The After Show: They Know Everything
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Hi, I'm Brad Milkey. I'm the host of the Crime Scene Weekly, a new show from ABC Audio about the biggest headlines in true crime. This week, in the heart of Washington's wilderness, a tragedy has shattered a family. Three young sisters are dead and their father is on the run. I'll talk to ABC News correspondent Kena Whitworth to get the latest. Listen now on Apple, Spotify, Amazon, or wherever you get your podcasts.

Hi there, everybody. Deborah Roberts here and with another case that is so fascinating from 2020. This one, prosecutors say, was sparked by obsession, passion, and a love rivalry. The disappearance of 18-year-old college student Christian Aguilar shocked the University of Florida community where he went to school, the Gainesville area. Loved ones conducted a massive search to find him.

But tragically, Christian's body was eventually found in a remote swamp. Today on 2020 The After Show, I am going to catch up with ABC News correspondent Victor Aquindo, who brought us the latest updates on this episode on Friday. Victor, so good to see you. Hi, Debra. Thanks for having me. I see you on the tube all the time down in Miami, but we don't get a chance to see each other face to face that often. This is rare. I love being up here in person.

with you. It makes a big difference. Well, you've been joining us on 2020 recently. And one of the things that we like to do on the podcast is get to know people. Oftentimes, they're folks I've worked with regularly and behind the scenes. But you and I have just begun to kind of work together on 2020. So I associate you with Florida. You're a guy who's born and raised, I guess, down there, right? That's a good place to start. Yeah. And just to go way back, tell you how I got into journalism in the first place. That journey started at a very young age.

Mom and dad both worked in television. My mom, an anchor for Univision for more than 30 years. Of course. She had a show called "Aqui y Ahora," "Here and Now." It was like a long format style show. Yeah.

My father, before he passed away, was a vice president at Univision. So this was just like in your blood. Exactly. It's the family business. I grew up around newsrooms where a lot of people might walk into one and be like, what the heck is going on here? This is so weird. I don't know how you guys do this for a living. I was always very comfortable in that setting. So started studying it.

Followed through in college at the University of Miami. Great journalism program there. Of course. Excellent school of communication. Started interning. Started work at WPLG as a news trainee. I remember PLG, of course. And here you are. About 15, 16 years later, here we are now. Here we are. Well, I worked in Florida all those years ago, too. I worked in Orlando and I worked in Miami, too, for another network, for the bureau down there.

So I have a sense of a lot of the areas that you've covered. And, you know, I mean, for 2020, I've actually continued to go down there from time to time. We got a lot of stories down in Florida, as you know. This particular one, I remember this going back, I mean, obviously a few years ago, and it just was so striking. College town, right?

A young man who is like the pride of his family going off to school. And, you know, we don't hear a lot of stories like this that often. So tell me about your first reaction to this story. Yeah, I actually remember this one when I worked locally at WPLG as a news anchor there.

This one, it almost involved the entire state, enveloping everyone, because these kids were from Miami and they went up to Gainesville. Some went to the University of Florida, some went to a local community college nearby. We'll get into all of that a little bit later.

We've covered so many difficult stories throughout the years. And what I tend to find, whether it's a hurricane, a shooting, something like that, people always tend to come together after a tragedy. And we saw that happen in a way I've never really seen happen before in this case, where once Christian Aguilar went missing, the hundreds of people, the throngs of people that descended on Gainesville to help that family search for their missing son, never seen anything like it.

Haven't seen anything like it since. Wow. And that area is, I mean, it's a southern part of, you know, the country too. This area really sort of personifies that kind of almost small town, kind of southern feel, which would probably explain like the folks coming out and really feeling the connection to a teenager who's missing. Absolutely. Gainesville, it's not exactly a huge town. It is all about the University of Florida there. That's what you get. But

But people were driving up the five, six hours from Miami to go help this family. They were desperate to find their son. Yeah. Well, talk about your background a little bit because obviously you're from Florida. Did it help at all because we're talking Spanish-speaking folks here too? I mean, obviously you speak Spanish. How did your background help inform you as you began to report this story? Yeah, I mean, I'm a first-generation Cuban-American. The families involved here, they're not Cuban, but...

But still, there is a sense that I knew these families in a way, in the sense that Latin families are super tight-knit. Usually kids, especially the daughters, will live at home almost until they're married. So for Christian Aguilar, he was going to be one of the first in his family

to graduate from college. So for him to leave Miami, leave the nest, go up to Gainesville, his dream school, he had already got the season tickets for Gator football. For him to leave, that was a huge deal for the family. And he made a promise to his parents that he would call them every single day. His dad told me he made sure to call every single day. So when he didn't call...

That's when they knew something was wrong. They knew something was up. Well, let's talk about diving into this story. We saw you in the episode on an airboat out there, you know, with the investigators looking. And we oftentimes jump into all kinds of scenarios to report these stories, which is kind of fun to talk about on the podcast because we can bring our listeners into how we go about telling these stories. I jumped on a boat recently for a story, but this is an airboat. And you're kind of out there in an area that's kind of

tough too to you know a swamp it's a legit swamp there is a reason why that stadium at the University of Florida is called the swamp because the surrounding areas there are brutal it is a true swampland so we got out there we had Captain Art he knew someone in the sheriff's department so we had two airboats I was riding along with their sheriff and

And on the other boat was our whole crew, photographer, camera. Capturing the photos of you, the video of you. I'm talking to camera, one boat to another. Look, I've reported in hurricanes, tornadoes. I'm used to getting tossed in the elements. I will say going full speed on a loud airboat.

That's something different. It's different. And especially because we were also using drones at times as well. So, you know, you can imagine the drone is only as steady as it can be. We're also on a moving boat. So yeah, it wasn't the easiest of shoots, but I think that what we were able to do

eventually record and show everyone at home. And hopefully those who are listening to this right now is just what that area looked like, what it was like for this family, for the volunteers, for authorities as they search for more than three weeks searching for Christian Aguilar. Yeah, and that's what's so important because you're kind of taking the viewers for 2020, and of course the listeners here now can understand, we're taking them

inside to kind of figure out what that search was like. So the family is, of course, just devastated because they know something is wrong. They're searching for him. It was a painful discovery for everybody when they finally did discover the hard truth, which is Christian was not alive. And you spoke with his parents, Carlos and Claudia Aguilar, and

We've got a clip recalling how they responded to learning this devastating news that their son was gone from the Gainesville police detective Randy Roberts. Let's listen. It's hard to do a death notification for anybody. It's hard to tell them that their loved one's not coming home. So that conversation with Randy Roberts, where he tells you that they found a body. He used to tell me, I asked him, "Randy, in your experience,

You know, the body that you guys found in there matches the clothing, everything that Christian was wearing. And he says, "100%." So, you know, at that moment, we all start crying. Claudia, you wanted to go see the body after it was recovered? Why? Because I didn't believe that he was-- he was-- he passed. He was murdered. Even that Randy said that he found the Christian body, I didn't believe that. For me, it's been 30 years I've been doing it.

And that was the only time that I ever probably broke down with the family. That was the hardest one I ever did. You just spent more than three weeks searching for your son. You must have been exhausted physically and mentally. What was it like when you had to bury him? My brain was not there. My heart was not there. My physical presence, yes. But, you know, I don't remember everything clearly.

It just breaks your heart. To just hear this, it just breaks your heart. And the parents, I mean, they were holding on to hope. And that was a powerful quote to hear from Christian's father, too, when he had told you justice is different from revenge. A loving family who, you know, just had to deal with this and trying to honor their son's legacy. One thing that I learned about Carlos Aguilar, Christian's father, was that when he sets his mind to something, he's going to do it. I mean, the second that his son went missing,

He made it to Gainesville in record time, a couple hours. It usually takes five to six to get to Gainesville from Miami. He searched every single day, 22 days, nonstop. He said, "I don't care if we lose the house. I don't care what happens to our jobs. We're not going to leave Gainesville until we find Christian one way or another." At the funeral, we saw clips of him there hugging everyone. Friends talked about how emotional that was. Obviously, a very difficult experience. We're talking about kids who were 18 years old when this happened.

And then yes, Carlos said that the focus shifted to finding justice for their son, not revenge. The quote here, if somebody has done a wrongdoing and you know it, and it's really bad, that person needs to be brought to justice. And we asked for justice. We didn't ask for revenge, which is different.

Yeah. And so they've gone from the heartbreak of losing their son and having to bury him to now trying to figure out what happened. And now the investigation begins. And we're going to take a short break. And when we come back, we're going to discuss the evidence that authorities uncovered and give us a picture inside a killer's mind. And, Victor, you had a rare prison interview with the person who was eventually convicted. Stay with us, everybody. ♪

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I'm back now with ABC News correspondent Victor Aquindo talking about his 2020 report on the Christian Aguilar case. Just a heartbreaking story. Victor, we learned through your reporting that police eventually hone in on one of Christian's friends, Pedro Bravo.

And eventually they wind up charging him with murder. Let's talk about that investigation and also charging a friend in a friend's murder. Crazy. Yep. Pedro Bravo was always someone that they were looking at closely for the main reason. He was the last person who saw Christian Aguilar alive. Christian and Pedro had spent that day together. They were on campus. They got a bite to eat. They went to a Best Buy to buy the new, at the time, Kanye West CD. And that...

That's the last time that we actually see any video. There's some surveillance surveillance. That's when you see Christian physically. Then there's another clip at a Walmart nearby at a parking lot there where they're inside the car together.

But Pedro Bravo, he was the key to unraveling what happened. And tell us about their relationship, their buddies. I mean, you know, and that must be the hardest thing probably for these families to try to figure out. I mean, these guys are friends, knew each other in high school, right? So they both went to Doral Academy Charter School. That's in Miami. They were close friends in high school. By all accounts, Pedro Bravo.

Very smart guy. He actually had a full ride to FIU, Florida International University. That's in Miami. That's a big school. And it's a great school. He was also known to be like a class clown. Really funny, smart guy. Christian wanted to be a biomedical engineer. He was off to the University of Florida. Now there's a third person here, Erica Freeman.

During high school, Erika dated Pedro Bravo. They break up. Erika goes off to Santa Fe Community College. It's right next to the University of Florida. Often what people do is that they'll go to Santa Fe for a couple years, spend a couple semesters, and then transfer right over.

In those early weeks and months at the University of Florida in Gainesville, Christian and Erica, they get involved romantically. It picks up. It's clear that they like each other. Also, it obviously helps. They're in a new place. And being that they both went to high school together, they're from Miami. And they're young. And they're young. They started dating and ultimately...

Pedro found out, and it's clear that didn't sit well with him. Yeah, yeah. And then to the point that we made earlier, you know, you get jealousy and rage and all of that that just plays a part here. So tell us about this investigation. I mean, eventually he's charged.

in this murder. It's got to be painful for everybody involved. What leads up to the trial? What is that like, that period, like getting us to his trial? Yeah, so there was actually a two-year gap there. It wasn't until 2014 that this went to trial. But just going back to the investigation alone, seeing Pedro Bravo being interrogated by police, you just saw it unravel in real time. His story just never really added up. And then

It was one thing after another. He seemed to have an answer for everything. You could just tell he was very slippery having spoken with him in person. Yeah, he's good at lying.

Yeah. I want to get to that in a little bit too, because you did get to talk to him, but investigators could see that too. They could see right through it. You know, at first what he said was we got into an argument in the car that we were riding in together and Christian asked to be let out. So I just let him out. That's the last time I saw him. Then it evolves to, well, we got into a physical altercation and I left him on the side of the road and then I went straight home. Things aren't adding up here, especially because he kind of does it to himself. The timeline doesn't make sense. He says he went straight home.

He gave investigators the key to his car. Of course, police are going to comb through that vehicle. They found a receipt for McDonald's. In the middle of the night, long after Pedro Prover said he'd been home, again, he changes his story. He says, honestly, guys, I forgot. I'm sorry I didn't tell you about this. I took some sleeping pills and I was just a little out of it. I...

Sorry about that. It was just one thing after another. Yeah, and the inconsistency started to speak volumes to investigators. And then, before you know it, police charge Bravo with murder. Tell us about the results of his trial because...

As you said, it took a couple of years. Then Bravo is on trial in 2014. And he actually decides to testify in his own defense. Pretty risky move there. Shocking, yeah. So during that trial in 2014, Pedro testified that he and Christian did have an argument, but he denied killing his friend. He testified that he just left him on the side of the road after they fought.

Now, in August of 2014, a jury convicts Bravo of his charges. He was sentenced to life in prison without parole and tried appealing several times. All of those denied. Pedro's mother told me that, obviously, there's another family involved here, another set of parents. Of course. She took it incredibly hard and she started crying seeing what was happening to her son. Carlos Aguilar said that Pedro destroyed two families, his and ours, and nobody won that day.

Yeah. And these are young people. We have to remember college age people. We cover a lot of these stories where people are older or married couples and things have happened. They've got children. But in this case, these are young, young lives. Well, nearly a decade after the sentencing, you got a rare opportunity to actually speak with Pedro in prison and

We've all done these prison interviews before, but this one was really fascinating to watch. Absolutely. And actually, to prepare for this one, I went back to an old episode of 2020 and watched one of your prison interviews to see how this was done. Yeah. Well, it's kind of a little strange, isn't it? It is incredibly strange. Just get through the security process in the beginning, getting all your gear in, setting up for the interview.

And then you never know, will they already be in the room waiting for you? Or are they going to bring them in from somewhere else? It's just eerie to be in a prison in the first place. And you don't know what demeanor you're going to get from that person either. You don't know what you're going to get when you're sitting down across the, you know, away from a convicted murderer. And then for us, and this is, you know, really looking behind the curtain here, we want these people to open up to us. So it's a fine line, the delicate balance here that we have to take. But

When we got to that prison and went through the whole thing, Pedro Bravo was already waiting in that room for us. This was at the Okeechobee Correctional Facility in Florida. That's where he was serving his life sentence. And it was the first time in nearly a decade that he'd spoken about this case since he testified in his own defense. And what were your impressions when you first walked in and you saw him? He was silent. He didn't say a word to us. I also didn't want to go over there and introduce myself just yet. I wanted our crew to take a beat.

go ahead, set up, make sure that everything was okay, because you have a limited amount of time here. They're not going to, you know, they're on a pretty tight schedule. So we had in total an hour to get in, set up the interview, roll on the interview, and then break down and head out. What did he begin to tell you about not only the trial, but what happened? What surprised you? The way that he talked about Christian surprised me. It shouldn't have because of the amount of lies I've heard him tell, just digging deep in the story.

But he spoke so fondly of Christian about how close they were in high school and that he was very soft-spoken in it. You know, like he didn't appear to be very confident. At the same time, though, when I left that interview, I didn't come away thinking, oh, that's someone who was wrongly convicted. I didn't believe a word of it. You didn't believe his story? Not at all, because I pushed him on the lies. Granted, this is someone who's spoken to professional investigators here. This is someone who's

crafted and honed in these lies. He might have even believed them himself at some point. Who knows? But he didn't break character here. He stayed true to the story that he'd told all along for 10 years. And there was definitely a coldness in his eyes. He's also aged, you know? 10 years had passed here. You know, he was almost... He was clearly balding when we met him. It was a different person physically, but...

Yeah, yeah, yeah. You got some real impressions there, too. As you said, his stories kind of changed and they were all over the map. Yes, very clearly. And when he would talk about Christian, he would describe him as charismatic. He loved to laugh with him, how close they were. Pedro said that he was conflicted in high school, that he was starting to have some struggles there. He didn't really know what he wanted to do with his life. He talked to us about Erica. He described it as teen love, right?

He said that he was mad at Christian at first for dating his ex, Erica Freeman, mad that they kept it a secret from him. He talked about the changing storyline with investigators and how he allegedly punched Christian in the face. One quote that he told police was, I'm not used to talking to law enforcement. I was worn down by the interrogation. He couldn't keep things straight, Debra.

So those are Pedro's claims. And we knew that what was said at trial, that outcome differed from what it was said to us. Right. I also I asked him point blank, did you kill Christian? Pedro responds seemingly heartfelt answer. Right. We know what the truth is behind that. Yeah. Well, let's take a break. And next, we're going to talk about the scheme that authorities say Pedro used to try to get himself out of prison.

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Back now with ABC correspondent Victor Aquindo, who reported on this incredible story on Christian Aguilar as part of our recent 2020 episode. And you and the team include some fascinating updates from the years since all of this happened, since Pedro Bravo was sent to prison. And there are moments that I'd love for you to break down for us that we talked about in the report that you learned about two people involved in

a scheme essentially to try to get him out of prison. Right, so let's start with Michelangelo and yeah, that's his real name. That is kind of surprising. When I saw that I was like, okay, is that real? I know. Michelangelo meets Pedro while in jail. At some point, Michelangelo says that Pedro confesses everything to him, revealing details that only the killer would know. Angelo would later testify to this at Pedro's trial.

Pedro sentenced to life in prison. Again, all of those appeals are denied. Almost a decade passes with no movement on this case. But that changes in 2023. That's when Michelangelo recants that testimony that was so important at trial.

Also at that time, an alleged eyewitness, her name is Kelsey Edwards. She comes forward claiming that back in 2012, she saw Pedro and Christian's fight. And then she saw Christian walk away afterwards. Just bizarre. Something's not adding up here. Yeah. Yeah. Just bizarre. Well, investigators determined that Kelsey Edwards actually had kids with a man named Brandon Campbell. And Campbell, it turns out, was in prison for,

Pedro Bravo. And that's seemingly the connection between

Pedro and Kelsey, right? Putting it all together here. Authorities uncover communications. You have calls, you have messages, financial transactions between Pedro and Kelsey Edwards that show this scheme that would, you know, hopefully ultimately get Pedro out of prison. Kelsey says that Bravo paid her to provide false testimony. The state's attorney determines that Kelsey's affidavit and Michael's recantation are both false testimonies.

and part of an elaborate scheme that was orchestrated by Pedro himself. All of this from prison, by the way. Absolutely unbelievable. Well, your report included audio recordings from the investigation. So let's take a listen to an excerpt from Florida State Attorney Brian Kramer's conversation with Kelsey Edwards, where she talks about Pedro communicating with her. Now, when you first started talking to Bravo, when he first reaches out to you and you guys have your conversation,

Does he now start to communicate with you outside of Brandon, knowing about it? Yeah. Now it's just kind of you and him talking. I mean, you might talk to Brandon here and there, but primarily all this stuff is now just you and Bravo? Yes. And based on what you said, you feel like he was trying to have, like, a personal relationship with you? Yes. And then, like, I feel like he purposely sought me out because...

Like he said, in the original case, there was a witness or somebody who said there was a young female also in the vicinity that could have seen something. And he said that the physical description fit the way I looked. And Brandon had pictures of me with our kids on his Facebook page.

Just so you know, that's all untrue. What? Everything you just said. Oh, I'm sure it is. Oh, I'm sure it is. By the way, we should point out that Brandon Campbell was never charged and authorities told us that he cooperated fully with this investigation. That's one of those, we're sitting here shaking our heads just even listening to that. Imagine what it was like for investigators digging deep, putting all of that together, trying to figure out the connection between these two. Now, Kelsey Edwards, she would plead guilty to fraud.

uh michelangelo pleaded guilty to perjury for his false recantation bravo is charged with racketeering conspiracy to commit perjury perjury in a capital proceeding and witness tampering in a capital proceeding so big picture though those recordings

They show that personality shift that we saw in Pedro. In our interviews, Pedro said he was scared, right? Well, the cops see the other side. Here in those messages, he's more controlling. Calculating. He's more direct. I guess it's that old adage, cameras never lie. Yeah, yeah, absolutely. Well, you know, I mean, we heard again in that clip that investigators found an admission from Pedro about Christian.

WhatsApp messages that Pedro sent to Kelsey from prison. He was able to communicate so frequently, concoct this kind of scheme from prison while locked up, sentenced to life. It's wild. He admits that he killed Christian.

Though this latest admission differs from what authorities allege that trial Pedro still claims. Okay. That it was a spontaneous fight that led Christian to dying in his car. And then he buried him. Authorities suggest that at trial, it was something more deliberate that Pedro had planned in advance. This is a version Pedro claims is true, but at least he's finally admitting he did kill Christian. Uh, the outcome though, and this was the,

Final chapter of this very long story. Pedro kills himself. He was found to have died by suicide in prison in March of 2025. Age 31. Wow.

Wow. So this story, the tragedy just continued even years later and even in prison. What do we know about Christian Aguilar's loved ones today? How are they doing? I don't know how you ever get over the loss of a son, especially they were so close. They were clearly so proud of him. His parents loved him. His brother, who I interviewed as well, they were very, very close. The University of Florida honored Christian with a posthumous degree in biomedical engineering. That's what he wanted to do. He

After Pedro Bravo's death, Christian's father, Carlos, actually posted a note of condolence on Facebook to Pedro's parents, saying that no parent should go through the pain of losing a child. Christian's parents showed me mementos that they've been able to keep. That family's still hurting. Can't forget Christian's brother, Alex, talking to us about he and his family. They showed up every single day at Pedro's trial. They carried on for Christian since he didn't have a voice anymore. Christian's brother, Alex, said,

guess which college he decided to attend. University of Florida. There it is. Yeah, just to kind of follow in his brother's footsteps. I mean, what a tragedy on two levels, as you said, two families.

Devastated in this case. I know it was a hard one to report. And, Victor, I know for me, oftentimes when I'm covering these stories, particularly when it's somebody young, it really kind of gets you in the gut. So I know this is one that's probably going to stick with you for a while. Absolutely. And I had friends that went to their high school. I had a lot of friends that went to the University of Florida. These are places I knew well. Mm-hmm.

So this one definitely hit home. Yeah, it definitely did. Well, your reporting was just absolutely excellent. And you brought it back to us and updated us. And as always, it's so great to see you. We don't see enough of each other. I'll come back more often. Yeah, let's do that. Well, thank you. We appreciate you bringing the latest in this case for us on 2020. We also want to note that if you are struggling with thoughts of suicide or worried about a friend or loved one,

Call or text the Suicide and Crisis Lifeline at 988 for free and confidential emotional support 24 hours a day, seven days a week. Thanks so much for joining me for this after show episode and on Friday nights for 2020 on ABC. The 2020 After Show is produced by Amira Williams and Sasha Oslanian with Joseph Diaz, Jeff Schneider, Mike Schultz, Brian Mazursky and Alex Berenfeld of 2020.

Theme music by Evan Viola. Janice Johnston is the executive producer of 2020. Josh Cohen, the director of podcasting at ABC Audio. Laura Mayer is the executive producer. Hello, it's Robin Roberts here. Hey guys, it's George Stephanopoulos here. Hey everybody, it's Michael Strahan here. Wake up with Good Morning America. Robin, George, Michael, GMA, America's favorite number one morning show.

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