Teacher Stabbed by Pre-Med Student Son More Than 70 Times: Cops

it is one of the most bizarre murders that we've dealt with in a very long time a beloved second grade teacher murder 70 times to me is absolutely Overkill the accused killer a one-time valid dictorian Premed student and the victim's son that he was aiming for specific parts of her body based on his medical knowledge being a Premed student so that also tells me that there was thought that that went into this what's more there's video of the suspect carrying the murder weapon I think the first thing that I was thinking about this was how unemotional he seems and how Unapologetic and a near immediate confession tell me exactly what happened but investigators are still scratching their heads wondering what led up to the shocking crime it's really hard to see that there's anything in this family's background that would have led to this Behavior this is 46-year-old Elia Espinosa a second grade teacher at Ben Hill Griffin Elementary School in Frostproof Florida according to those who knew her Elvia was a beloved member of the community an educator for decades and a mother of three her youngest son is 21-year-old Emanuel Manny Espinosa who in 2020 graduated as valedictorian from the same district she taught in here's P County Sheriff Grady Jud he was the 2020 Frost Proof valedictorian with a 4.5 GPA average he was quoted at his high school graduation by saying high school was just one of the chapters out of the many we will have throughout our lives we still have so much to accomplish in the future that would define what kind of Legacy the class of 2020 will leave behind that's right he was described as being a genius of being remarkably brilliant he was a Premed student in his fourth year at the University of Florida the next chapter of his life was to be a medical doctor I want you to understand she was really the perfect mom I want you to understand that she was very proud of his accomplishments in going to the University of Florida graduating number one in his high school class and then I want you to understand that he viciously murdered her and confessed to it Manny later told investigators he talked to his mother regularly about every other day so it was normal to hear from her mom called on Saturday morning and said Manny I haven't seen you in a while they would text about every other day I'd like to come up to Gainesville to see you and he said well Mom I'm visiting grandfather this weekend he has an event so I'll be down your way she said that's great why don't you stay with me at the house and he said sure I'd love to the University of Florida is in Gainesville about 3 hours north of frost proof where Elia lived on April 8th Manny made that drive he said that he had just been angry or not liked his mother for years and years when we said do you love her he said oh yeah I love her do y'all get along yeah eight out of 10 we get along but I've wanted to kill her for years and I made up my mind as I drove from Gainesville today is the day and he then showed up at the front door he's caught on ring camera video approaching his mother's front door you can see Manny walk up with something behind his back as the video goes on we learn it's a knife that investigators say he used to stab his mom notice behind his back there's the knife he tried to open the door and the door was locked so he knocked on the door and his beautiful mother was so excited to see her son she opened the door the second she opened the door he charged in and started stabbing her P County investigators say Manny stabbed his mother in excess of 70 times all without saying a word and then he told the detectives in his confession that he had cut his hand on the knife while stabbing his mother and as he's standing at the kitchen sink washing himself off and the knives he wanted to ask his mother for the Neosporin for the cut in his hand but he noticed she was dead he immediately called 911 and confessed tell me exactly what happened someone hello hello yes tell me exactly what happened I killed someone only seconds into the 911 call Manny admits he stabbed his mother and repeats this fact multiple times how did and how did this happen I Mon and by the sound of the call he's confident his mother is beyond saving all right so we need to try to render Aid if we can okay that's fine okay I'm going okay well we're GNA try to render her Aid okay all right is she awake no she BL okay is she breathing no the think she is beyond any help I do to understand the case better I sat down with former CIA officer and FBI agent Tracy Walder is there any defense that he can really bring after he already confessed that's a really actually great question several defenses obviously there's really only six that you can employ right I Didn't Do It um I did it out of self-defense um I did it because someone else made me to made me do it I I don't think any of those are going to work in this case but it sounds like he has refused a public defender and does not have an attorney of his own the only thing that I could possibly see is if an attorney got involved they might encourage him to utilize the insanity defense but even if he utilized that he'd have to go through a really rigorous testing process because that's how it works um and I'm not sure that they would deem him to be insane but investigators say there weren't any warning signs we have gone back and searched his room at UF and we don't see any information there any notes any Communications that are indicative of this conduct or planning of such a murder and obviously we will as part of the follow-up investigation as you understand this happened just Saturday afternoon it doesn't seem that there's reports of you know police activity at their home in the past right all of those things would probably be easy to see um again I don't know his juvenile record was like because it's probably sealed so I I don't know if there were things going on there that would kind of be my one I guess question mark um if you will uh yes it seemed I don't know uh you know exactly the types of conversations that he was maybe having about his mom to other people I think that might be very telling um but it it's really hard to see that there's anything in this family's background that would have led to this Behavior even though the crime feels completely completely out of the blue it's possible Manny did some mental planning one day he just decided that he was going to go kill her he said he'd been thinking about it a lot would that make it premeditated so in my opinion yes as him saying utilizing those statements which are all admissible statements you know him saying this is something I had thought about but I finally did it um right him you know actually having a plan right leaving school coming home to do this all of those things can definitely Point towards premeditation because typically in a case like this where you see someone being stabbed you 70 times which is the case here multiple multiple times those are a lot of times fits of rage right so then they're not always premeditated but in a case like this he also made a statement too I believe to the 911 operator but I I can't be certain that he was aiming for specific parts of her body based on his medical knowledge being a Premed student so that also tells me that there was thought that that went into this premeditation doesn't have to be planning weeks in advance it can be planning a day in advance and I think they could make a case there is it possible that his background in the medical field studying biology and human anatomy could have led to her death and exactly what you were saying he knew where to stab her for it to be fatal sure I think that his background if this was something he was thinking about for a while which he indicated his background could have been made him more confident um in terms of I hate to utilize this word but being successful in killing her it maybe made him more confident in doing so because he knew um you know which places to stab her to ultimately kill her however 70 times I don't think that you have to be you know Premed student um to know that stabbing someone 70 times just from simp Le blood loss will most likely kill them is 70 times to you Overkill 70 times to me is absolutely Overkill um I don't want to say it's rare but um you know we hear about people being stabbed 40 times 50 times 70 times is definitely rageful so he clearly has rage in there um and in my opinion it's definitely Overkill then there's the strange request about Neosporin he noticed during all of this that he had a cut on his hand during the stabbing and he went to ask his mom for Neosporin and then realized that she was dead that really stuck out to me as something very startling what do you make of that and I also think that's kind of to what we were talking about earlier where I see an insanity defense being employed um because then that would mean he's disassociated right from his own actions and he doesn't understand uh what he has done the problem is is in something like that the degree of premeditation um that there is here isn't going to go well for him in regards to the insanity defense because then that also points to the fact that he knows what he did was wrong and so that's where I think things are going to get really complicated because you're right um that is very much disassociating from yourself from your actions all of those things um not realiz realizing that your mom's Dead who you just stabbed so many times but asking her for Neosporin all of those things um do point to insanity but then at the same time you have someone who had their wits very much about them um to get into the car to plan this to stab her in places that he thought she would die and so I think that's where there's going to be some conflict here but there's still a lot of question marks in the case I do have to wonder what led up to a rage induced stabbing like this because if we talk about his mom the victim in this case she was an elementary school teacher apparently beloved by the city that she taught in knew a lot of families and she had even volunteered to go visit her son on his campus Because she wanted to spend more time with him so it doesn't sound to me like she was a rage filled person but perhaps it was just her son that was it's hard to say because and again that will help with using the premeditation against him the idea that she did offer to come to visit him and he said no he wanted to visit her is all going to help with building that case about premeditation and that he was probably thinking about it it doesn't seem to me um that their relationship was that acrimonious I believe he's made statements that he's just simply found her annoying I think a lot of us find our parents annoying um at any phase of Our Lives um but that doesn't translate into Overkill uh like we've seen in a situation like this and that's we don't know obviously what went into his upbringing and what was going on in this home but it sounds by all accounts um there was nothing that maybe happened in his past that would have triggered something like this and does it make it more of a crime of passion because it was his mother that he killed yes I think it probably does make it more of a crime of passion because it is someone that he's close to right um and it is someone where there's obviously emotions involved and there is a huge degree of Overkill involved as well with Danny's confessions already on the 911 recording it's not quite as important to determine what led up to the murder at least not from a legal standpoint so is determining a motive going to be something important for investigators to do in my opinion in this case no um because the the the reality is is you have an individual who's been stabbed 70 times and you have someone who has admitted to that crime um and so really motive in a case like this I don't want to say it doesn't matter because clearly motive matters but it's going to matter more in terms of the type of defense that he employs and the ultimate sentence that he's trying to get and the location of the crime could make a big difference in the sentence we know that this happened in Florida so there's a possibility of the death penalty is this something that prosecutors might seek in this case in my opinion yes but that's where I think the insanity defense is really going to be utilized but that depends on the type of representation that he employs as well he could very well defend himself if that's something that he wants to do um I think the issue is is the death penalty is very much on the table particularly in a case like this um however if he uses the the insanity defense in a case like this and they wouldn't be able to give him if he's convicted um and found deemed to be insane they wouldn't be able to give him the death penalty but before that there's still more investigative work ahead is this going to be a lengthy investigation moving forward or is it something that could be wrapped rather quickly I in my opinion I think it's going to be wrapped up uh rather quickly yes I think they're going to look for motive because again as an investigator law enforcement you're always thinking about you know how is the defense going to defend this individual and you are always trying to make sure that your case is sort of like locked up airtight if you will um to to make sure that you get a conviction in a case like this but this is going to be pretty easy because I believe they also have him on ring doorbell camera um as well with the knife in his hand and his hand cut um from the knife so you've got him on camera you have him on the phone um and you have his phone records putting him inside the house so I I really think this is going to be pretty easy and according to Tracy it's possible Manny could have lashed out at someone else had he not been arrested is it possible that if he hadn't called 911 let's say he escaped and had not been caught that he would be a risk of hurting someone else based on his actions toward his mom so I believe so um I believe someone that's capable of that in my opinion and capable of that kind of Overkill could absolutely be a risk of someone else if he did this and again we don't know for sure but if he did this simply because she quote annoyed him and that was a statement he made then who's to say what he would do to a friend a colleague a professor um and so I think that in and of itself is is highly problematic in that he is very dangerous to society after elvia's death pulk County Schools put out a statement saying quote her students and colleagues greatly loved her and her sudden Unexpected death is a devastating loss she was a very special part of her school family her son was charged with first-degree murder and right now is being held in the Fulk County Jail without bond reporting for long crime I'm Sierra Gillespie

Channel: Law&Crime Network

Views: 146,673

Keywords: law and crime, law and crime network, true crime, truecrime, true crime videos, court, trials, law&crime

Id: GvPQIwrw1Ws

Length: 17min 27sec (1047 seconds)

Published: Fri Apr 12 2024