A former law enforcement officer detailed to an Iowa jury on Thursday the alleged murder confession of the illegal alien charged with murdering 20-year-old University of Iowa student Mollie Tibbetts in July 2018.
In August 2018, Cristhian Bahena Rivera, a 25-year-old illegal alien from Mexico, was charged with the murder of Mollie Tibbetts after police said he admitted to confronting and chasing down the young woman.
Following a nationwide search, Tibbetts’ body was found in a cornfield in Poweshiek County, Iowa. The illegal alien lived in a region of Iowa surrounded by sanctuary cities, Breitbart News reported. He worked on a dairy farm using a stolen ID and Social Security card after crossing the U.S.-Mexico border at 17-years-old.
On the second day of the trial, former officer Pamela Romero was called to the witness stand by the prosecution and explained Bahena Rivera’s alleged murder confession to her.
Romero said she interviewed Bahena Rivera on August 20, speaking to him in his native Spanish language. Bahena Rivera, according to the transcript of the conversation with Romero, first said he had “no idea who she was and told me that he had never seen her.”
Bahena Rivera, the transcript states, confirmed that it was his Chevy Malibu he was driving in surveillance footage that was taken near the location where Tibbetts was last seen jogging. He also noted in the transcript that he saw a woman jogging and repeatedly circled back to where she was, describing her as “attractive” and “hot.”
Later, when officers were taken to the cornfield where Tibbetts’ body was found, Romero said Bahena Rivera began confessing to murdering Tibbets and explained in depth the incident.
According to Romero, Bahena Rivera waived his Miranda Rights in order to speak with her. From there, the transcript states that Bahena Rivera confessed to seeing Tibbetts jogging three times on the route where video footage shows him repeatedly circling back in his vehicle.
Then, Romero said Bahena Rivera told her that he parked his car, ran up to Tibbetts, and she attempted to slap him and said she would call the police if he did not get away from her. Bahena Rivera, according to the transcript, said he “got angry” and told Romero he “blacked out.”
Eventually, the transcript states that Bahena Rivera said he next remembered looking down at Tibbetts’ headphones in his lap while driving his Chevy Malibu, and that is when he remembered that he had put Tibbetts’ body in the trunk of his car.
Romero said Bahena Rivera could not remember putting Tibbetts’ body in the trunk of the car but did remember taking her out, noticing her neck was bleeding, placing her in a cornfield, putting corn leaves over her body, and leaving.
While allegedly carrying Tibbetts’ body over his shoulder, the transcript states that Bahena Rivera said he remembered he had taken his shirt off because it was covered in blood, though he did not remember using any weapons when fighting with Tibbetts.
“I brought you here, didn’t I? So that means I did it, right? I don’t know how I did it,” Bahena Rivera allegedly told Romero of the murder. When asked if he ever thought about the incident while the community was searching for Tibbetts, Romero said Bahena Rivera told her “I didn’t think about it” and that he had blocked it out of his memory.
Throughout the course of the 11-hour conversation, Romero said Bahena Rivera was not coerced into a confession and was given food, his drink of choice, as well as eight to nine breaks. Romero said that at no point did she witness Bahena Rivera sleeping as she repeated multiple times that the illegal alien had been allowed to have his cell phone and was able to leave whenever he wanted as he was not, at the time, in custody.
The jury was also shown video footage of Tibbetts jogging moments before her abduction and murder. Around the same time, Bahena Rivera’s Chevy Malibu can be seen in footage circling the area multiple times.
For more than a year, Bahena Rivera’s defense attorneys had sought to have his alleged murder confession thrown out of evidence, claiming it was coerced and a false confession. In their opening statements, expected next week after the prosecution wraps up its case, the defense is likely to claim that the confession was coerced.
On the first day of the trial, prosecutors called Tibbetts’ boyfriend, Dalton Jack, to the witness stand. During cross-examination, the defense seemingly pointed the finger at Jack, suggesting he may have had something to do with Tibbetts’ murder.
According to prosecutors, Bahena Rivera was the last person who saw Tibbetts jogging on the evening of July 18 in Brooklyn, Iowa. She went missing later that night.
Bahena Rivera allegedly stabbed Tibbetts to death, dumped her body in a cornfield, and placed corn stalks over her to prevent law enforcement from finding her. The illegal alien has been held on a $5 million bond.
John Binder is a reporter for Breitbart News. Email him at jbinder@breitbart.com. Follow him on Twitter here.
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