He S.A. And Killed Two Girls At 16; Then Joined The Marines And Attacked Again

Laura Hobbs, 8, and Krystal Tobias, 9, went out to ride their bicycles on Mother's Day 2005. When the girls failed to return home, their families reported them missing. Despite searching through the night, police, nor volunteers, found the girls. Sadly, Jerry Hobbs found the girls' dead bodies the next day.

An autopsy determined the girls had been sexually assaulted before receiving fatal stab wounds to their necks and faces.

Police suspected Jerry Hobbs of murdering his daughter and her friend. He had recently moved from Texas to Zion, Illinois to reconcile with his ex-girlfriend and three children. The pair separated after he chased off a man with a chainsaw. He was an ex-con, which triggered alarm bells.

Police arrested Hobbs on a knife possession charge and interrogated him about the girls' murders. Several hours later, Hobbs confessed to murdering both girls.

Hobbs spent five years in jail awaiting trial. Three years into his sentence, his defense team learned that semen samples taken from Laura's body did not match his DNA. He spent two additional years in jail before he was finally

Jorge Avila-Torrez grew up in the neighborhood. The 16-year-old knew both girls and was friends with Kayla's half-brother. Avila-Torrez joined the Marines in 2008 at age 18.

On July 12, 2009, Navy Petty Officer 2nd Class Amanda Snell, 20, failed to report for duty at the Pentagon. The no-show raised alarms, as Snell was extremely dedicated to her career.

Coworkers performed a welfare check at the Joint Base Myter-Henderson Hall in Arlington, VA, where Snell lived. No one answered the door, although it was unlocked and the coworkers allowed themselves in. They spotted Snell's purse in the room. Venturing further into the house, they noticed a horrible odor coming from a closet. It was the smell of decomposition. Snell was inside, dead, curled up in a fetal position with a pillowcase over her head." An autopsy later determined she likely died from asphyxiation, however, the extensive trauma of her body and the state of decomposition prevented an official cause of death.

Police collected semen from Snell's bed and used it to create a DNA profile for the suspect. Despite recovering semen, floor impression from the intruder's shoes, and police believing the perp was someone who lived or worked there, Snell's murder went cold.

In February 2010, two young women were out for a night run at a location about three miles from Joint Base Myer-Henderson Hall when they were approached by a man claiming he had a gun. He attacked the women, forced one of them into his vehicle, and drove her to a secluded area where he beat and raped her. He tied a scarf around her neck, choked her until she fell unconscious, dragged her body into the woods, and drove away.

The woman was found alive the next day. She provided the police with a description of the perpetrator and the vehicle. As luck would have it, an officer on patrol spotted a suspicious-looking driver matching the description. He did not conduct a stop on the driver but ran his information. The driver was identified as Jorge Torrez, a man who lived at an address located a few doors down from Amanda Snell's old residence.

Police tracked Torrez down and found overwhelming evidence that he attacked the women. The victim's student ID and earrings were located in the backseat of his car. In his barracks, they located a handgun and computer loaded with porn material depicting women being sexually assaulted and tortured. They also recovered a pair of Nike Air Force 1s that matched the shoe impression found at Snell's death.

Torrez's DNA matched the DNA found on the rape victim's body. It also matched semen recovered from Snell's bedsheet.

Authorities charged Torrez with attempted murder, rape, and kidnapping, although they lacked enough evidence to charge him in Snell's murder.

While in jail, Torrez bragged about killing Snell. A jailhouse informant named Osama El-Atari agreed to wear a wire and captured a confession via audio tape.

Torrez told the informant that he tied her up with a laptop cord. 

He then stated, 

"So I choked her about another two minutes that way…Now I've got a body to deal with…luckily enough, she had a room in the bottom of her fucking closet."

Authorities ran Torrez's DNA through a national database while he awaited trial. They learned that his DNA matched DNA recovered in the sexual assaults and murders of Laura Hobbs and Krystal Tobias back in 2005.

Torrez was charged with and convicted of the murders and rapes of both young girls and Amanda Snell, kidnapping, and attempted murder. He received a sentence of five life terms and the death penalty.