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Hell and Gone Murder Line: Anna Laura Costa Porsborg · Hell and Gone: Murder Line

• 0:46
  Speaker 1: School of Humans.
• 0:49
  Speaker 2: Helen Got Murder Line actively investigates cold case murders in
• 0:53
  Speaker 2: an effort to raise public awareness invite witnesses to come
• 0:56
  Speaker 2: forward and present evidence that could potentially be further investigated
• 1:00
  Speaker 2: by law enforcement. While we value insights from family and
• 1:03
  Speaker 2: community members, their statements should not be considered evidence and
• 1:07
  Speaker 2: point to the challenges of verifying facts inherent in cold cases.
• 1:12
  Speaker 2: We remind listeners that everyone is presumed innocent until proven
• 1:15
  Speaker 2: guilty in a court of law. Nothing in the podcast
• 1:19
  Speaker 2: is intended to state or imply that anyone who has
• 1:22
  Speaker 2: not been convicted of a crime is guilty of any wrongdoing.
• 1:26
  Speaker 2: Thanks for listening.
• 1:31
  Speaker 3: It was December twenty eighth, twenty twenty two, a few
• 1:34
  Speaker 3: days after Christmas, and Urbina Costa was beginning to get
• 1:38
  Speaker 3: seriously worried about her daughter, Twenty two year old Anna
• 1:41
  Speaker 3: Laura Costa Porsberg on a in the military, and before Christmas,
• 1:45
  Speaker 3: she had gone on leave and headed out on a
• 1:47
  Speaker 3: vacation in Los Angeles with her boyfriend, thirty six.
• 1:50
  Speaker 1: Year old Luis Gomez. A kay.
• 1:54
  Speaker 3: For Anna, this had been a dream trip because she
• 1:56
  Speaker 3: had always wanted to go to Los Angeles. Anna had
• 1:59
  Speaker 3: grown up in northern Brazil, but she had fallen in
• 2:02
  Speaker 3: love with the US as a teenager, so once she
• 2:05
  Speaker 3: finally got to the West Coast, she wanted to see Hollywood,
• 2:08
  Speaker 3: Beverly Hills, the Walk of Fame, all the places.
• 2:11
  Speaker 1: She had seen in the movies.
• 2:13
  Speaker 3: Anna and Urbina were very close and normally spoke several
• 2:17
  Speaker 3: times a day, and for the first few days of
• 2:19
  Speaker 3: Anna's West Coast trip that pattern continued. Anna was sending
• 2:24
  Speaker 3: her mom pictures and texts and updates about what she
• 2:27
  Speaker 3: and Luis were doing and where they were planning on
• 2:29
  Speaker 3: going next. Then on December twenty.
• 2:32
  Speaker 1: Eighth, that stopped.
• 2:34
  Speaker 3: Urbina didn't hear anything from her daughter, no calls, no texts, nothing,
• 2:39
  Speaker 3: and then Anna stopped responding to Urbina's calls and texts.
• 2:43
  Speaker 3: At first, she tried not to panic. She told herself
• 2:47
  Speaker 3: her daughter was a grown woman and Anna was on vacation,
• 2:51
  Speaker 3: But after a full twenty four hours, Urbina knew that
• 2:54
  Speaker 3: something was wrong. Urbina was nervous about Anna's new boyfriend, Luis.
• 3:00
  Speaker 3: There were things about her daughter's relationship with Louise that
• 3:03
  Speaker 3: had her concern, like the fact that Louise was so
• 3:06
  Speaker 3: much older than Anna, almost fifteen years and that their
• 3:10
  Speaker 3: relationship had moved so quickly. Urbina told the Los Angeles
• 3:15
  Speaker 3: Times that she had conveyed some of her concerns to
• 3:18
  Speaker 3: her daughter, but like a lot of young people in love,
• 3:21
  Speaker 3: Anna kind of blew her off. Urbina was in Brazil,
• 3:25
  Speaker 3: thousands of miles from La so she contacted the police there,
• 3:29
  Speaker 3: and Brazilian authorities then reached out to the FBI in
• 3:32
  Speaker 3: Los Angeles, and soon investigators in California began trying to
• 3:37
  Speaker 3: reconstruct the final days of Anna. Laura Costa Porsburg's Christmas
• 3:42
  Speaker 3: vacation started out in sunny Hollywood ended with a body
• 3:47
  Speaker 3: and a suitcase.
• 3:49
  Speaker 1: I'm Catherine Townsend.
• 3:51
  Speaker 3: Over the past eight years of making my true crime podcast,
• 3:54
  Speaker 3: Helen Gone, I've learned that there is no such thing
• 3:56
  Speaker 3: as a small town or any community where murder never happens.
• 4:01
  Speaker 3: I've received hundreds of messages from people all around the
• 4:03
  Speaker 3: country asking for help with an unsolved murder or disappearance
• 4:07
  Speaker 3: that has affected them, their families, and their communities. If
• 4:11
  Speaker 3: you have a case you'd like me and my team
• 4:13
  Speaker 3: to look into, you can reach us through the Helen
• 4:15
  Speaker 3: Gone Murder Line at six seven eight seven four four
• 4:18
  Speaker 3: six one four five. That's six seven eight seven four
• 4:21
  Speaker 3: four six one four five. Or you can send us
• 4:25
  Speaker 3: a message on Instagram at Hell and gonepod. This is
• 4:29
  Speaker 3: Helen Gone Murder Line. Anna Laura Costa Porsburg was born
• 5:18
  Speaker 3: and raised in Santahan in the northern Brazilian state of Para.
• 5:24
  Speaker 3: Long before she vanished in Los Angeles, Anna had imagined
• 5:27
  Speaker 3: building a life in the United States. During her senior
• 5:31
  Speaker 3: year of high school, Anna came to Massachusetts as an
• 5:34
  Speaker 3: exchange student. She went to a school called Everett, where
• 5:36
  Speaker 3: she played basketball and became a cheerleader. Anna came from
• 5:40
  Speaker 3: a humble background in Brazil, so this opened up a
• 5:44
  Speaker 3: new world for her. According to her mother, Anna loved
• 5:47
  Speaker 3: being there at that school. She said the experience completely
• 5:51
  Speaker 3: changed the direction of her daughter's life, because after returning
• 5:55
  Speaker 3: to Brazil, Anna decided she wanted to move to the
• 5:58
  Speaker 3: US permanently. Anna enrolled at Johnson and Wales University in Providence,
• 6:04
  Speaker 3: Rhode Island, where she studied business administration and marketing. While
• 6:09
  Speaker 3: Anna was in college, she met the man she would
• 6:11
  Speaker 3: eventually marry. Now very little has been publicly reported about
• 6:15
  Speaker 3: Anna's husband. He's been described as someone she met while
• 6:19
  Speaker 3: attending college. We don't know anything about the status of
• 6:22
  Speaker 3: their relationship in twenty twenty one and twenty twenty two.
• 6:26
  Speaker 3: I should also say there has been no indication anywhere
• 6:29
  Speaker 3: that he was ever considered a suspect in Anna's disappearance.
• 6:33
  Speaker 3: In fact, very little has been written about Honna. One
• 6:37
  Speaker 3: of the reasons why I wanted to cover this case
• 6:39
  Speaker 3: was because I was shocked that there were so few
• 6:41
  Speaker 3: headlines about it. Los Angeles Magazine's website pointed out they
• 6:45
  Speaker 3: were the only news outlet at the time to cover
• 6:48
  Speaker 3: this story, even though the website pointed out Anna disappeared
• 6:52
  Speaker 3: at around the same time as another Ana.
• 6:54
  Speaker 1: Anna Walsh.
• 6:56
  Speaker 3: Anna Walsh was a Serbian immigrant married to a rich
• 6:59
  Speaker 3: guy living in Massachusetts, and the Anna Walsh case made
• 7:02
  Speaker 3: national news. I actually covered the Anna Walsh case because
• 7:06
  Speaker 3: it involved financial fraud on my other podcast, Red Collar.
• 7:10
  Speaker 3: Anna Walsh was everywhere, while when Anacosta, who was from
• 7:14
  Speaker 3: much humbler circumstances in Brazil, vanished, her disappearance largely flew
• 7:20
  Speaker 3: under the radar. After graduation, Anacosta held different jobs, including
• 7:25
  Speaker 3: working for Abercrombie and Fitch in New Jersey and Enterprise
• 7:28
  Speaker 3: were in a car in Rhode Island. Anna already had
• 7:31
  Speaker 3: a green card, but she believed that joining the United
• 7:33
  Speaker 3: States military could be her ticket to building the life
• 7:37
  Speaker 3: she wanted because she saw a path to citizenship. When
• 7:41
  Speaker 3: Anna announced that she intended to enlist, or Beina told
• 7:44
  Speaker 3: the La Times she was surprised because, in her opinion,
• 7:47
  Speaker 3: her daughter didn't fit the image of what she believed
• 7:50
  Speaker 3: a soldier would be. For example, Urbina said Anna always
• 7:53
  Speaker 3: had perfect hair and perfect makeup.
• 7:55
  Speaker 1: She was a girly girl.
• 7:57
  Speaker 3: But in the summer of twenty twenty two, Anna reported
• 8:00
  Speaker 3: for basic training at Fort Jackson, South Carolina. This involved
• 8:03
  Speaker 3: running miles with a heavy pack, learning to throw a grenade,
• 8:06
  Speaker 3: learning to shoot, all the hardcore stuff you go through
• 8:10
  Speaker 3: during military training. After basic training, in November twenty twenty two,
• 8:15
  Speaker 3: Anna was assigned to a base in Virginia. Now at
• 8:18
  Speaker 3: this point, her husband, who she'd met at university, was
• 8:21
  Speaker 3: reportedly still living in Rhode Island. Anna had family on
• 8:25
  Speaker 3: the East Coast, including a cousin in Elizabeth, New Jersey.
• 8:29
  Speaker 3: Anna was visiting one of her New Jersey cousins when
• 8:32
  Speaker 3: she was introduced to one of his roommates, who was
• 8:35
  Speaker 3: renting out the cousin's basement. This man was Louis Antonio
• 8:39
  Speaker 3: Gomez a Kay. Even though Louis was almost fifty ten
• 8:44
  Speaker 3: years older than Anna, they did have things in common.
• 8:47
  Speaker 3: They had a shared background, they were both Brazilian, and
• 8:49
  Speaker 3: they bonded quickly. The relationship appears to have moved fast.
• 8:54
  Speaker 3: Louise took Anna skydiving, and he traveled with her to
• 8:57
  Speaker 3: Las Vegas to celebrate her twenty first birthday. Anna told
• 9:01
  Speaker 3: her mother that she was attracted to the fact that
• 9:04
  Speaker 3: Louise seemed more independent than the guy she was used to.
• 9:07
  Speaker 3: She described him as someone who was his own man.
• 9:11
  Speaker 3: But when Urbina met Louise, she was uncomfortable, and she
• 9:15
  Speaker 3: told the La Times. She was also worried for her
• 9:17
  Speaker 3: daughter because she told the La Times, Anna was still
• 9:21
  Speaker 3: married and neither man in Anna's life knew about the
• 9:24
  Speaker 3: other one. So Louise did not know that Anna was married,
• 9:28
  Speaker 3: and Anna's husband did not know about Louise. Arbina worried
• 9:32
  Speaker 3: about what could happen if either relationship was exposed. Urbina
• 9:46
  Speaker 3: told Anna that she believed that Anna's husband would be
• 9:50
  Speaker 3: devastated if he discovered the affair, but she did not
• 9:53
  Speaker 3: think he would react violently. She was less certain about Louise.
• 9:57
  Speaker 3: Arbina warned her daughter that she did not know what
• 10:00
  Speaker 3: Louise might do if he discovered that she had a husband.
• 10:05
  Speaker 3: Anna told her mother to relax. She said Louise would
• 10:09
  Speaker 3: never find out, and for a while, it seems as
• 10:12
  Speaker 3: though she was right. Louise and Anna continued to communicate
• 10:16
  Speaker 3: throughout twenty twenty two. They made plans to get together.
• 10:20
  Speaker 3: Anna called her mother and told her that she and
• 10:23
  Speaker 3: Louise were going on this dream vacation to Los Angeles.
• 10:27
  Speaker 3: Anna met up with Louise in Newark, and on Christmas Eve,
• 10:30
  Speaker 3: December twenty fourth, twenty twenty two, she and Louise flew
• 10:34
  Speaker 3: from Newark to Los Angeles. They checked into the Double
• 10:38
  Speaker 3: Tree by Hilton Hotel in El Segundo, a neighborhood in
• 10:41
  Speaker 3: South Los Angeles near lax. They wheeled three suitcases into
• 10:46
  Speaker 3: the hotel, one of those being a large blue suitcase,
• 10:50
  Speaker 3: and checked into Rooms six thirty eight. Over the next
• 10:54
  Speaker 3: several days, they visited tourist destinations throughout the Los Angeles area.
• 10:58
  Speaker 3: During that time, Anna stayed in contact with her mother,
• 11:02
  Speaker 3: and the trip appeared to be going well. Then, on
• 11:05
  Speaker 3: the evening of December twenty seventh, Anna and Louise went
• 11:09
  Speaker 3: to a bowling alley. According to the account Louise would
• 11:12
  Speaker 3: later give investigators, they went bowling, played pool, and had
• 11:15
  Speaker 3: several drinks, and then they went back to their hotel
• 11:18
  Speaker 3: at around nine thirty pm. That was the last time
• 11:22
  Speaker 3: that anyone in Anna's family heard from her. When Anna disappeared,
• 11:28
  Speaker 3: they had to start with the person they knew she
• 11:30
  Speaker 3: had been with, Louise. On New Year's Eve, Detective Jeremy
• 11:33
  Speaker 3: Glunt of the El Segundo Police Department went to the
• 11:36
  Speaker 3: Double Tree with his partner and knocked on the door
• 11:39
  Speaker 3: of Room six thirty eight. Louise answered and allowed the
• 11:42
  Speaker 3: detectives to come in side. There was no sign of Honna,
• 11:46
  Speaker 3: but detectives noticed that all of her belongings were still there.
• 11:50
  Speaker 3: Her clothing was hanging in the room and her toiletries
• 11:53
  Speaker 3: were in the bathroom, so her possessions had not been
• 11:56
  Speaker 3: packed up and removed, as if she had made a
• 11:58
  Speaker 3: deliberate decision to leave Los Angeles, and from what Anna's
• 12:02
  Speaker 3: mother said, Anna was not the type of girl to
• 12:05
  Speaker 3: leave her hair brush and toiletries and her nice clothes behind.
• 12:09
  Speaker 3: Detective Glint later testified he also noticed something else, something
• 12:13
  Speaker 3: that to him was a red flag, a strong smell
• 12:16
  Speaker 3: of urine inside that room. The officers continued talking to
• 12:21
  Speaker 3: Louise for almost four hours. Louise repeated the same story.
• 12:25
  Speaker 3: Anna was angry about his phone, she broke up with him.
• 12:28
  Speaker 3: She walked out on him, and told him not to
• 12:30
  Speaker 3: contact her again. The detectives asked Louise what he had
• 12:34
  Speaker 3: been doing in the four days since she left. He
• 12:37
  Speaker 3: told them that after Anna left town, he went to
• 12:40
  Speaker 3: the Angelus National Forest to look for her. This was
• 12:43
  Speaker 3: another red flag because the Angelus National Forest is a
• 12:46
  Speaker 3: vast wilderness area north and northeast of Los Angeles. It's
• 12:50
  Speaker 3: made up of mountains, remote roads, ravines, canyons, and heavily
• 12:54
  Speaker 3: wooded terrain. There was no obvious reason to believe that
• 12:58
  Speaker 3: Anna would leave an airport hotel and somehow end up
• 13:01
  Speaker 3: in that forest. Louise said he had an explanation. He
• 13:06
  Speaker 3: claimed that he and Anna had planned to go hiking
• 13:09
  Speaker 3: in the Angelus National Forest on December twenty eighth. He
• 13:13
  Speaker 3: said they had made an itinerary and that that outing
• 13:16
  Speaker 3: was listed in the itinerary they had created.
• 13:18
  Speaker 1: Before their trip.
• 13:20
  Speaker 3: His suggestion was that Anna might have decided to follow
• 13:22
  Speaker 3: their original plan even after breaking up with him and
• 13:25
  Speaker 3: walking out.
• 13:25
  Speaker 1: Of the hotel.
• 13:27
  Speaker 3: Meanwhile, Urbina on his mother, told the La Times she
• 13:31
  Speaker 3: never bought Louise's story. She said, even if her daughter
• 13:34
  Speaker 3: did walk out on Louise, Orbina knew she wouldn't walk
• 13:38
  Speaker 3: out in her whole life and drop off the radar
• 13:40
  Speaker 3: and not contact her or the rest of their family.
• 13:43
  Speaker 1: Anna was in a city.
• 13:44
  Speaker 3: Far from her home, her military posts, and her family,
• 13:48
  Speaker 3: and she supposedly walked out without her phone or any
• 13:51
  Speaker 3: of her belongings. This made zero sense to her family.
• 13:55
  Speaker 3: If Anna had left a hotel near the airport on foot,
• 13:58
  Speaker 3: there was no obvious reason to assume she had gone
• 14:01
  Speaker 3: into the mountains. They believed she would have gotten on
• 14:04
  Speaker 3: a plane she was near Lax. Detective Glunt asked to
• 14:08
  Speaker 3: see the itinerary. Louise showed it to him, but according
• 14:11
  Speaker 3: to Detective Glunt's later testimony, the itinerary did not say
• 14:15
  Speaker 3: that Anna and Louise were supposed to hike in the
• 14:17
  Speaker 3: Angelus National Forest on December twenty eighth. Instead, it showed
• 14:21
  Speaker 3: they were supposed to travel north to Napa Valley. While
• 14:25
  Speaker 3: speaking with Louise, detective Glunt also examined his hands and arms.
• 14:31
  Speaker 1: He noticed what appeared.
• 14:32
  Speaker 3: To be fresh abrasion on Louise's hands and saw marx
• 14:36
  Speaker 3: near his elbows that he believed looked like rugburns. After
• 14:40
  Speaker 3: the interview with Louise, detectives pulled surveillance footage from the hotel.
• 14:45
  Speaker 3: Detective Glunt saw the footage of Anna and Louise coming
• 14:48
  Speaker 3: into the hotel on December twenty seventh, but according to
• 14:51
  Speaker 3: the detective's later testimony, in the video, they did not
• 14:54
  Speaker 3: appear to be arguing, so the detectives kept scrolling through
• 14:58
  Speaker 3: that footage, and at six h nine am on the
• 15:00
  Speaker 3: morning of December twenty ninth, a camera recorded Louise leaving
• 15:04
  Speaker 3: the hotel alone without Ana. He was carrying a trash
• 15:09
  Speaker 3: bag in one hand and a big blue suitcase in
• 15:11
  Speaker 3: the other hand. Louise is a big, strong guy, but
• 15:15
  Speaker 3: he was fighting with that blue suitcase, which appeared to
• 15:18
  Speaker 3: be extremely overstuffed. Investigators now had to consider a possibility
• 15:23
  Speaker 3: far more serious than a woman walking away after an argument.
• 15:27
  Speaker 3: Investigators then examined Louise's cell phone, the location information and
• 15:31
  Speaker 3: GPS data.
• 15:32
  Speaker 1: According to court.
• 15:33
  Speaker 3: Documents, the electronic trail showed that Louise traveled from Elsigundo
• 15:38
  Speaker 3: to the Angelus National Forest. He stayed there for approximately
• 15:42
  Speaker 3: an hour, then he returned to the Double Tree two,
• 15:45
  Speaker 3: room six thirty eight. Investigators did not have Anna's body
• 15:50
  Speaker 3: or any definitive proof that she had been murdered, but
• 15:55
  Speaker 3: the day after they knocked on Louise's hotel room door,
• 15:58
  Speaker 3: police arrested Louise on suspicion of murder. El Segundo detective
• 16:03
  Speaker 3: Joseph Iberi questioned him, and at first Louise completely denied
• 16:08
  Speaker 3: killing Anna, but the detective kept grilling him, and at
• 16:11
  Speaker 3: some point Louise indicated that he was ready to change
• 16:14
  Speaker 3: his story. On the detective's notebook, Louise wrote, speak only
• 16:19
  Speaker 3: you two. Iberi and the other two detectives left the room.
• 16:25
  Speaker 3: Louis then began telling a totally different story. According to
• 16:29
  Speaker 3: the detective's later testimony, Louise said he and Anna had
• 16:33
  Speaker 3: argued in the hotel room on the night of December
• 16:35
  Speaker 3: twenty seventh. He said that during that argument, Anna became violent,
• 16:39
  Speaker 3: that she hit him twice, and that he grabbed her wrists,
• 16:43
  Speaker 3: pulled her onto the floor and put her in a
• 16:45
  Speaker 3: choke hold. Now, Louise has martial arts training. He told
• 16:50
  Speaker 3: the police that usually when he puts people in a
• 16:52
  Speaker 3: choke hold in his experience, they would kind of signal
• 16:55
  Speaker 3: that they were about to pass out. He called this
• 16:57
  Speaker 3: tapping out, but he said that Anna did not tap out. Instead,
• 17:03
  Speaker 3: she just stopped moving. He said that he panicked when
• 17:06
  Speaker 3: he realized that she wasn't breathing. After realizing that she
• 17:10
  Speaker 3: was dead. According to the statement described by Detective i Bery,
• 17:13
  Speaker 3: Louise allegedly said he put on his body inside the
• 17:17
  Speaker 3: large blue suitcase and kept it there for the next
• 17:20
  Speaker 3: two days. Finally, early in the morning on December twenty ninth,
• 17:25
  Speaker 3: Louise was ready to make his move. Louise said he
• 17:29
  Speaker 3: drove the suitcase into the mountains and started walking toward
• 17:32
  Speaker 3: an embankment, but then en route, the suitcase slipped out
• 17:36
  Speaker 3: of his hands and on his body fell out.
• 17:40
  Speaker 1: Louise said that because he was Catholic.
• 17:43
  Speaker 3: His religious would not allow him to leave her exposed,
• 17:46
  Speaker 3: so he covered her body with rocks. Detectives asked Louise
• 17:50
  Speaker 3: to identify where he put on his body, but he refused,
• 17:54
  Speaker 3: and without help it would be very hard for police
• 17:57
  Speaker 3: to find a body even with cell phone data because
• 18:01
  Speaker 3: the Angelus National Forest covers hundreds of thousands of acres.
• 18:05
  Speaker 3: Even with a phone and GPS evidence narrowing the search,
• 18:08
  Speaker 3: investigators were still looking at a massive area of steep,
• 18:11
  Speaker 3: heavily wooded terrain.
• 18:14
  Speaker 1: But the LAPD did try.
• 18:16
  Speaker 3: They did search with personnel from the FBI and the
• 18:19
  Speaker 3: United States Army, but it was a tough search. Along
• 18:23
  Speaker 3: with all the issues with the terrain, they were also
• 18:25
  Speaker 3: dealing with severe weather during the search efforts. In the end,
• 18:29
  Speaker 3: they didn't find any signs of on his body. Then
• 18:33
  Speaker 3: something else happened. Newspapers in Brazil started reporting on this story,
• 18:38
  Speaker 3: and some of those news reports claimed there might be
• 18:40
  Speaker 3: another reason why Louise was not giving details about the
• 18:43
  Speaker 3: location of Anna's body. It turned out that Anna wasn't
• 18:48
  Speaker 3: the first of Louise's girlfriends to go missing and for
• 18:52
  Speaker 3: her body to never be found. Another young woman connected
• 18:55
  Speaker 3: to Louise had disappeared in Brazil under similar circumstances. Reports
• 19:12
  Speaker 3: from Brazil said Louise was refusing to identify the location
• 19:16
  Speaker 3: of Anna's body because he believed that the absence of
• 19:19
  Speaker 3: a body could prevent prosecutors from convicting him. After Louise's arrest,
• 19:25
  Speaker 3: investigators interviewed people who knew him. One friend said Louise
• 19:30
  Speaker 3: had previously been connected to the disappearance of another young
• 19:33
  Speaker 3: woman in Brazil, and according to the friend, Louise had
• 19:36
  Speaker 3: once said that if he ever needed to kill someone,
• 19:39
  Speaker 3: he would know how to do it in a way
• 19:42
  Speaker 3: that insured the body would be found. Brazilian news reports
• 19:46
  Speaker 3: identified the missing woman as twenty four year old Anna
• 19:50
  Speaker 3: Claudia do Santos Silva. Anna Claudia had reportedly dated Louise
• 19:54
  Speaker 3: for approximately four months in twenty seventeen, and then she
• 19:58
  Speaker 3: broke up with him.
• 20:00
  Speaker 1: Shortly after that she disappeared.
• 20:03
  Speaker 3: Anna Claudia's body was never found, and at the time,
• 20:06
  Speaker 3: according to multiple reports, Louise was suspected, but he was
• 20:10
  Speaker 3: never arrested or charged in connection with her disappearance. Investigators
• 20:15
  Speaker 3: in Los Angeles now had two cases involving two young
• 20:18
  Speaker 3: women who had been romantically involved with the same man,
• 20:22
  Speaker 3: but in Anna's case, authorities believed that they had more
• 20:26
  Speaker 3: than suspicion. But as the Los Angeles District Attorney would
• 20:30
  Speaker 3: later discuss, homicides with no body are notoriously harder to prove.
• 20:39
  Speaker 1: Detectives did have evidence.
• 20:41
  Speaker 3: They had the surveillance footage from the hotel, the smell
• 20:44
  Speaker 3: of urine in the room, and the circumstances like the
• 20:47
  Speaker 3: fact that Anna dropped off the radar completely, took none
• 20:50
  Speaker 3: of her stuff with her, and the wounds the detective
• 20:52
  Speaker 3: said he saw on Louise's arms. Plus they had phone
• 20:56
  Speaker 3: and GPS records placing Louise in the Angelus National Forest,
• 21:00
  Speaker 3: and according to detectives, they had his description of how
• 21:04
  Speaker 3: Anna died and what he did afterward. Prosecutors charged Louise
• 21:10
  Speaker 3: with murder. Prosecutors first had to establish that Anna was dead.
• 21:14
  Speaker 3: Then they had to prove beyond a reasonable doubt that
• 21:17
  Speaker 3: Louise killed her, all without ever showing the jury or
• 21:20
  Speaker 3: the court a body. Louise pleaded not guilty. His bail
• 21:25
  Speaker 3: was set at two million dollars. I went to the
• 21:27
  Speaker 3: courthouse and pulled the court documents. I saw the documents
• 21:30
  Speaker 3: where prosecutors stated that because he was a Brazilian national
• 21:34
  Speaker 3: and because Brazil will not extradite people to the US
• 21:38
  Speaker 3: under any circumstances, they considered him a major flight risk.
• 21:44
  Speaker 3: While he was in jail, awaiting trial. There was another
• 21:47
  Speaker 3: twist in the case because Louise was placed in a
• 21:50
  Speaker 3: jail cell with two men he believed were incarcerated for murder.
• 21:54
  Speaker 3: In reality, they were undercover agents. Louise told these two
• 21:58
  Speaker 3: men that he strangled Anna, panicked, and hid her body
• 22:01
  Speaker 3: in the ceiling of the room, then took her out
• 22:04
  Speaker 3: in the suitcase and dumped her body in the forest.
• 22:07
  Speaker 3: Louise also told the informants more details. He said Anna
• 22:11
  Speaker 3: cried while he choked her and that her body trembled. This,
• 22:15
  Speaker 3: of course, was completely different than what he told detectives
• 22:18
  Speaker 3: about him putting her in a choke hold and not
• 22:21
  Speaker 3: realizing she was in trouble.
• 22:23
  Speaker 1: She was fighting for her life.
• 22:25
  Speaker 3: The informants taped the whole conversation, they told detectives about it,
• 22:29
  Speaker 3: and it later became evidence in court. During a preliminary
• 22:33
  Speaker 3: hearing in twenty twenty three, prosecutors laid out the evidence
• 22:36
  Speaker 3: they believed justified putting Louise on trial. The big question was,
• 22:41
  Speaker 3: with very little physical evidence and no body, could prosecutors
• 22:45
  Speaker 3: make a totally circumstantial case. Detective Glunt described entering Room
• 22:51
  Speaker 3: six twenty eight. He told the court about Hones's clothing,
• 22:54
  Speaker 3: the odor in the room, the marks on Louis's hands
• 22:57
  Speaker 3: and elbows, and the inconsistencies in Louise's story, and also
• 23:01
  Speaker 3: they showed the surveillance video of Louise dragging the bulging
• 23:05
  Speaker 3: blue suitcase out of the hotel. Detective I Berry testified
• 23:09
  Speaker 3: about the statement Louise allegedly made after asking to speak
• 23:13
  Speaker 3: with him alone. There was a confession in this case.
• 23:17
  Speaker 3: The judge ruled that there was enough evidence to take
• 23:20
  Speaker 3: Louise to trial, pointing out that honest friends and family
• 23:22
  Speaker 3: had not heard from her in months and that she
• 23:24
  Speaker 3: left all of her personal belongings behind. Urbina traveled from
• 23:28
  Speaker 3: Brazil to the United States for the hearing, and according
• 23:31
  Speaker 3: to Los Angeles Times, Urbina stayed at the same hotel
• 23:35
  Speaker 3: that her daughter had, the Double Tree in Elsigundo. Urbina
• 23:40
  Speaker 3: later said she believed Louise wasn't revealing the location of
• 23:43
  Speaker 3: on his body because he thought American law worked the
• 23:46
  Speaker 3: same way he apparently believed.
• 23:48
  Speaker 1: Brazilian law worked. Nobody, no crime.
• 23:52
  Speaker 3: Meanwhile, the investigation continued, and nearly a year after Anna vanished,
• 23:56
  Speaker 3: her cell phone was found in the mountains. Human remains
• 24:01
  Speaker 3: detection dogs were taken to Louise's rental car. They alerted
• 24:04
  Speaker 3: when they were brought near the vehicle. Prosecutors also found
• 24:08
  Speaker 3: evidence on Louise's electronic devices. He had told police he
• 24:12
  Speaker 3: was worried about Anna and looking for her, but investigators
• 24:15
  Speaker 3: recovered communication showing Louise had been speaking with escorts and
• 24:19
  Speaker 3: communicating with someone on tender within hours of the time
• 24:23
  Speaker 3: Ana disappeared.
• 24:24
  Speaker 1: Louise had deleted those.
• 24:25
  Speaker 3: Conversations, but law enforcement were able to recover them after
• 24:29
  Speaker 3: forensic data digging. The case eventually went to trial in
• 24:33
  Speaker 3: twenty twenty six. By then, Louise had been held in
• 24:37
  Speaker 3: custody for more than three years. The prosecution laid out
• 24:41
  Speaker 3: the circumstantial evidence, telling the it was preposterous to believe
• 24:45
  Speaker 3: Anna would have voluntarily abandoned her clothes, her stuff, her
• 24:49
  Speaker 3: military career, her family, and everyone she knew. The prosecution
• 24:53
  Speaker 3: said Anna had died in room six point thirty eight.
• 24:56
  Speaker 3: Louise carried her out into the suitcase to the rental car,
• 24:59
  Speaker 3: then drove to the Angelus National Forest and dumped her
• 25:02
  Speaker 3: in her phone there. Then he returned to the hotel
• 25:06
  Speaker 3: and constructed a story in which Anna became angry and
• 25:09
  Speaker 3: disappeared on her own. The prosecution also presented evidence that
• 25:13
  Speaker 3: Louise had been controlling, jealous, and possessive during his relationship
• 25:16
  Speaker 3: with Anna. Witnesses traveled from Brazil to testify. They included
• 25:21
  Speaker 3: people who knew about the disappearance of Louis's other former girlfriend,
• 25:25
  Speaker 3: Anna Claudia do Santo Silva. Two of Louis's friends testified
• 25:30
  Speaker 3: that Louise frequently used the phrase nobody, no crime. Louise's
• 25:35
  Speaker 3: attorney argued the prosecution's case had significant gaps. The defense
• 25:40
  Speaker 3: maintained there was no way to disprove Louise's story that
• 25:43
  Speaker 3: Anna had walked out of the hotel room angry and
• 25:45
  Speaker 3: upset because Louise was paying attention to his phone instead
• 25:48
  Speaker 3: of her. Louis's attorney argued that it was possible Anna
• 25:52
  Speaker 3: left the hotel and that something unrelated happened to her. Later,
• 25:55
  Speaker 3: Louis's attorney questioned why the prosecution needed evidence about Anna
• 25:59
  Speaker 3: Claudia's disappearance in Brazil if the case involving Anacosta was
• 26:04
  Speaker 3: as strong as the prosecutors claimed, Because, according to the defense,
• 26:08
  Speaker 3: Brazilian authorities had previously investigated Anna Claudia's disappearance and had
• 26:13
  Speaker 3: not determined that a crime occurred. The prosecution responded that
• 26:17
  Speaker 3: the evidence involving Louise's former girlfriend helped establish a pattern
• 26:21
  Speaker 3: and gave context to statements he'd allegedly made about making
• 26:25
  Speaker 3: bodies disappear. Louise testified at trial through a Portuguese interpreter.
• 26:30
  Speaker 3: He said Anna became angry and stormed out of room
• 26:32
  Speaker 3: six thirty eight, and that he never saw her again.
• 26:35
  Speaker 3: He said he assumed she would come back at some
• 26:38
  Speaker 3: point and looked for her in several places, including the
• 26:40
  Speaker 3: Angelus National Forest, which he said explained why his phone
• 26:44
  Speaker 3: was at that location. He said the large suitcase contained
• 26:48
  Speaker 3: clothing not on his body. But remember, Louise had a
• 26:52
  Speaker 3: problem because he had already confessed twice, once to the
• 26:56
  Speaker 3: police to Detective Iberi and the second time to the
• 26:59
  Speaker 3: two informants in prison. Louise had an explanation for that
• 27:03
  Speaker 3: alleged confession. He said he was intimidated into making the
• 27:07
  Speaker 3: false confession to the men in prison because he said
• 27:10
  Speaker 3: he was terrified of those two men and believed they.
• 27:12
  Speaker 1: Might kill him.
• 27:14
  Speaker 3: And he insisted that when he first confessed to Detective Iberi,
• 27:17
  Speaker 3: that was also a false confession. Louise said he made
• 27:20
  Speaker 3: up the story because he believed the police would release
• 27:23
  Speaker 3: him if he told them what they wanted to hear.
• 27:26
  Speaker 3: Louise said he loved Anna, that he wanted to marry her,
• 27:28
  Speaker 3: and that he would never hurt her. He repeatedly stated
• 27:31
  Speaker 3: that he was innocent and had never killed anyone. However,
• 27:36
  Speaker 3: right after stating that he loved Anna and was worried
• 27:38
  Speaker 3: about her, Louise was also forced to admit he had
• 27:41
  Speaker 3: sent those messages chatting with Escorts, messages he admitted he
• 27:45
  Speaker 3: later deleted. The jury had to decide whether Luis was
• 27:49
  Speaker 3: an innocent man who just behaved strangely after his girlfriend
• 27:53
  Speaker 3: walked away, or whether every single part of his story
• 27:56
  Speaker 3: had been designed to explain evidence he never expected the
• 27:59
  Speaker 3: police to find. The defense argued there was reasonable doubt
• 28:03
  Speaker 3: the odors smelled by a detective wasn't definitive evidence, and
• 28:07
  Speaker 3: that the prosecution had failed to eliminate every reasonable possibility.
• 28:12
  Speaker 3: Prosecutors stated that the evidence showed overwhelmingly that there was
• 28:15
  Speaker 3: only one reasonable possibility that Anna never left that hotel alive.
• 28:22
  Speaker 3: On April third, twenty twenty six, the jury found Luis
• 28:26
  Speaker 3: Antonio Gomeza Kay guilty of first degree murder. After the verdict,
• 28:31
  Speaker 3: Urbina spoke through an interpreter and said the result gave
• 28:34
  Speaker 3: her some peace of mind, even though it could never
• 28:37
  Speaker 3: bring her daughter back. She said she at least had
• 28:40
  Speaker 3: some peace in knowing that the justice system could work
• 28:43
  Speaker 3: even when her daughter's remains had not been found. She
• 28:46
  Speaker 3: thanked the police and the prosecutors for their work in
• 28:49
  Speaker 3: the case. The verdict also had potential consequences beyond Los Angeles.
• 28:55
  Speaker 3: A Los Angeles County sheriff's sergeant said that Anna's case
• 28:59
  Speaker 3: had helped restart the investigation into Anna Claudia Dosanto Silva's
• 29:04
  Speaker 3: disappearance in Brazil. That case had previously been treated as
• 29:08
  Speaker 3: a missing person's investigation, but now Brazilian authorities are reportedly
• 29:12
  Speaker 3: examining it as a criminal case. The prosecutors said Luis's
• 29:16
  Speaker 3: conviction could carry way with officials who were investigating Onna
• 29:20
  Speaker 3: Claudia's disappearance. Meanwhile, search teams in the Angelus National Forest
• 29:25
  Speaker 3: have continued looking for Anna's remains. Montro's Search and Rescue
• 29:33
  Speaker 3: has reportedly incorporated Anna's case into training operations, allowing their
• 29:37
  Speaker 3: members to keep searching while they're out practicing their wilderness
• 29:41
  Speaker 3: recovery techniques. Authorities of said they will not stop trying
• 29:45
  Speaker 3: to bring on a home. On April twenty seventh, twenty
• 29:49
  Speaker 3: twenty six, Louis Gomez a KAY was sentenced to twenty
• 29:53
  Speaker 3: five years to life in state prison. Louise continued to
• 29:56
  Speaker 3: maintain his innocence. His attorneys have said they plan to
• 29:59
  Speaker 3: appeal even though are being a beliefs justice was served.
• 30:04
  Speaker 3: She says she's still traumatized by the fact that she
• 30:06
  Speaker 3: cannot bury her daughter. Somewhere inside the vast Angelus National Forest,
• 30:13
  Speaker 3: there may be a location known to only one living person,
• 30:17
  Speaker 3: a cluster of rocks where, shortly after sunrise, a man
• 30:21
  Speaker 3: dragged a heavy suitcase.
• 30:24
  Speaker 1: I'm Catherine Townsend.
• 30:26
  Speaker 3: This is Helen Gone Murder Line. Helen Gone Murder Line
• 30:34
  Speaker 3: is a production of School of Humans and iHeart Podcasts.
• 30:37
  Speaker 3: It's written and narrated by me Catherine Townsend and produced
• 30:40
  Speaker 3: by Etiis Perez. Special thanks to Amy Tubbs for her
• 30:44
  Speaker 3: research assistance and James Wheaton for legal review. Noah camer
• 30:48
  Speaker 3: mixed and scored this episode. Our theme song is by
• 30:51
  Speaker 3: Ben Sale, Executive producers of Virginia Prescott, Brandon Barr, and
• 30:55
  Speaker 3: LC Crowley. Listen to Helen Gone ad free by subscribing
• 30:58
  Speaker 3: to the iHeart True Crime Plus channel on Apple Podcasts.
• 31:02
  Speaker 3: If you were interested in seeing documents and materials from
• 31:05
  Speaker 3: the case, you can follow the show on Instagram at
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• 31:11
  Speaker 3: and my team to look into, you can reach out
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