HARRIS COUNTY, TEXAS: Joey Leos Sanchez, a 49-year-old man from Texas has admitted to murdering his estranged wife with an "unknown object" five years after she was reported missing without a trace.
His admission has provided investigators with the information required to locate her body as he has pointed them to where her remains could be, reports Law and Crime.
Who was Jennifer Sanchez?
Jennifer Sanchez, a 39-year-old woman was last seen alive on September 7, 2018. Her estranged husband Joey was initially charged with capital murder after her disappearance.
From the initial phase of the investigation, Harris County authorities suspected that he intentionally killed her "while in the course of committing and attempting to commit retaliation" against her.
Jennifer's aunt Yvonne said that the suspect was a "very violent person" and added that the duo were still married at the time of her death.
She had sought a restraining order against Joey, indicating a history of domestic violence.
Joey Sanchez had a violent past
The suspect had a violent past as the charging documents showed the defendant's 1996 conviction of aggravated assault with a deadly weapon.
He is also a convicted sex offender who had served a significant time in prison for the aggravated sexual assault of a 14-year-old girl in the mid-nineties, according to the Texas Department of Public Safety records.
What are the charges against Joey Sanchez?
Joey "pleaded true" to first-degree murder in the death of his estranged wife. On Monday, October 9, he was sentenced to serve five decades in prison in the custody of the Texas Department of Criminal Justice.
While the court filings confirmed the use of a deadly weapon to kill the victim, the weapon was not a firearm. Instead, it was an "unknown object" that was used to perpetrate the crime.
Joey claimed that he strangled his estranged wife after he hit her estranged wife with a beer bottle, reported Local CBS affiliate KHOU.
He also disclosed that he discarded Jennifer's remains in Galveston.
Speaking to KHOU, Jennifer's mother Ofelia Gomez said, "We don’t know if it’s the truth. If he did throw her in the ocean, it’s just a pinpoint."
"He said that he strangled her with his hands and hit her with a beet bottle and he cut her in the temple," she continued.
"She never got to see her grandbabies. One of them is so much like her," Gomez added.
