He didn’t want to finish fixing grandma’s roof - so he did the unthinkable

for Susan Hernandez her family was everything she raised seven children we were her life we were her world my mom was a beautiful person and a wonderful mother a wonderful grandmother it's been six months since the love of her life her husband of 59 years Carlos died now to keep her company in her Pueblo Colorado home is her dog baby and Vanessa one of her daughters who lives right across the street Katrina who lives about 45 minutes away talks to her mom daily every morning the first thing I always says mom how did you sleep Katrina says her mom hadn't been sleeping well she'd been stressed out about the new roof she'd hired her grandson Anthony to put on in any case the devout Catholic had a tried and true way for dealing with her worries pray that's what my mother did whenever anything went wrong in her life she would turn to God and pray but on this one Wednesday in late July 77 year-old Susan Hernandez would need so much more than prayers that Wednesday morning first thing I did was called mom a little bit after 7:00 in the morning her mom didn't pick up so Katrina left a voicemail told her I talked to her later told her have a good day gotta brush my teeth and for some reason I thought I'm gonna call mom again it was around 7:15 717 I called mom again still no answer Katrina tries her again later nothing I had a horrible gut feeling going through my stomach I closed up my house and drove down to prep lo when Katrina arrives at her mom's house she's greeted not by her but by clouds of smoke and sees where the smoke is coming from the basement my mother's in the basement like somebody broke in I don't know Katrina goes outside but the intense need to find her mom pulls her back in what she's about to see is beyond police and fire crews already on their way to what they think is a structure fire you're this over the radio at possible burglary as well she's under a mother in the basement on fire I know Purvis was acting sergeant detective Raymond Purvis who is assigned to the case comes from a storied law enforcement family he's a relative of famed FBI agent Melvin Purvis considered to be the man who got gangster John Dillinger as Detective Purvis approaches the house he immediately noticed his signs of forced entry the door jamb was broken and splintered it appeared that someone had kicked open the door inside things seem to be untouched and nothing was out of order miss Hernandez kept that house immaculate then he makes his way to the basement so you go down into the basement and you had mrs. Hernandez she had been set on fire but that wasn't all investigators would soon learn [Music] Susan Hernandez had been bludgeoned she had a large hole to the back of her head she had been struck multiple times and we knew that because of the cast-off and the blood splatter at the scene we definitely knew it was a homicide there was not a question about that I didn't want it to be real do you want it to be well you want it to be true not even a bad nightmare because a nightmare you could wake up wake up it it didn't happen but this happened sorry Katrina's sister brenda was at work when she got the news when she arrives i saw of the crime scene tape and i know she was murdered at that point more distraught family members show up to the horrific scene there along with brenda and katrina is their sister Vanessa who lives across the street her son's Devon and Anthony in their cousin Sebastian Anthony walks up to me and he says I'm so sorry aunty Brenda and we hugged and I was crying and I said who would do this to your grandma who would murder your grandma like this Anthony who would do this and he goes I don't know I don't know while cops wearing body cams canvass the neighborhood family members are escorted to the station for routine questioning were they about to get their first break in the case anything out of the ordinary and cars coming and going and a three car this morning there there's a blue car that was parked right right a little bit it was a vicious and violent attack beloved 77 year-old Susan Hernandez has been savagely murdered in her own basement hit several times in the back of the head and set on fire I looked down and I and I seen my mom's leg she was on fire in her basement immediately pueblo police officers wearing body cams hit the pavement they get their first tip when a neighbor describes a suspicious car seen parked near Susan's house earlier that morning so blue car doctor the dark blue car one hurdle one odds spent one in there and that was at what time this morning o'clock we had to locate this blue car we had to find out who this individual was because he could potentially be the person who committed the crime cops get other leads and learn when Susan was last seen alive supposedly she was last seen the day before earlier in the morning walking her dog there was also a neighbor that state as she maybe saw a suspicious male who walked back and forth up from the river we were also told that the night before there were some lights on and mrs. Hernandez's house it was just unusual for her to have the lights on she was going to bed usually pretty early and and the life stayed on throughout the night so the canvassing of the neighborhood yielded some valuable information hopefully talking to Susan's family will help investigators get closer to catching the murderer we had them all transported down to the police station and begin to interview them as witnesses Susan's daughters are at the Pueblo Police Department Catrina the one who found her mom Brenda and Vanessa she's the daughter who lives across the street from her mom also at the station are Vanessa's sons Susan's grandsons Devin and Anthony and their cousin Sebastian we were just trying to find out why mr. Hernandez was killed she had no enemies everyone loved her and so it was kind of confusing to us why somebody would want to do that then a theory starts to take shape we were told that mrs. Hernandez had a cash box that had potentially a large amount of cash in there the first time we were searching that house we did not locate that cash box so at this point in time it was appeared that it could have been a possible burglary the distraught family members are all brought to different interview rooms I was assigned interview Anthony Sena which is Susan's grandson remember he's the one who was supposed to redo her roof she been stressed out about it causing her to have some sleepless nights while waiting for detective Purvis Anthony notices the cameras and switches seats he then receives a call [Music] then the interview Monday today's Wednesday okay so the basically Monday you saw her then what happened so Anthony saw and talked to her on Monday he then tells the kicker Purvis he went to his grandmother's again on Tuesday but on Tuesday she didn't answer the door or any of his calls that whole day but back to the roofing job a job he was going to do with his brothers Bruce and Devon and cousin Sebastian Anthony says his grandmother had written him two checks one for the materials and one for the labor the cost would be 76 pardon me for all the questions have you purchased the materials where do you purchase materials from the story was starting to not make some sense then Anthony starts to get flustered Anthony had done some prison time for stealing vandalism in the armed robbery of an armored car Anthony was in trouble all the time since he was little you know I believe he was on an ankle brace and since he was like 11 and he was proud of it the interview then takes a more serious turn [Music] [Music] God forgive me if I come off as I'm black but what you understand that the Mambo confer responds Anthony gives detective Purvis consent to search his phone and his Anthony sits alone he talks to himself looks at the cameras and even throws up when purpose returns he has one more very pointed question remember his mom Vanessa lives right across the street from his grandmother so does that place him at least near the scene of the crime eventually Anthony and his other family members are free to go then a couple of nights later a woman approaches some cops on the street what's wrong you want to sit down and test Amina go all this is wearing body cams go to the woman's house can you tell us what's going on I understand you would over have a conversation with one of our officers what's your name it's Vanessa mom two son's Anthony Bruce and Devan but who is she talking about okay you've been drinking it all tonight oh yeah I don't have working from the inside out cops talked to the family of Susan Hernandez first her grandson Anthony sent up just one of those interviews it was shaping up to be a real whodunit we did not have a murder weapon at that time there wasn't nothing at the house a whole lot that we could go on so it was going to take some old-fashioned legwork and some video surveillance to help solve this heinous crime mrs. Hernandez had had been seen at a store in the area around I believe around noon maybe 12:30 so with that time that she was alive around 12:30 and that she was potentially not alive around 2:30 or 3:00 because she wasn't answering her phone investigators believe she was killed on Tuesday between noon and 3 p.m. the house was set on fire the next day a week later the family is back at the police station for some routine fingerprinting and photo detective Purvis is once again assigned to Anthony Sena so as we're walking down the hallway he stops me and he says um you don't have anything on me if you had anything on me you'd arrested me by now and he looked at me and said you know God stopped that fire and I said no I said the fireman stopped that fire but I thought about it for a minute I said you know what I think God did stop that fire anything thank you right little did Anthony know who really stopped the fire was it the same person who started it she was probably burning for no longer maybe than a few hours whoever had done this at that time shut that basement door when they set her on fire and there was really not enough oxygen to get down to that basement to really ignite the flames so it was a big break that whoever did this did not let a bunch of the oxygen fuel the fire because we probably would have had the entire house on fire and that misstep would lead investigators to a bombshell the body had not been totally burned as consumed so there was one hand that had some finger nails or fingers left to it and when the pathologist's had taken these samples from underneath the fingernails we did send that off to CBI which later came back as y-str DNA y-str DNA is DNA found only in males and when the results come back from the lab this was TR DNA identifies five potential suspects Anthony senna devin senna bruce senna sebastian senna and we asked Joseph Center which is the father the shocker they are all her own family members so we knew that it was one of the Sena members we just didn't know which one had actually committed the crime or maybe all at this point in time we didn't know so we began on working to rule out each one and try to find a true person who did this although cops are looking at all five of these cinnamon Clues keep bringing them back to just one Anthony remember his mom Vanessa she had talked to officers before well it seemed like she had more to say there one night we got a phone call from her I stayed in that she had found the murder weapon and she identified this hammer that was in her kitchen as the potential murder weapon she believed her son Anthony could have possibly put it there cops take the hammer in for testing but can't link it directly to the murder then a break a man finds Susan's ID and some other cards of hers lying on the side of the road phone records eventually placed anthony near the road where the cards were found there was just one more piece of evidence that we had to suggest he was involved in the case phone records also place Anthony near the house the morning of the fire and shockingly so does a neighbor there family members came over here asking me for seen tomorrow who came over the grandson Anthony he asked me you know have you seen my grandma that was basically all to create an alibi and the leads keep coming this time from Anthony's little girl his daughter had stated that the day that Anthony met Devin over to talk with grandma when her dad came back to get her and they were driving she saw some blood as detectives are closing in on Anthony they're simultaneously ruling out the other's sentiment through phone records witness statements and alibis it was evident to us that Anthony was pretty much the lone person in the case it isn't looking good for Anthony in the meantime he seems to be busy on social media Anthony we need a Facebook posting he was pouring out his heart about you know missing his grandparents Anthony wrote quote I love you grandma and grandpa you both have helped me so much over the years no matter what was going on in my life you were both there my heart is broke and my mind a wonder without you both here I will forever cherish our memories shared together God has his choice now love you so what would be Anthony's motive cops learned it may have all stemmed from money in a roofing job that never was Anthony took the money from my mother never made good on the roof and he kept giving her the runaround Katrina says her mom told Anthony many times she wanted her money back and she told me that if he doesn't bring the money back by Tuesday she's calling the cops Tuesday she was dead the walls were closing in on Anthony at that time he didn't have the money so he had an option I can try to get the money or I can potentially just go ahead and can kill grandma and make it look like someone else did it and and that'll be my way out cops bring anthony back in for questioning and this time he tries to strike a deal he suggested that he would give us the money back and we would call it a day we told him we could take the money back but you know we still have to look at the murder and that's what investigators continue to do follow leads locates eventually the missing cash box is found hidden in Susan's closet and the blue car scene the morning of the murder is a dead end and the other set of men one by one they're all subsequently cleared of any wrongdoing the detectives anthony is their man I think he did it with intent I think he did it with deliberation and I think he committed cold-blooded first-degree murder after a four-month investigation Anthony Senna is arrested at his house for the murder of his own grandmother his face at that moment was ghost white he was scared he really I think he knew we had him after the fire he hugged me put his arms around me now thinking that the murderer that killed my mother with those evil hands had his hands around me trying to console me he's a sociopath is all I can say the trial last two weeks he gloated out his looked at as smirked at us like he was gonna get away with this but the jury would disagree after four hours of deliberations anthony is found guilty and sentenced to life in prison without parole Anthony Sena almost got away with this murder if the hand had been burned this case probably and could likely have gone unsolved so Anthony will spend the rest of his life behind bars leaving behind a family in pain and deeply sponger our parents brought us up to love each other to not break the law I don't know what happened every day my life every morning I wake up I learn relive that day every day she was my life that will never forgive him for what he did to my mother [Music]

Channel: True Crime Daily

Views: 7,011,974

Rating: 4.8521652 out of 5

Keywords: Anthony Sena, True Crime Daily, Crime Watch Daily, Susan Hernandez

Id: kgsV4f1ZWvo

Length: 23min 16sec (1396 seconds)

Published: Thu Mar 07 2019