{"id":107384,"date":"2025-07-31T11:12:15","date_gmt":"2025-07-31T11:12:15","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/107384\/"},"modified":"2025-07-31T11:12:15","modified_gmt":"2025-07-31T11:12:15","slug":"shanna-gardner-mario-fernandez-back-in-court-for-pretrial-hearing-in-jared-bridegan-murder-for-hire-case","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/107384\/","title":{"rendered":"Shanna Gardner, Mario Fernandez back in court for pretrial hearing in Jared Bridegan murder-for-hire case"},"content":{"rendered":"

JACKSONVILLE, Fla. <\/strong> \u2013 Shanna Gardner<\/a> and her estranged husband, Mario Fernandez<\/a>, who are accused of plotting to have her ex-husband, Jared Bridegan<\/a>, killed in 2022, will be back in court Thursday afternoon for another pretrial hearing.<\/p>\n

The hearing was originally scheduled for June 6 but has experienced multiple delays. It will take place at 2 p.m. Thursday in Duval County court.<\/p>\n

Their trial is currently set to begin with jury selection on Oct. 20.<\/p>\n

In an earlier pretrial hearing, the state said that it had provided both defense teams with its complete discovery inventory and that the Jacksonville Sheriff\u2019s Office computer forensic unit was able to recover data from some damaged hardware that was seized in a raid. They did not elaborate on what that data included.<\/p>\n

RELATED | <\/b>Overwhelming Evidence: Attorneys, judge grapple with massive data challenges in Jared Bridegan murder-for-hire case<\/b><\/a><\/p>\n

Gardner and Fernandez are under indictment for first-degree murder in what prosecutors say was a murder-for-hire plot in the death of Gardner\u2019s ex-husband, 33-year-old Jared Bridegan.<\/p>\n

Related: <\/b>Gardner\u2019s attorneys seek sanctions for SAO, say it \u2018abused its authority\u2019 in murder-for-hire case<\/b><\/a> | <\/b>Jared Bridegan\u2019s wife files wrongful death lawsuit against 3 accused in his murder<\/b><\/a><\/p>\n

Bridegan, a father of four, was gunned down outside his SUV on Feb. 16, 2022, after he stopped to move a tire that was blocking the road. He was taking his normal route home after dropping off the twins he shared with Gardner at her Jacksonville Beach home.<\/a><\/p>\n

According to police reports, the admitted gunman, Henry Tenon, fired four shots, two hit Bridegan and two hit the SUV. Tenon<\/a>, a former tenant of Fernandez, pleaded guilty to second-degree murder in the Bridegan case and had agreed to testify<\/a> against the estranged couple.<\/p>\n

But in January, the case took a turn when Tenon said his testimony was false<\/a> and asked for a new lawyer. That led to his public defender stepping down earlier this month. He now has a new attorney as he considers withdrawing his guilty plea<\/a>.<\/p>\n

The change could significantly impact the case against Fernandez and Gardner, according to a legal analyst. <\/p>\n

RELATED: <\/b>Shanna Gardner\u2019s estranged husband\u2019s phone pinged at rental property for man who shot Jared Bridegan, docs show<\/b><\/a><\/p>\n

After Bridegan\u2019s death, courts settled a custody dispute between Gardner\u2019s parents and Bridegan\u2019s parents<\/a> over the care of the couple\u2019s twins. Full guardianship was granted to Gardner\u2019s parents, who live in Washington state, with visitation rights for the Bridegans, according to sources for the Florida Times-Union<\/a>.<\/p>\n

Bridegan\u2019s widow, Kirsten, and members of the Bridegan Foundation were presented with a Back the Blue award<\/a> for their Bexley Box initiative<\/a>. Bexley, who was a toddler at the time of the murder, was in the SUV when her father was shot.<\/p>\n

Kirsten Bridegan has filed a wrongful death lawsuit<\/a> against the three people facing charges in his murder.<\/p>\n

Copyright 2025 by WJXT News4JAX – All rights reserved.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"JACKSONVILLE, Fla. \u2013 Shanna Gardner and her estranged husband, Mario Fernandez, who are accused of plotting to have…\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":107385,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[5136],"tags":[5229,3188,723,68775,7310,68773,68776,49395,68774,67,586,132,5230,68,2969],"class_list":{"0":"post-107384","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-jacksonville","8":"tag-america","9":"tag-fl","10":"tag-florida","11":"tag-henry-tenon","12":"tag-jacksonville","13":"tag-jared-bridegan","14":"tag-mario-fernandez","15":"tag-murder-for-hire","16":"tag-shanna-gardner","17":"tag-united-states","18":"tag-united-states-of-america","19":"tag-unitedstates","20":"tag-unitedstatesofamerica","21":"tag-us","22":"tag-usa"},"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/pubeurope.com\/@us\/114947551583639032","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/107384","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=107384"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/107384\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/107385"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=107384"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=107384"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=107384"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}