Vanessa Guillen’s bludgeoned body ‘hidden in box that 2 witnesses saw being wheeled out of blood-spattered armory’
SLAIN Vanessa Guillen’s body was hidden in a box that two witnesses saw being wheeled out of the armory after the solder was allegedly bludgeoned to death.
New details about the gruesome case, which emerged after an FBI agent’s affidavit was filed in the US District Court in Texas last week, outline what happened in the weeks after 20-year-old Guillen went missing from the base on April 22.
Witness testimony and phone records led investigators to the suspect, fellow soldier Aaron Robinson, who took his own life after Guillen’s remains were found in a shallow grave about 20 miles from Fort Hood.
Robinson had been on investigators’ radar early on because he was known to have been the last person to see Guillen, and her last outgoing text message was sent to him, according to the affidavit.
He was initially questioned on April 28 by Army investigators, and told them he had gone straight home after work that day to be with his girlfriend – 22-year-old Cecily Aguilar – the second suspect in connection to Guillen’s death.
Aguilar initially told cops that she had been with Robinson all night.
That story began to unravel when two witnesses told investigators that they had seen Robinson pulling a large box out of the armory on the night Guillen disappeared, which witnesses said he then loaded into his car and drove away with.
Phone records also indicated that both Robinson and Aguilar were near the Leon River in Ball County – about 25 miles away from Fort Hood – for about two hours in the early morning of April 23. Aguilar’s phone was also in that area on April 26.
The suspect initially said she and her boyfriend had gone to the area – where Guillen’s remains were later found – on the night in question to “look at the stars.”
The remains were found “placed in a concrete-like substance” and buried on June 30.
Both suspects were approached by investigators that day. Aguilar reportedly confessed, while Robinson shot himself.
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Aguilar is reportedly cooperating with the FBI, but is still facing up to 20 years in federal prison and a maximum $250,000 fine.
She was charged with one count of conspiracy to tamper with evidence.
Robinson allegedly got Aguilar to help him dismember and dispose of Guillen’s body. They reportedly attempted to burn the soldier’s remains, and then buried her in three separate shallow graves.