The Prosecutor's office opened the file on the murder case involving U.S. citizen Carla Stefaniack who was killed in Nov. 28th. Her body was found on December 3 in a wooded area near the hotel in Escazu* where she had been staying.

The opening of the evidentiary file occurred in the Pavas Criminal Court* in the presence of the lawyers of the victim's family Jose Rivera and David Hernández. Also attending were specialists in Computer Forensics and the suspect of the crime, surnamed Espinoza-Martínez.

After attending the opening of the case, attorney David Hernandez said that among the evidence included was the suspect's cell phone where lawyers will have access to see a file of "photos, recorded messages, written messages and videos."

The man suspected of the crime is a Nicaraguan national who was the security guard at the hotel. According to the prosecution’s thesis, the motive for the murder was a sexual attack. Espinoza is in six months pre-trial detention.

According to the declaration of the only suspect, Espinoza-Martínez, the hotel where Ms Stefaniak stayed was a clandestine meeting place for guests who wanted to use drugs and perform sexual acts. 

"Already working for them, being a clandestine hotel not registered, they already had 5 years of working like that (referring to clandestine place). I observed deplorable sexual acts and drug use, but as they had told me about the privacy, I did not comment, I just watched and kept quiet, even the owners felt the smell of marijuana or any drug, or the immoral acts of the guests in each apartment and it was normal for them (referring to the owners of the hotel)."

In his defense, Espinoza-Martínez said that it was physically impossible for him to have killed the victim and then taken the body to where she was buried.

"I reiterate that I never had any sexual contact with the girl nor did I ever have any intention of sexually assaulting or raping her. The day the offended woman entered at the apartments, I saw that she arrived and that the other hotel staffer received her. The offended is a little taller than me, her weight calculated that about 90 kilos, at first glance she looked big, obviously with those characteristics it is impossible for me to have dragged her to another place, to me it seems that they were other people, for my physic is not possible that I did it. It seems to me that other people participated, because of the cuts and other wounds appear on her body."

The attorneys for the victim's family will make an analysis of the evidence that was collected by the judicial agents as provided for by standard procedure.

Carlos Caicedo, Ms Stefaniak's father, held a press conference in December 2018 when he was in Costa Rica, where he said that he hopes that justice will be done and that those responsible for the murder will be punished.