A 19-year-old girl was killed by an amateur killer, whom she found on an ad
22-year-old Joseph Lopez (Joseph Lopez) will spend the next 48 years of his life behind bars on a charge of murder in the 2nd degree. It would seem to be an ordinary case with which American justice deals on a daily basis, if not for one detail — the victim hired her killer herself.
Lopez's victim was 19-year-old Natalie Bollinger. On December 28, 2017, the girl left the house and disappeared, and a day later her corpse was found outside the city with a gunshot wound to the head. In addition, it turned out that at the time of her death, Bollinger was under the influence of drugs — an almost lethal dose of heroin was found in her blood.
The killer was found a month later, having tracked the correspondence found in the deceased's phone. It turned out to be a young guy — Joseph Lopez. In the man's phone, the police found a lot of messages sent to Natalie Bollinger on the day of the murder.
Lopez told investigators that he met Natalie on the Craigslist classifieds site. According to the guy, the girl offered him to kill himself, promising a reward for it. For the first time they met on the day of the murder — Lopez stopped by for his victim, and they discussed the operation in detail, and also agreed on a reward.
After that, the customer and the killer went out of town, where Lopez fired a fatal shot at the girl's head from behind from a pistol belonging to her. According to the killer, along the way he actively dissuaded Natalie from a rash step, but did not succeed in this. The girl was very worried about her breakup with the guy and was firm in her intention to die.
At the first interrogation, Joseph tried to convince the investigation that he refused to fulfill the order, dropped Bollinger out of the car on the way and left. But the GPS data presented by the police, indicating that he was at the murder scene, forced him to tell the truth.
According to the detainee's story, when he and Natalie arrived at the place chosen for the murder, both knelt and prayed, and then Lopez got up and, closing his eyes, shot the girl in the head.
This is how judicial analyst and lawyer David Beller commented on the unusual situation.
During the investigation, the police talked with relatives and friends of the victim, whose opinions were divided. Some claimed that the girl was constantly haunted by suicidal thoughts, while others were sure that she was enjoying life and was not going to die.
We can say that Joseph Lopez was very lucky that he got off with 48 years in prison, since he could well have been awarded a life sentence. However, experts believe that it is too early to put an end to the case, since the father of the murdered woman is dissatisfied with the verdict and is going to appeal it.
The father of the deceased tried to challenge the court's decision, but so far his petition has been rejected.