SAN BERNARDINO – (INT) – Exhaustive detective work and video surveillance has paid off in solving one of the city’s recent homicides in which the victim’s body was left in a wooden box.

Video showed the driver of a distinctive U-Haul truck leaving the box in a parking lot on North Del Rosa Avenue on June 2nd. Wrapped in a tarp inside the specially-built box was the body later identified as that of Marlene Santellan, 34, of San Bernardino.

Investigators determined that the mother of suspect Rico David Sanchez had rented the truck and that he had purchased materials for the box at a local hardware store. A search warrant turned up additional evidence at the home where Sanchez and his mother lived.

Detectives have not disclosed how or when Santellan was killed, but said he and the victim knew each other.

Story Date: July 18, 2018