the other side of this Jersey barrier,
37:33you'll go down a hill and there'll be a sewer drain.
37:36And I put her in the sewer drain.
37:41So we walked down this hill.
37:45And we came to this sewer drain.
37:48And we lifted this top up and looked down in there.
37:54And, I mean, I was shocked.
37:59As clear as day, there were her remains
38:02at the bottom of this hole.
38:0418 years later.
38:06And I could see them by standing at the top of this hole
38:08and just looking down.
38:10It was unreal.
38:13And when we exhumed Christina's body
38:16from the bottom of the hole,
38:18we found an ID card with her name on it.
38:24When they said that they found Christina's body,
38:27I remember breaking down, crying,
38:30and my mother, too.
38:32You know, all of us, we were emotional.
38:34You know, we didn't expect for her to go through that,
38:36especially the way she, you know,
38:39And to throw her in a sewer?
38:41And a baby?
38:43I mean, what kind of monster does that?
38:45He's a monster.
38:47He's Satan.
38:49It was like a game of cat and mouse,
38:51where the mouse was running law enforcement in circles.
38:58Elias Acevedo thought he was clever.
39:00He hid Christina's body
39:02in a place that was
39:05almost like a prison.
39:07A place that was almost in plain sight.
39:13And, in fact, had used new construction
39:17and highway infrastructure
39:19to hide Christina's body.
39:22I mean, it was an absolutely diabolical thing to do.
39:28And then to have 18 years pass by,
39:32it's astonishing to think about.
39:35The solventous case was like the kid
39:37who walks up to his baseball coach and says,
39:40Coach, I'm going to hit a grand slam today.
39:43You say, good. You say, good, kid.
39:46First, you got to set up the bases.
39:48You got to load the bases, right?
39:50Then you got to have the power to hit it over that fence.
39:53And Agent Burke did both.
39:55He set up the bases, and he hit that ball
39:57right over the fence for the grand slam.
39:59It was a heck of a day.
40:02And we were able to prove beyond a reasonable doubt
40:05that Elias Acevedo and Elias Acevedo alone
40:08was responsible for the murder of Christina Atkins.
40:12On December 30, 2013,
40:16Acevedo was sentenced to prison for life
40:20on over 100 counts without possibility of parole
40:24with an additional 445 years to serve.
40:29He took my life, my love, my pride,
40:33my wife, my child.
40:36But you know what?
40:38There's a God up there.
40:40And she didn't go hands.
40:44I hope Elias thinks about what he's done
40:46for the rest of his life.
40:47I hope he's tormented every day,
40:50every moment, every second.
40:53It's not only by what he did to Christina and that baby,
40:57but also, you know, the grief that he caused.
41:00I hope he's tormented.
41:02I hope that he doesn't live in peace.
41:14It really was a needle in a haystack.
41:17Had the teens gone off the road
41:20and they were stranded somewhere?
41:22Why would someone do that to two teenagers?
41:25It unleashed something we never even fathomed.