Suspect bought 300 lbs of cement mix and iced coffee before model's body found in concrete

LAS VEGAS – What exactly killed a 24-year-old adult entertainment model before authorities found her body encased in concrete is still under investigation.

But court documents offer a glimpse of what Las Vegas Metropolitan Police homicide detectives discovered before finding the remains of Esmeralda Gonzalez in the desert south of Las Vegas.

The tip

Gonzalez's brother reported her missing in May.

She was last seen alive May 31 when she was captured on residential surveillance video, wearing lingerie and high heels.

The adult entertainment industry worker had no contact with her family. Her financial records showed no recent activity. The details led police “to believe she [had] become the victim of a crime.”

But it wouldn't be until months later that detectives would begin to unravel what happened to her.

On July 18, a tipster told detectives about a woman who had  been tied to a bedpost in the home of 45-year-old Christopher Prestipino before her murder.

She remained bound for "an extended period of time," the tipster said, and at some point her captors injected her with pool cleaner. 

The tipster told police Prestipino rented a U-Haul to dump the victim’s body in the desert. 

Records confirmed Prestipino rented a 15-foot truck from the U-Haul Moving and Storage in the 8600 block of South Las Vegas Boulevard. He picked up the truck around 6:30 p.m. June 8 and returned it two days later. 

LVMPD detectives contacted their colleagues in the missing persons department for leads that might identify the victim allegedly dumped in the desert. They soon learned about Gonzalez, who lived a tenth of mile east of Prestipino’s home.

“The two essentially lived on the same street,” a police report said.

'He thought she was dead'

Detectives later interviewed a witness, a friend Prestipino called early one morning for help. 

“Christopher was acting strange and talking about an unknown female,” the report said. “He ended up getting her high on methamphetamine.”

The woman was Gonzales, the report said. The witness said she "started acting bizarre and speaking in the devil’s tongue."  

Gonzales allegedly threatened to call the cops on Prestipino to report the drugs he’d given her.

“Christopher ended up tying Esmeralda to a chair to try and calm her down,” the report said. “[He] attempted to untie Esmeralda later, but she punched him in the face.”

The incident, the report said, escalated.

“Christopher strangled the girl, and he thought she was dead,” police wrote, “but she woke up.”

The cement mixer and freezer

Prestipino had a U-Haul truck, the friend told police. In the back was a cement mixer and freezer “taped and strapped shut.”

“Inside Christopher’s garage was a large wooden and concrete structure on a pallet,” the report said. “Christopher wanted helped putting the wooden structure into the back of the truck, but the two couldn’t move it.”

The friend asked Prestipino about the freezer, the report said: “Christopher stated if anyone got inside, ‘it would be all bad.'"

The Home Depot trip

Around 8:30 p.m. on June 6, less than a week after Gonzalez went missing, Prestipino visited Home Depot for supplies, according to police. 

An arrest report detailed what he purchased:

• Two boxes of deck screws

• An Ocean Mist Filter Fresh Clip Strip

• Two tubes of WD-40 silicon lube

• 10 96-inch 2x4 studs

• Five 60-pound bags of concrete mix

• One 50-pound bag of lime.

• Eight concrete fence cap blocks.

• An iced coffee

Prestipino paid with cash and returned to the store the next day for a drill and concrete mixing paddle.

The discovery in the desert

On Oct. 8, authorities found Gonzalez's body encased in a homemade concrete and wooden structure north of Las Vegas. 

Authorities arrested Prestipino. He now faces charges of open murder, kidnapping and conspiracy to murder. He remains logged in the Clark County Detention Center on $500,000 bond.

Prestipino’s 31-year-old girlfriend Lisa Mort faces a charge of harboring, concealing or aiding a felon, authorities said. She was arrested Aug. 27 in an unrelated drug case.

On Tuesday, Justice of the Peace Harmony Letizia allowed her to be released with electronic monitoring.

An arrest warrant was issued Oct. 17 for 39-year-old Casandra Bascones who was in Milwaukee when police first interviewed her about the missing woman, police said. Authorities arrested her in Wisconsin.

Bascones, also known as Casandra Garrett, faces multiple charges including first-degree murder and kidnapping, authorities said.

The tipster that first reported the murder to police said Garrett aided Prestipino, according to his arrest report.

In June, Prestipino called Garrett's phone several times – and dialed her immediately after renting the U-Haul truck, according to court documents reported in the the Las Vegas Review-Journal. 

“Investigators believe Casandra Garrett switched her telephone number after disposing of the victim’s body,” the court document said.

The Clark County coroner has not released the manner of Gonzalez's death.

Contributing: The Associated Press. 

Ed Komenda writes about Las Vegas for the Reno Gazette Journal and USA Today Network. Do you care about democracy? Then support local journalism by subscribing to the Reno Gazette Journal right here.