PHOENIX – A man who was extradited from Mexico to stand trial in the cold case murder of a Phoenix teenager was sentenced to 20 years in prison last week, authorities announced.
Sergio Reyes, 39, learned his fate more than 21 years after 15-year-old Elena Lasswell was beaten and strangled to death at her home near 23rd Avenue and Thomas Road.
Lasswell was seen alive for the last time going into her bedroom with a boy and shutting the door, according to the Maricopa County Attorney’s Office (MCAO).
She was found dead in her room the next day. The autopsy determined that her cause of death was strangulation and blunt force trauma to the head.
How did police solve cold case from 2004?
In 2013, the Phoenix Police Department cracked the cold case by using familial DNA evidence to link Reyes to the crime. A grand jury indicted him in 2014.
The suspect was extradited to Arizona in July 2024 after being arrested in Mexico, where he’d been living.
Reyes, who was 17 when Lasswell was killed, pleaded guilty to one count of second-degree murder in August of this year.
“This case highlights the tireless efforts of Phoenix Police detectives and MCAO prosecutors who never gave up in the pursuit of justice for Elena and her family,” Maricopa County Attorney Rachel Mitchell said in a press release. “This defendant tried to run and hide, but in Maricopa County, the truth will catch up to you and so will law enforcement.”
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