Olympic boxer Félix Verdejo Sánchez has been found guilty of kidnapping and killing his pregnant girlfriend nearly two years after Keishla Rodríguez Ortiz’s body was found in a lagoon.
A jury issued a verdict on Friday after the one-month trial of the former athlete who competed for Puerto Rico in the 2012 Olympic Games in London. The jury consisted of three men and nine women, according to The Washington Post.
Olympic Boxer Félix Verdejo Accused of Killing Pregnant Girlfriend, Who Was Found Dead in Lagoon
Verdejo, 30, was charged with kidnapping resulting in death, carjacking resulting in death, intentionally killing an unborn child, and possession of a weapon during a violent crime after Rodríguez Ortiz was found in a lagoon in San Juan.
The trial was held in the U.S. District Court of Puerto Rico and ended with Verdejo guilty of kidnapping resulting in death and causing the death of an unborn child, The Washington Post reports. While a verdict could not be reached on the other two charges, Verdejo’s sentencing is scheduled for Nov. 3.
A lawyer for Verdejo declined to comment when reached by PEOPLE on Friday night.
Ramon ” Tonito ” Zayas/GDA via AP
“May he live the rest of his life thinking about everything he did to my daughter,” Rodríguez’s father José Antonio Rodríguez said while speaking with reporters after the verdict, per Telemundo Puerto Rico. In a conversation with the local newspaper El Nuevo Día, he added that “the truth always prevails.”
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“I do not wish him death,” he said. “I wish him good health and that he can last as long as he can last. If he wants to last 200 years, let him last, but that he remembers what he did to my daughter, always.”
Rodríguez Ortiz’s death sparked protests across the island over the treatment of women and led Gov. Pedro Pierluisi to declare a state of emergency for gender violence in Puerto Rico, drawing attention to what he described as “the consequences of systematic machismo, inequity, discrimination, lack of education, lack of guidance and above all, lack of action.”
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“Gender violence is a social evil, based on ignorance and attitudes that cannot have space or tolerance in the Puerto Rico that we aspire to,” he said in a news release, per ABC News. “It is my duty and my commitment as governor to establish a STOP to gender violence and for these purposes, I have declared a state of emergency.”
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Source: HIS Education