A California woman was gunned down outside a hamburger restaurant, and her estranged husband is accused, along with four other men, of targeting her in a murder-for-hire plot stemming from the couple’s “contentious” divorce.
Sergio Reveles, 53, Reynaldo Ruelas, 37, Arnoldo Ruelas, 54, Gerardo Llamas, 31, and Juan Perez, 42, are charged with the murder of Reveles’ wife, Yesenia Torres, 44, police said.
Torres was shot on January 10th outside the Burger Point restaurant at 444 W. Mill Street is in San Bernardino, more than 60 miles east of Los Angeles.
Surveillance footage captures the moments leading up to the attack, including Torres walking to her Mercedes SUV and a vehicle approaching behind her.
A passenger, identified as Llamas, approaches her and appears to attempt to take her purse. Torres fights back. A struggle ensues. A passerby tries to intervene but flees when Llamas appears and points the weapon at him.
Torres flees her vehicle as Llamas allegedly points the weapon, which appears to have a silencer attached, at her before allegedly shooting her as she runs for the restaurant’s door.
Police reported that nine shots were fired. Llamas then allegedly gets into a waiting getaway vehicle and drives away.
Torres was discovered dead by paramedics at the restaurant’s doorway.
Hours later, police discovered the suspects’ getaway vehicle in a Walmart parking lot, leading to the arrests of the five suspects over the next several weeks in raids across Southern California, where hundreds of thousands of dollars were also seized.
In a press conference announcing the charges, San Bernardino authorities stated that the plot was staged to appear to be a robbery.
However, investigators discovered that it was allegedly the result of a “contentious” divorce between Reveles and Torres after linking the suspects to the victim via a pallet business owned by the former couple.
The two owned commercial real estate and shared millions of dollars in assets, said San Bernardino Police Department Detective Dominick Martinez .
The suspects stalked the victim for several months before the murder and from her home to the restaurant the day she was killed, Martinez said.
The suspects are each charged with one count of murder with special circumstances, which includes lying in wait, financial gain, and a crime committed during the commission of a robbery.
Local Fox affiliate KTTV shared clips from Torres’ TikTok account in which she discussed the importance of community involvement. According to San Bernardino Police Chief Darren Goodman, Torres is a good citizen.
“She was well-known and well-respected by many throughout the community,” he informed me. “She was very civically engaged and supported numerous endeavours throughout the city.”
The suspects are scheduled to appear in court on March 14.
