- 18 hours ago
After years of suffering in silence, Francisca Quintero finally leaves her violent husband. But for Javier Bahena, there is no such thing as a divorce. His wife has a choice: stay with him or die. When she refuses to stay, he forces his hand to murder.
Category
📚
LearningTranscript
00:00my mother was always the more outgoing my dad he was very charismatic he was very easygoing
00:16around my mom's family he was so in love with my mom that he followed her here
00:22but my father is a human being with several faces
00:30things are getting very tense at home his kind of obsessive behavior with her started coming out
00:40i think this was as close to a public execution as you could probably get
01:00christmas eve 2005 francisca quintero celebrates the festive season at a family party with her
01:10husband javier bahena my mom francisca she was always the first one on the dance floor parties
01:18always she would typically dance with my father javier or she would just dance by herself she
01:27really just wanted to dance and didn't really matter who was there to dance with her
01:30my dad was also a very great dancer this is a dad that i remember growing up with like very easy
01:41going almost nostalgic to see how close they were and how affectionate they were
01:50francisca quintero is born january 1st 1973 in morelos mexico my mother francisca she grew up in morelos
02:04she grew up very traditional in the mexican culture as far as you have to learn how to cook you have to
02:13know how to sew tend to your house clean and she always talked about the festivals the events they
02:19would have going on every year how they would dance their folklorico with everyone there wasn't you
02:25know the bustle of being in a big city or anything it was just very calm living but around the age of 15
02:34she dropped out of middle school and ended up coming over to the states in 1988 francisca quintero
02:46decides to follow the american dream it's not easy to get from mexico all the way to chicago illinois
02:55especially in the manner that she did my mom was very open with like telling us her stories and what
03:02she'd gone through and how hard it was to leave for life in mexico to come here the only way to get
03:09across the border back then unless you did it on your own was to hire a coyote someone who you pay for
03:16your passage and they will bring you along the border of mexico in u.s and get you safely across
03:23it's a very tough journey it takes multiple days you have to be very careful of police and criminals so
03:32there's a lot of factors with deciding to come from mexico to the united states i think when she
03:40made the decision to come over first it was mainly for opportunity because there was more here than
03:47there was back in her homeland and the first job over here is as part of the housekeeping staff at
03:54local hotels over in the chicagoland area i believe there was less of a risk being in chicago in terms
04:01of being found out and being deported in december 1991 francisca visits her family back home in
04:10morelos where she reconnects with javier bahena arellano born april 15 1971 in guerrero mexico my dad's
04:21side and my mom's side were very very close growing up once my mom was older she spiked an interest in in
04:29my dad i don't know much about my dad's childhood because he didn't like to talk about it from what
04:34i gathered it wasn't easy for him he grew up being able to take care of himself and being able to figure
04:41out how to survive while at a local festival romance starts to blossom i do remember a story that was
04:56told to me of how they got together as a couple where my dad saw my mom at a local festival and
05:04deciding that he was going to be the one to dance with her my mom had a bunch of gentleman callers that
05:09also wanted to dance with her but he said to them i'll be the one that she decides to dance with
05:14last he was the one that started pursuing her at first he did what he could to get her to go out
05:21with him to be his girlfriend but they put a pause on things because mom was going to come back over to
05:27united states but my dad was so in love with my mom that when she came over he followed her here
05:34for all he knew he could come over my mom would have been like it's over but he took the risk he
05:41went through the rio grande had to swim over and then from there figure out transportation to where
05:46he needed to go they found their way back to each other things progressed very quickly to the point
05:54where my dad was going to my grandparents and asking them for permission to get married
05:59okay my mom looks beautiful they really went all out for her
06:15she keeps looking at my dad and they keep sharing a smile she felt very special and beautiful on her
06:31day and i think his main focus for their wedding it was her
06:35after they get married in 1992 the whole aspect of family finally came in when i came along a year
06:48later she definitely took to the mother role so after my sister was born a year and a half later she
06:57had my brother francisco and a year and a half later i was born she always put the kids first and i think
07:07that definitely changed their relationship quite a bit i think once there was three of us running around
07:15there was more pressure on him as far as making sure he was providing enough for everyone
07:20we would rarely see him because he would be working during the days and as a young child there are moments
07:28where i don't really remember him being there they were concerned about finances but we were never
07:35without because while my dad would be awake learning how to fix cars my mom she would do those odd jobs
07:44and all the while carrying around three kids
07:47i think it was very tricky to make sure that they were still having time together once he was focusing
07:57more on work by 1998 the bahena cantero family are settled in carpentersville illinois when francisca
08:08gets suspicious of who javier is spending his time with my dad was a little ladies man and my mom
08:17she started getting suspicious of the fact that he was staying so late at work and finding some
08:22reason to not come home right away she did not shy away from saying what she needed to say but i don't
08:29think she ever expected him getting physical with her the story i was told about the incident that took
08:41place in 1998 was she was ironing his clothes so he could go out and he got into an argument verbally and
08:50it progressed to him hitting her and i believe she managed to turn around and in turning around she
08:58scratched him which kind of just added fuel to the fire so at that point he did throw a punch
09:06and it hit her in the face my mother reacted and tried to get away from him and police were called
09:15she ended up going to get stitches he had to go to jail
09:21javier is charged with the domestic battery of francisca and spends a night in jail 18 days later he pleads
09:30guilty to the attack and is given a conditional release to complete a 26-week counseling program
09:37francisca believes he has changed and takes him back
09:42i think the worry is always there with anyone who comes over from mexico to the united states
09:47illegally that at any point you know you could be caught and be sent back
09:52i can only imagine how the atmosphere must have been after she took him back
10:05but we were better for it to grow up with a dad because he did care about us a lot
10:12my father is a human being with several faces and we got to see the father face but my mom got to see
10:23something else
10:25what's going to happen what's going to happen what's going to be the fallout of this
10:55because as soon as you get caught by the police your name's in the system so i'm giving a false id
11:02to the police i think was his way of trying to avoid being found out or immigration being called
11:10javier pleads guilty to the domestic battery of francisca and receives a sentence of three
11:16days in jail and 18 months probation but for a second time francisca takes him back
11:25so my mom wasn't going to quit on her marriage or you know her family
11:33even if it wasn't the best thing to do i think she thought she could handle the abuse i think she
11:40thought that it wasn't going to get beyond that point so she more internalized whatever she was
11:48feeling at that moment and just put us first seven months later immigration officials deport javier
12:02life continues in illinois for francisca and their children
12:05and my early memories are with my mom rather than my dad
12:25and i played a tour guide and gave
12:27false information about every single animal
12:31there are times where my mom just goes over to an animal and just records the animal
12:37which tells me that she was having fun too
12:43i think the fact that my dad worked a lot
12:46made it so that when he was deported it wasn't that big of an event in my young mind
12:52i was at the age being the youngest where i was already in preschool or kindergarten
13:03and as a mother of three kids by herself i think she did what she needed to do
13:12i think she was able to keep her head up and you know try to make things happen for us
13:17i think she was very uneasy with how things were going to play out but at the end of the day he was
13:39still her husband a lot of our family did not know the details of what happened you know they were given
13:46some fabricated story of the reason why he was gone so i think it was easier for him to let back in
13:54into the family with open arms when he did come back and he was very charismatic he was very
14:01easy going around my mom's family
14:06as javier's birthday comes around francisca puts on a show but times are tough with both of them being
14:12undocumented i can only imagine that that if his work was limited before it was more limited now
14:30if work got to the wrong person that he was here there's really nothing we could do to stop him from
14:37being sent back javier and francisca struggle to hide their discontent
14:52there were moments when there was tension or when there were arguments and that is around the
15:09time when we actually start moving a little bit more we moved up to burlington for a little bit
15:14but then we uprooted from burlington and then from there we went to california we were there for a
15:22few months before we just made the decision to move back we moved to lake geneva for i think the better
15:29part of a year i felt like that was the first time things felt stable and i do remember them coming in
15:39and giving us the great news that they had gone in the house in richmond
15:48my mother was always the more outgoing
15:53but my father did have his moments too
16:01i think these are the moments where i see the most affection between them too
16:03when they're dancing and they're in that state this is a way for them to reconnect with where they came
16:12from
16:16they're just enjoying
16:19the company that they're with and each other
16:24i think this was one of the periods where we were able to just kind of have fun
16:33but even just the way like my mom looked at my dad in the video
16:39i do think it was one of their better moments
16:45but something else would would trigger something in their relationship
16:49i know that he definitely gambled it was an aspect that i would see that uh would drain the coffers a little bit
17:12but i think my father mostly just went to drinking
17:20do you remember one time he went to the store and i grabbed the beer before it was scanned to kind
17:26of hide it away he didn't find out until we got back into the car and we got back he was asking my
17:32mom where's my beer i mentioned that i took it out of the cart and i remember him just looking around
17:39angry he asked me to hand him my game boy which i had at the time and he took it and then he slammed it
17:47into the car door next to him uh enraged i think it did get to the point where he felt like he needed
17:56alcohol especially at parties
17:59i never noticed that how much he stayed around my mom
18:10he's being very handsy
18:14if she moved somewhere he was right behind her
18:19i think that side of him started to come out more even without alcohol being involved
18:26but when he was drinking it was magnified times 10 and he definitely had more of like a machista
18:43which is very like possessive very controlling way of handling her and kind of handling situations
18:52and from this point on i'd say all of his bad qualities started to come out
19:08new year's eve 2009 francisca celebrates turning 37 with her family
19:14and i knew i knew a lot of things here they definitely had problems they definitely were not okay
19:33she always made a speech
19:45it's that last bit that really hit me where she says that please try to be happy because when you're
19:51happy everything looks different it's not something one would typically say during that time
19:56my dad at some point says and i love you too which doesn't escape my notice there
20:26i love you too but i love you too much
20:30a month later at the end of a family party javier turns on francisca
20:41this is a usual case of my dad rough housing
20:49and my mother usually doesn't approve of that
20:51you can't even just see her hitting him in the back like let up
20:59yeah my mom was absolutely not okay with this behavior the dynamic was switching and he wasn't
21:09getting away with as much as he had gotten away with in the past
21:12this woman he had married that he had put through all these things and had forgiven him and had put up
21:22with so much was finally getting to this breaking point that he didn't think she'd ever get to
21:26i remember her bringing us all to the living room and she said that she wanted to separate from my dad
21:41at that time i didn't accept it
21:49i think the words i said was
21:53think before you do something that you will regret
21:59that was a terrible thing to say
22:01especially to her i think my mom took my words to heart
22:11they stayed together for a little bit longer after that
22:15for the next four years francisca tries to make her relationship with javier work
22:36i think a big factor of why she stayed with him and i think the reason
22:40that i heard as well growing up or why she had put up with it so much was because of us
22:48but it got to the point where the three of us were almost hyper aware of how uncomfortable she was
22:56getting
22:59when she started sleeping in my bed or my sister's room was a big eye-opener
23:05this isn't one of those times where they're sitting us down and telling us they're breaking up like
23:12this is getting serious to the point my mom doesn't feel safe
23:17there were rumors of my dad being unfaithful
23:24i think my mom just had it i think that was it that kind of pushed it over the edge
23:30things were getting very tense at home and that's more when his kind of obsessive behavior with her
23:39started coming out i think it was just a constant what are you doing what is she doing i want to
23:45talk to her let me talk to her and just not leaving her alone in february of 2014 it got to a point where
23:55we needed to leave one month later francisca takes evelyn to california a big factor as to
24:03why i moved to san diego was her feeling like her life was in danger
24:10he was threatening her he was you know saying if you're not with me you're not going to be with
24:14anyone and he had contacted his family in california to try to find her
24:19he was actually threatening my mother at this point with taking her life if he could
24:33i wanted to believe that it was a joke but she had heard from a family member that he had hired
24:41somebody to track her and find her and you know deal with her
24:46and once she heard about that then she made sure to just never be alone
25:01francisca decides her only option is to return to illinois
25:08we ended up moving back because my mom could not
25:10feel comfortable being away from my my brother and my sister for so long especially with the behavior
25:17that he was exhibiting and i think that's when things definitely took a turn shortly after my 18th
25:26birthday was when for whatever reason she decided to give him another chance and i think maybe
25:34maybe a part of it was just to get him to stop with the threats
25:42that was the point where i decided i was going to wash my hands of the situation and
25:50stop getting involved
25:54and i could not wrap my head around why after everything we had gone through she would take him
25:59back i stopped talking to my mom i stopped talking to my dad um i would just keep in contact with my
26:05brother and my sister
26:09i know their their reconciliation was very brief i think my mom realized she had made a big mistake
26:17friday march 20th i had my sister reach out i needed to come to the hospital
26:22my mom needed me
26:39my uncle was in the icu he had suffered a heart attack and he was in critical condition
26:44knowing my mom and i knew she was going through it i went with my mom that friday
26:56she wanted to know if she was okay but on sunday morning i was told that that my uncle had passed
27:07my father was there that day and i do feel like he was stalking her at that point
27:14my dad was just kind of there watching over my mom then he managed to get my mom into the bathroom
27:27911 what is this emergency
27:30yes we had a woman a visitor that was stabbed in a in the chest by with a screwdriver by her ex-husband
27:36in our critical care waiting area where's that husband i had no idea we're trying to deal with
27:42the woman here we were told the offender javier was still on site and was currently being detained
27:50by security so officers get there as soon as they possibly can and get him in custody
27:57at the same time hospital staff started to render aid to francisca
28:04we understood that there was an altercation between francisca and javier in the bathroom
28:08and the family members who were at the hospital for a separate family member heard them screaming
28:13trying to get in they couldn't and then javier came out and she had been stabbed officers take javier
28:20into custody and act quickly to secure the scene but it's already been disturbed before our evidence
28:27officers can process it hospital staff began cleaning up the crime scene taking away a lot of the blood
28:34evidence that may have been there but this made things more difficult for us because things were
28:40not in the exact place as they were when it happened officers race to secure the remaining evidence
28:47before any more is lost
28:54the offender had plunged the screwdriver into the wall when he came out of the bathroom
29:00somebody could easily have gone and taken it out so the officer made the decision to secure it so
29:07nobody else could touch it or grab it officers now turn their attention towards javier we knew javier was
29:18married to francisca but we did not know much about his background so we did run his criminal history
29:26and we found that he had been arrested for a domestic battery that he was in the country illegally
29:35and he had been deported before so the hospital staff took francisca to the emergency room to start
29:43working on saving her life but unfortunately they could not save her
29:50this is now a murder investigation i remember driving to the hospital
30:01and i remember walking in and just seeing it littered with all of my mom's family
30:11and nobody would look at me like people were just crying so i was like okay i'll just go look for her
30:15i get to the outside of the chapel and my aunt comes out and meets us right in front and i remember
30:24hugging my aunt and i asked her do you know where my mom is my aunt grabbed me by my arms and she looked
30:35me in my eyes and she told me that my mom was with god and in that moment i kept asking for my dad
30:44where's my dad where's my dad where's my dad my aunt told me she said do you remember how your dad kept
30:50threatening your mom and that was all she needed to say i knew that in whatever way it had happened
30:58like that he was responsible officers now get to work interviewing the family in this case we had
31:08multiple eyewitnesses so um it was kind of rare in that regard and that there were so many people that
31:13heard what was going on in the bathroom and my assignment was to interview all the family members
31:17all the witnesses to find out what they saw what they heard and then try and get some of that
31:22background about their relationship
31:26the witnesses were in the waiting room of the critical care unit they began to hear screaming
31:31coming from the bathroom they could tell that it was francisca yelling at javier to stop and to think
31:40about the kids and clearly she was in distress and the witnesses went to the bathroom tried to open the
31:49door it was locked they began kicking the door to try and help her the door opened and they saw her
32:01on the ground bloody and him with a screwdriver in his hand after he walked out of the bathroom
32:08he said something to the effect this is what happens to the prostitutes who cheat on their husband
32:17he plunged the screwdriver into the wall they began yelling at him and trying to go and help francisca
32:24and they were trying to find somebody to at the hospital to help
32:30officers gain an insight into francisca and javier's relationship as the witnesses open up
32:36in some of our interviews with the family members we learned that there seemed to be
32:40the long history of uh threats um and domestic trouble with francisca and javier
32:46several of the family members told us of threats about killing her
32:52it just kind of told me a little bit about his mentality and that maybe this was more of a planned
32:58out murder and not something that was a spur of the moment thing
33:02we had enough witnesses we had enough information that he was the perpetrator we just wanted to know
33:11why and only he could tell us what exactly occurred behind that closed door
33:17about 3 20 pm we went in for our first interview
33:32he seemed a little cold like almost like he didn't care but he had no problem talking to us he knew he was
33:38caught so i think that just helped him decide you know what i'm just going to tell him kind of what
33:45happened and he had quite a few details of everything before and after the bathroom
33:55he told us he needed to go out to his truck and he took her phone with him
34:03and he started scrolling through it it was then that he saw some messages
34:09and believed she was cheating on him
34:15he then came back inside with the screwdriver from the truck in his pocket at which point he motioned
34:23for her to come to the bathroom so he can confront her with her phone
34:29then he blacked out
34:33next thing he knew she was on the ground he just couldn't get himself to say i stabbed her
34:39he showed no remorse he showed no concern about her well-being
34:49it took a while for him to actually ask us hey how's my wife doing and that's when we told him she's
34:55dead that's when he broke down crying and just said do whatever you want to do
34:59security footage shows javier's movements prior to francisca's killing video surveillance shows him
35:11leaving from the lobby out to the parking lot and then coming back
35:17coming off the elevator to the ccu unit hand in his pocket presumably with the screwdriver and then going
35:24around the hallway out of view of the camera which is towards where the bathroom was
35:30he was walking normally acting normally didn't appear in distress but nothing on that corridor was
35:36captured by video surveillance officers now turned to digital forensics we want to search through the
35:43phones to see any communications between the two of them and the communications between francisca and
35:50who she was speaking with which was what javier was looking at she was speaking to another man in
35:57relation to her brother passing away i don't know if he knew who she was speaking with but
36:03maybe because it was another man that's what triggered him that just shows me how controlling
36:09he is how insecure he is how jealous he is
36:24essentially he confessed but he didn't use the words he just kind of resigned to the fact that
36:30he was done he went and sat in his truck for about an hour looking through her phone thinking about
36:41this before he went in brought her into a bathroom and started arguing with her this isn't something
36:48that just happened in the spur of a moment where he saw something and then immediately took out a weapon
36:54and attacked her it was a premeditated murder so our state's attorney decided at that point to give us
37:03the first degree murder charge javier contests the charges the first initial court date i remember
37:12feeling the need to be there so he can see me so he can see what he did so he can realize that
37:18this is real and i remember seeing him and not recognizing the man that i was staring at it wasn't
37:27the man that had raised me that i had grown up knowing my whole life who i loved
37:34i was staring at a complete stranger i think for a year or so was just you know court date presenting
37:42evidence him pleading not guilty him continuing to plead not guilty and us kind of having to relive
37:51everything that happened
37:56it got to a point where i think they offered him two plea deals and he said no
38:02he thought he could go to court and win with saying that it was manslaughter there was so much
38:09evidence leading up to this being very premeditated there's absolutely no way he was going to get
38:16manslaughter so i made the decision to go see him
38:24he never brought up my mom he never brought up what happened he was playing a character like oh how are you
38:33guys like like as if nothing had happened we told him that he needed to take this plea deal because there
38:39was absolutely no way he was getting anything less and continuing to put us through this every
38:44single month it was just prolonging this process after talking to him his attorney called
38:53and let us know he was going to be taking the plea deal we weren't going to have to go to trial
38:58and everything was going to be done april 24th 2017 javier bahena pleads guilty to the first degree
39:08premeditated murder of francisca quintero
39:14i think every homicide investigation is a shocking incident i think this was as close to a public
39:19execution as you could probably get he came out with the murder weapon and met the family members and it
39:25just showed us the uh the coldness of him he is currently in prison right now serving a 30-year sentence
39:38i've not spoken to him in several years at the end of the day i cannot bring myself to hate that man
39:46because there's so much that my dad did that molded me and my sisters to who we are
39:55it should be easy to say i hate javier bahena
40:06but i can't
40:23i would like to remember her as not only an influential figure in my life
40:29but also a reason that we can be whoever we want to be i think about her every day and the way she
40:36would light up a room the way she would just make you feel so loved and so comfortable my mom
40:45francisca quintero
40:49was not the perfect person
40:51she didn't have to be she was perfect for us for kids
41:04that's what mattered
41:05they were typical brothers
41:14tamir and rodney was like total opposites
41:18he destroyed his family i was completely heartbroken
41:21he killed my baby
41:23there's nothing worse than killing your brother in front of your mother
Be the first to comment