SAN DIEGO — A preliminary hearing began Tuesday morning for a former Marine accused of murdering his girlfriend back in 2016 and fleeing the country until his capture six years later.
41-year-old Raymond McLeod was caught in El Salvador in 2022. He was once named one of the most wanted fugitives in the country.
Prosecutors say McLeod murdered 30-year-old Krystal Mitchell during a trip to San Diego from Phoenix. The couple was visiting friends in San Diego.
On the night of her death, Mitchell and McLeod went to a neighborhood bar for drinks.
Inside the bar, a drunken McLeod slapped Mitchell. When a bar patron tried to intervene, McLeod, an avid bodybuilder, got into a fight with him.
Shortly after the fight, the couple went to the apartment on the 7600 block of Mission Gorge.
Mitchell was found strangled and beaten to death inside the apartment the following day. Detectives discovered a trail of blood from the elevator to the apartment door.
McLeod was nowhere to be found.
Detectives later learned he left the apartment and rented a car at the San Diego Airport.
He placed a phone call to his ex-wife telling her that he would not be able to make their son's birthday party.
Mitchell's mother, Josephine Wentzel, spent the next six years tracking the former Marine through South America.
On August 30, 2022, authorities arrested McLeod in Sonsonate, El Salvador, and extradited him to the US to stand trial for Mitchell's murder.
During Tuesday's hearing, the defense asked the judge for permission to allow different witness statements to be admitted in as evidence.
One of McLeod's defense attorneys read written statements from women who claimed to have had sexual encounters with McLeod.
The women were identified by their initials.
"[J.H.] stated he was never violent toward her while simultaneously detailing their extremely aggressive sexual practices. There were certain things we liked to do, according to J.H., choking was not a problem with me. He knew we had limits. When I told him to stop he would stop immediately. We were kind of into the whole bondage thing," read McLeod's defense attorney.
The prosecution argued against the statements being allowed in as evidence.
"Bringing in a character witness to talk about the facts of their circumstances, sex-related or not is limited," argued Deputy District Attorney Franciesca Balerio. "We're talking about relationships that have been going back and forth, which is consistently different than what the facts are in this particular case."
This hearing is expected to last three days. When it's over the judge will determine if there's enough evidence to send this case to trial.