Body Bags with Joseph Scott Morgan: Unearthed in Vegas - The Esmeralda Gonzalez Story

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True Crime, News

3.9 • 7.6K Ratings

🗓️ 4 June 2023

⏱️ 34 minutes

🔗️ Recording | iTunes | RSS

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Summary

A young Instagram model, Esmeralda Gonzalez, disappears in Las Vegas. In this episode of Body Bags, hosts Joseph Scott Morgan and Dave Mack examine this chilling case reminiscent of old school "Mob justice," but this is a cover-up involving a U-Haul, 300 pounds of Quickcrete, lime, and a large water tank. All-in-all the set up reveals the peculiarities of a crime scene that mirrors a Hollywood thriller. Hear the harsh reality of forensics as it unravels the effects of the desert environment on human remains, the recovery of the victim's jewelry, and the painstaking process of identification.

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Time-codes:

00:00 - Introduction.

01:20 - Case of Esmeralda Gonzalez: introduction and discussion.

03:05 - Esmeralda's life, circumstances, and disappearance.

04:00 - Vulnerabilities and dangers in Las Vegas.

05:45 - Predatory tactics towards individuals with mental illnesses.

07:15 - Introduction of felon Christopher Prestapino and his criminal background.

09:25 - The ordeal Esmeralda faced in Prestapino's house.

10:25 - Discussion on the effects of acute mental illness and methamphetamine.

12:10 - Conditions under which Esmeralda was kept and her experiences.

14:15 - Analysis of Prestapino's fear, paranoia, and further criminal acts.

15:30 - Prestapino's dilemma after Esmeralda's death.

17:30 - Effects and application of pool cleaner injection.

20:40 - Timeline of Esmeralda's disappearance and discovery of her body.

21:35 - Prestapino's attempt to dispose of the body and suspicious activities.

24:15 - Analysis of Prestapino's thought process and planning of the crime.

26:30 - Gruesome details of how Esmeralda's remains were encased.

27:45 - Actions leading to Prestapino's downfall.

29:10 - Challenges faced by forensic scientists during the case.

30:15 - Discovery of Esmeralda's jewelry and its implications.

31:45 - Discussion of the brutal nature of the crime and attempts to hide it.

32:35 - Decomposition and identification challenges in the harsh desert environment.

33:20 - Resolution of the case and the pursuit of justice.

33:30 - Outro.

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Transcript

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0:00.0	I guess some folks might think that given my profession as a medical legal debt investigator,
0:26.2	I have a morbid fascination with death. I wouldn't say that. I certainly have a fascination with
0:34.6	science. Something I have always had an attraction to. And I mean that in a pure sense, our graveyards.
0:43.2	There's something about the way the debt are remembered. Stone monuments that are created that are
0:50.7	left behind by those that once walked among us. And there are two different degrees aren't they? You can
0:58.3	actually learn a lot about maybe a family history based upon how much money was spent in memorializing
1:07.9	family members. But Stone says something. It has a permanence to it. You know, if you think about
1:15.6	a wooden cross, it just doesn't hold up like stone. I want to talk about a tomb that was created
1:24.7	in haste for a young woman who lost her life in a most horrible way. Today we're going to have a
1:33.1	discussion about the kidnapping, murder, and concrete encasement of the remains of Esmeralda Gonzalez.
1:43.2	I'm Joseph Scott Morgan and this is Body Bags. Dave Mack, I want to ask you something. I'm from New Orleans.
1:54.7	We're famous for our graveyards down home. People take tours, you know, I'm sure many of our listeners
2:01.0	have been to New Orleans. And I've spent time just walking through the graves because it's amazing.
2:07.5	It's like walking through a huge kind of museum. If you will, an outdoor museum that never seems
2:13.3	to diminish everywhere you turn. There's beauty to it. But this case today, there's not much beauty
2:20.8	involved in this matter. In fact, it may be one more horrible things we've covered in some time.
2:25.5	When I think about forensics, Joe, and I think about it, oftentimes when we cover stories and the crime,
2:31.9	you cover a lot of background. When we get into the forensic, the body bags part, it oftentimes
2:38.1	would not make sense if you didn't have more of the story, like knowing what the significance is
2:45.7	of a person being placed inside a cement tomb. That boggled my mind when it comes to the death of
2:51.8	Esmeralda Gonzalez. There are so many aspects of this particular story. And if any of you have
2:57.3	followed it, if you didn't follow each step along the way, you missed a major thing. Starting right
	...

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