In a chilling turn of events, a Florida man who initially reported his girlfriend missing is now facing charges for her murder. Saul Garcia Gonzalez has been accused of killing 37-year-old Nerida Martel, whose lifeless body was tragically discovered in a canal close to the residence they shared with their young daughter. Martel had suffered a fatal gunshot wound.
Gonzalez, aged 40, contacted authorities on October 9 to report Martel missing. He claimed the last time he saw her was on October 6, when she was supposedly taking their 2-year-old to daycare before heading to work. However, she never arrived at her workplace that day, according to the Miami Herald.
In a peculiar twist, Gonzalez suggested to a friend of Martel that she might have been detained by immigration authorities. Despite this claim, her name was absent from any detention records. At the friend’s insistence, Gonzalez proceeded to file a missing person report with the police.
However, discrepancies in Gonzalez’s account soon raised suspicions among investigators. Conflicting details emerged about where and when he last saw Martel. While he told police she was at home when he left to drop their daughter at daycare, he informed others that he had left her at a bus stop. Further complicating his narrative, cell phone data seemed to contradict his statements.
On the very day Gonzalez claimed to have last seen Martel, her phone remained at their home, while his phone was traced to the canal where her body was eventually discovered, a mere half-mile from their house. The police report indicates that his phone then returned home and later both phones were tracked to the canal again, at which point Martel’s phone was switched off.
On October 6, for example — the day he claimed was when he last saw her — Martel’s cell phone remained at the home while Gonzalez’s phone traveled to the canal where her body was later found, less than half a mile from the home. Then, the police report says, Gonzalez’s phone returned home and both phones traveled to the canal, where Martel’s phone was turned off.
The report says that police had been called to the home in May by a woman in distress who was screaming for help. A man could be heard yelling in the background, but when police arrived, they could not find the woman who made the call.
According to WTMJ, a friend told investigators that Martel had been looking for a place to stay with her daughter to get out of the relationship.
Police say Gonzalez denied killing Martel. He’s been charged with second degree murder and is being held without bond.
