- Juan Carlos Garcia, former CEO of Amazon Mexico, paid two hitmen $9,000 to kill his wife in 2019, a court heard.
- Abri Pérez had filed for divorce after she accused her husband of beating her with a baseball bat.
- García fled Mexico days after his wife's murder, it is alleged, and is still on the run.
The former CEO of Amazon Mexico was accused of paying two hitmen $9,000 to kill his estranged wife in 2019, as her murder trial started this week in Mexico City.
Juan Carlos García, who is currently on the run, is accused of orchestrating the murder of his wife Abril Pérez Sagaón, who was fatally shot in the head in 2019 in a car in Mexico City in front of two of her children.
One of the assassins testified that García offered an extra $2,500 if his wife was killed before an upcoming hearing in a case she had filed against him, El Pais reported.
The couple were in the middle of a divorce after Pérez accused her husband of femicide – murdering a woman because of her gender – alleging that her husband viciously beat her with a baseball bat while she slept.
Graphic images that allegedly show Pérez covered in blood after the attack have circulated on social media.
García was held in pre-trial detention for 10 months, but a judge later downgraded the charge to domestic violence and he was released.
Prior to her murder, Pérez, who had a restraining order against García, had flown to Mexico City from Nuevo Leon for a court-ordered mental evaluation in connection with her case against her husband, per El Pais.
Authorities believe García fled to the US days after the murder, reportedly crossing into San Diego via Tijuana, according to the Mexican outlet La Jornada.
García was a successful businessman, and had been chosen to be CEO of Amazon Mexico when the company launched its first office there in 2014, a role he remained in until 2017.
Pérez's killing, which took place on the International Day Of Violence Against Women, sparked national outrage across Mexico, amid an ongoing femicide crisis in the country.
Amid rising numbers of murdered women, activists in Mexico have repeatedly taken to the streets criticized authorities for not taking enough action to protect women from gender-based violence.
García has proclaimed innocence, and reportedly sent a letter to Mexico City officials in 2019 denying his involvement in the attack.
Pérez's relatives have said they believe García was responsible for her killing.
"The attack was totally directed at her. And the only enemy she had in her life was him," an unnamed relative told El Pais.