Jury convicts man of rape, murder 14 years after UNC-Chapel Hill student’s death

A man accused of killing a North Carolina college student 14 years ago was convicted Friday of first-degree murder, rape and other charges after prosecutors told jurors that forensic evidence was “screaming his name.”

Faith Hedgepeth was a 19-year-old sophomore at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill when she was beaten to death in her off-campus apartment in September 2012. Miguel Salguero Olivares was arrested nine years later after being pulled over for driving while intoxicated and providing a DNA sample that prosecutors say matched evidence from the crime scene.

Salguero Olivares, 33, did not testify during the trial , and his attorneys rested their case without calling any witnesses. Jurors deliberated for six hours over two days before convicting him of murder, rape, sexual offense and burglary.

In closing arguments Thursday, defense attorneys accused investigators of having “tunnel vision” in assuming that their client was a monster and not a “19-year-old boy” who had consensual sex with the victim days before her death. Prosecutors, meanwhile, urged jurors to rely on DNA evidence instead of distractions from the defense team.

“We know who did it. The forensic evidence is screaming his name,” said prosecutor Angela Garcia-Lamarca, who described the “uncurable agony” Hedgepeth’s family has endured.

“When the defendant brought that bottle down on her head and she started to bleed, that was the start of a bleeding that still hasn’t stopped,” she said. “He sentenced her to death. He sentenced everybody else who loved her to life. There was no one there to protect her. There was no one there to stop him — until now. Y’all are here. You’re here now, and you can stop him.”

Nearly two dozen witnesses testified for the prosecution, including crime scene technicians, state and local law enforcement, a DNA expert and Hedgepeth’s friends.

Hedgepeth’s roommate, Karena Rosario, testified that she was drunk and sick when Hedgepeth drove them home from a club around 2 a.m. that Sept. 7. She said she later called a friend to pick her up, leaving Hedgepeth in the apartment alone. She returned hours later to find her roommate’s body.

Prosecutors suggested Salguero Olivares may have attended a barbecue hosted by Hedgepeth’s neighbor that night, unsuccessfully hit on the young women in the parking lot and then returned, embarrassed and angry, after Rosario left. No witnesses corroborated that theory, but Garcia-Lamarca told jurors, “You don’t have to believe that to know he’s guilty.”

An autopsy showed Hedgepeth suffered extensive skull fractures and cuts to her face and head, and she was also badly beaten on her arms and legs.

“He beat her until her skull cracked like an egg,” special prosecutor Lisa Coltrane said in her portion of the closing arguments. “That is what the last moments of this vibrant young woman’s life was.”

Experts testified that the defendant’s fingerprints and palm print were found on a wine bottle at the scene and that his DNA was found in Hedgepeth’s body, on a note written on a fast-food bag found at the scene and on a rum bottle covered in blood that investigators identified as the weapon in the killing.

Erin Ermish, a forensic scientist with the state crime lab, said DNA swabbed from Hedgepeth’s body was 170 septillion times more likely to be a mixture of DNA from Hedgepeth and Salguero Olivares than from Hedgepeth and an unknown individual. One septillion is a 1 followed by 24 zeros. In contrast, NASA estimates the entire universe contains only 1 septillion stars.

Ermish also said the DNA mixture from the top of the rum bottle was 48.6 tredecillion times more likely to be from Hedgepeth and Salguero Olivares than from two unknown, unrelated individuals. One tredecillion is a 1 followed by 42 zeros.

Defense attorneys questioned Rosario’s account of that night, the processing of the crime scene and the reliability of some DNA evidence. They pointed out that police failed to search some areas of the apartment and later lost some possible blood evidence and emphasized that DNA from sexual intercourse can remain for days afterward.

“Maybe he was living the same life as other 19- and 20-year-old children that we’ve heard about in this case,” defense attorney Jason Murphy said. “Maybe he had too much to drink, maybe he forgot about an encounter.”

But Coltrane dismissed that as “noise.”

“No matter what kind of mistakes were made or things that were missed, it doesn’t erase the palm print; it doesn’t somehow lift the DNA out of Faith,” she said. “They didn’t talk to every single person in Chapel Hill, and it doesn’t matter. They still got the guy because he left his DNA like confetti all over that room.”

This is a developing story and will be updated.

一名男子被控于 14 年前杀害了一名北卡罗来纳州的女大学生，周五，他被判犯有一级谋杀罪、强奸罪和其他罪行。此前，检察官告诉陪审团，法医证据“都在呼唤他的名字”。

2012 年 9 月，19 岁的费丝·赫奇佩斯 (Faith Hedgepeth) 是北卡罗来纳大学教堂山分校的一名大二学生，她在校外公寓内被殴打致死。九年后，米格尔·萨尔格罗·奥利瓦雷斯 (Miguel Salguero Olivares) 因酒后驾车被拦下，并提供了 DNA 样本，检察官称该样本与犯罪现场的证据相符，随后他被逮捕。

33岁的萨尔格罗·奥利瓦雷斯在审判期间没有出庭作证，他的律师也没有传唤任何证人就结束了辩护。陪审团经过两天共六小时的审议，最终裁定他犯有谋杀、强奸、性侵犯和入室盗窃罪。

周四的结案陈词中，辩方律师指责调查人员“目光短浅”，认定他们的当事人是个恶魔，而不是一个在受害者遇害前几天与她发生过自愿性行为的“19岁男孩”。与此同时，检方则敦促陪审团相信DNA证据，而不是被辩方的干扰所迷惑。

“我们知道是谁干的。法医证据都在指着他的名字，”检察官安吉拉·加西亚-拉马卡说道，她还描述了赫奇佩斯一家所遭受的“无法治愈的痛苦”。

“被告用酒瓶砸在她头上，她开始流血，那只是个开始，至今仍未止血，”她说。“他判了她死刑。他判了所有爱她的人终身监禁。没有人保护她。没有人阻止他——直到现在。你们来了。你们现在在这里，你们可以阻止他。”

近二十名证人出庭为控方作证，其中包括犯罪现场技术人员、州和地方执法人员、DNA专家以及赫奇佩斯的朋友。

海吉佩斯的室友卡琳娜·罗萨里奥作证说，9月7日凌晨2点左右，海吉佩斯开车送她们从夜店回家时，她喝醉了，而且身体不适。她说，后来她打电话让朋友来接她，把海吉佩斯一个人留在公寓里。几个小时后，她回到公寓，发现了室友的尸体。

检方推测，萨尔格罗·奥利瓦雷斯当晚可能参加了赫奇佩斯邻居举办的烧烤聚会，在停车场搭讪年轻女子未果后，在罗萨里奥离开后，他尴尬又愤怒地返回。虽然没有证人证实这一说法，但加西亚-拉马卡告诉陪审员：“你们不必相信这一点就能知道他有罪。”

尸检显示，海吉佩斯的颅骨严重骨折，面部和头部有割伤，手臂和腿部也遭到严重殴打。

“他把她打得头骨像鸡蛋一样碎裂，”特别检察官丽莎·科尔特兰在结案陈词中说道。“这就是这位充满活力的年轻女性生命最后时刻的写照。”

专家作证称，在现场的一个酒瓶上发现了被告的指纹和掌纹，在赫奇佩斯的尸体上、在现场发现的一个快餐袋上的纸条上以及一个沾满血迹的朗姆酒瓶上发现了他的 DNA，调查人员认定该酒瓶是杀人凶器。

州犯罪实验室的法医科学家艾琳·厄米什表示，从赫奇佩斯遗体上提取的DNA样本，其成分是赫奇佩斯和萨尔格罗·奥利瓦雷斯的混合DNA的可能性，比赫奇佩斯和一名身份不明人士的DNA混合DNA的可能性高出170万亿亿倍。1万亿亿是1后面跟24个零。相比之下，美国宇航局估计整个宇宙中只有1万亿亿颗恒星。

埃尔米什还表示，从朗姆酒瓶顶部提取的DNA混合物来自赫奇佩斯和萨尔格罗·奥利瓦雷斯的可能性比来自两个身份不明、互不相关的个​​体的可能性高出48.6万亿亿倍。1万亿亿是1后面跟42个零。

辩方律师质疑罗萨里奥对当晚情况的描述、犯罪现场的处理以及部分DNA证据的可靠性。他们指出，警方未能搜查公寓的某些区域，后来又丢失了一些可能的血迹证据，并强调性交产生的DNA可以在事后残留数日。

辩护律师杰森·墨菲说：“也许他过着和本案中我们了解到的其他19岁、20岁的年轻人一样的生活。也许他喝多了，也许他忘记了某次遭遇。”

但科尔特兰对此不屑一顾，称之为“噪音”。

“无论犯了什么错误，或者遗漏了什么，都无法抹去掌纹；也无法从费丝身上提取DNA，”她说。“他们没有和教堂山的每个人都谈过话，但这并不重要。他们还是抓住了那个人，因为他把DNA像彩带一样留在了房间里。”

这是一则正在更新的新闻。