AKRON, Ohio — New details were revealed in court Thursday in the trial against Elias Gudino, who is accused of kidnapping and killing three men and attempting to kill a fourth man in Summit County last year.
Cruz and Gudino married in 2019 but separated in 2021, when she moved from Summit County to Youngstown with her three older children from a previous relationship. Through an interpreter she testified she had filed for divorce but then canceled “because [Gudino] said he was harming me and was going to harm my children.”
On March 9, Gudino is accused of tying up the four roommates who were at the house and holding them at gunpoint. Prosecutors say Gudino made them text Mendez to lure him to the house. Mendez testified he came with one of Gudino’s older sons, looked in the window and when no one let him in, they left.
The next morning, he saw a text message from his cousin, who was one of the kidnapped victims who was killed.
“The first message said, ‘its very good you didn’t come in the house cousin because you and Rigoberto would have been killed’,” Mendez testified through an interpreter. “The last message said if you don’t leave there…we’re going to come for you.”
Mendez testified he left Cruz’s house when he saw those messages and never went back and never attempted to make contact with Cruz again. Gudino’s attorneys pushed back on the fact that Mendez broke his own phone before he reached out to police. They argue Mendez was trying to hide information. But Mendez testified he did it “because I was afraid they were going to track me down.”
Homeland Security Agent testifies
When the bodies were found on March 10, 2023, their hands were tied, their mouths duct taped and the gang “MS13” was written on their chests. That prompted police to quickly reached out to the Department of Homeland Security to help investigate.
Special agent Adam Gallegos was on the scene in Copley within hours after the bodies were found. He helped interview the surviving victim, Oscar Mejia-Gomez, and was with him at a gas station on March 10, when Gomez spotted Elias Gudino.
“The victim began to shake—to visibly shake,” Gallegos testified. “He said, ‘that’s him. That is the man that killed Domingo. He’s walking inside the gas station.’”
Defense attorneys argue Gudino is a victim—that the cartel he was involved with earlier in life threatened to kill his family if he didn’t play a part in the kidnapping and murders. Agent Gallegos said he investigated those claims at the time and investigated whether any of the victims or Mendez, the intended target, had any connection to the cartel.
“You’re saying today there is no connection between victims and transnational organized crime?,” prosecutors asked.
“That’s correct,” Gallegos responded.
Defense attorney pushed back on Gallegos and again he responded, “To date I have found no cartel involvement as a motive for these murders.”
Defense attorneys also accused Gallegos of being an advocate on the stand instead of a witness and questioning his investigation of Mendez—the intended target. Gallegos confirmed that Mendez, who is from Honduras and entered the country illegally, has received and “immigration benefit” that has allowed him to remain in the country legally due to his involvement in the investigation. But Gallegos denied that promising him benefits if he cooperated with the investigation.
Destroying the phone
Samir Abdelqader, a former friend and business neighbor of Gudino also took the stand Thursday. He testified that the morning of March 10—the morning after the murders—Gudino showed up at his tire shop shortly after he arrived. Abdelqader said he watched as Gudino grabbed a hammer from his shop and smashed his own phone and then threw it away.
Abdelqader, who didn’t want to show his face in court, said he went to lunch with Gudino later that day and the conversation turned to the news of the day—two bodies found in Akron and another found in Copley on the side of the road.
Abdelqader reached out to a friend at the police department to report the smashed phone. A sim card was also recovered. Later that day, Gudino was spotted by the surviving victim at the gas station.