SOUTH TOMS RIVER – On March 3, Cheyanne Juarez told her roommate that she ended her 11-year union with husband Gustavo Juarez-Perez.
Five days later, 30-year-old Juarez was dead.
Her husband called 911 at 9:12 p.m. that night.
“I killed my wife,” Juarez-Perez told the police dispatcher on March 8, adding that his four children, ages 3, 10, 12 and 14, were present in the house.
The police dispatcher asked the caller if the victim was conscious or unconscious.
“No, she is dead,” Juarez-Perez replied.
He told the dispatcher he lost control during an argument.
“I hit her and I used my belt,” Juarez-Perez said, explaining he choked his wife with the belt.
“After 11 years being together with little ones, she cheat on me multiple times and she confessed, and I was so upset and I loose (sic) control.”
The next day, when detectives attempted to take a formal statement from Juarez-Perez, he asked for an attorney, started crying and told them “he is a Christian man and that he will be asking God for forgiveness.”
Detectives noted there was red staining believed to be blood on Juarez-Perez’s jeans.
Those details are contained in an affidavit of probable cause to charge Juarez-Perez, 38, with the murder of his wife.
Juarez-Perez also is charged with possession of a weapon – a belt – for an unlawful purpose and unlawful possession of that weapon.
When police arrived at the couple’s Hummel Drive home, they found the victim in a bedroom, with blood on her face and a belt around her neck, the affidavit said. Juarez-Perez also was there and was taken into custody without incident.
Police asked him how long the victim had been down.
“Twenty minutes,” Juarez-Perez responded.
Police also located the couple’s three children and Juarez-Perez’s oldest child from an earlier union inside the home.
The eldest, a 14-year-old daughter, told police her father had moved out of the house at the beginning of March, but that he came to the residence that day to speak to the victim, the affidavit said.
The teen told police she heard “yelling and screaming” after the couple went into their bedroom to talk, and that she heard the victim say in Spanish, “it hurts,” the affidavit said.
At that point, the 14-year-old said she took the three younger children into another bedroom, where they all remained until police arrived.
The 14-year-old’s mother arrived the house and took custody of all four children, who were not harmed, according to the affidavit.
Police then located the victim’s roommate, Gisika Solir, who resided in the basement of the home with her two children. Solir told police the victim told her on March 3 that she had broken up with her husband, the affidavit said.
Investigators also spoke to the defendant’s brother, Ivan Juarez, on the phone on March 9. Three days earlier, the brother told them, the defendant told him he was having problems with his wife, according to the affidavit.
He didn’t hear form his brother again until at 9:18 pm. on March 8, when he received a text message from him, saying, “I killed my wife,” the affidavit said.
Juarez-Perez is being held in the Ocean County Jail. He faces a hearing Tuesday to determine if he will continue to be held without bail pending the outcome of the case.
Kathleen Hopkins, a reporter in New Jersey since 1985, covers crime, court cases, legal issues and just about every major murder trial to hit Monmouth and Ocean counties. Contact her at [email protected].
This article originally appeared on Asbury Park Press: Children hid in home as father killed wife in South Toms River – cops
Read the full article here