A jury convicted Miguel Salguero-Olivares of the 2012 rape and murder of UNC student Faith Hedgepeth, after DNA taken in a 2021 drunk-driving arrest matched evidence left at the scene.
Story Highlights
- The jury found Salguero-Olivares guilty on all four first-degree charges, including murder and rape.
- The judge sentenced him to life in prison without parole, which means he can never be released early.
- State experts tied his DNA to Hedgepeth’s body and to the rum bottle prosecutors said was the weapon.
- He said “It’s not fair” as the verdict was read, and he is appealing.
Jury Verdict Caps 14 Years Of Waiting
On Friday, October 23, a Durham County jury found Miguel Salguero-Olivares guilty of first-degree murder, first-degree rape, first-degree burglary and a fourth first-degree charge in the 2012 killing of Faith Hedgepeth. First-degree is the most serious level of each crime under North Carolina law. Judge Keith Gregory sentenced him minutes later to life in prison without parole, plus added prison terms that will run one after another. The jury had deliberated for about an hour on Thursday and several more hours on Friday.
The case turned on DNA. Investigators found one DNA profile on Hedgepeth’s body, on the bottle used to kill her and on other items at the scene, but it matched no one for nine years. Then in 2021, Salguero-Olivares was arrested for drunk driving, and officers took his DNA and fingerprints. His DNA matched the profile from the crime scene, and he was arrested in the murder case on September 16, 2021. He had never been named a person of interest before that. His lawyers argued that prosecutors failed to prove their case. He did not testify, and he declined to comment after the verdict.
A Student Taken In 2012
Hedgepeth was 19, a junior studying biology at UNC-Chapel Hill. She was a member of the Haliwa-Saponi tribe and grew up in the Hollister community in Warren County. On September 7, 2012, her roommate, Karena Rosario, came home to their off-campus apartment in Chapel Hill and found her dead in the bed they shared. She had been raped and beaten with a glass Bacardi rum bottle. A handwritten note with insults was left on a takeout bag at the scene.
Prosecutors said Salguero-Olivares killed her in a fit of rage. “They still got the guy because he left his DNA like confetti all over that room,” prosecutor Lisa Coltrain told jurors. More than 25 agents from the State Bureau of Investigation, North Carolina’s statewide police agency, worked the case, and more than 400 DNA samples were collected over the years.
Forensic Evidence Spanned Body, Bottles And Bag
Erin Ermish, a scientist at the State Crime Lab, testified that DNA from Hedgepeth’s body was 170 septillion times more likely to be a mix of her DNA and his than of hers and an unknown person’s. A septillion is a 1 followed by 24 zeros. Trial testimony also placed his DNA on the top of the Bacardi bottle and on the takeout bag. In 2014, a lab analyst found a partial palm print and a thumb print on a blue wine bottle in the bedroom, and experts matched those prints to Salguero-Olivares.
The defense pushed back on the investigation. His lawyers said police failed to search some areas of the apartment and later lost some possible blood evidence. They also argued that DNA from intercourse can stay in the body for days, so its presence did not prove when he was there. The judge barred them from arguing that Rosario was involved. The jury weighed those points and returned guilty verdicts on every count.
A Family Finds Peace
Hedgepeth’s family addressed the court before the sentence was handed down. Her mother, Connie Hedgepeth, said she was glad the family has “the closure we need, we have peace.” She said she had forgiven what happened. Her father, Roland Hedgepeth, measured the wait this way: “14 years, six weeks and four days.” Judge Gregory, whose own son was a UNC student a year behind Faith at the time of her death, hugged her parents after the hearing.
Sources:
chapelboro.com, wral.com, cnn.com, axios.com, kansascity.com, newsobserver.com
