Trial begins for Salvadoran fugitive accused in deadly attack of Maryland hiker

BEL AIR, Md. (AP) — Victor Martinez-Hernandez was carrying out a planned attack when he grabbed Rachel Morin off a popular Maryland hiking trail, bashed her head against nearby rocks and concealed her body in a drainage culvert, prosecutors alleged as his trial began Friday.

The state’s case hinges on DNA evidence that linked Morin’s death to Martinez-Hernandez, a fugitive from El Salvador accused of entering the United States illegally after allegedly killing another woman in his home country.

Morin was raped, beaten and strangled to death in August 2023. The apparently random act of violence sent shock waves through this suburban community northeast of Baltimore and became a political flashpoint during the 2024 presidential election as Donald Trump called for increased border security and mass deportations of immigrants living in the U.S. illegally.

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Martinez-Hernandez, 24, was arrested last summer in Oklahoma. He had been living in Bel Air, Maryland, around the time of Morin’s death, prosecutors said. They said Morin went walking or running along the same route almost every day, usually in the evenings.

“The defendant had a plan,” Harford County State’s Attorney Alison Healey said during her opening statement Friday morning. She described a 150-foot (46-meter) trail of blood leading to Morin’s body.

But defense attorneys challenged the assertion that the crime was a random attack, calling it instead a “crime of passion.” They said police simply got the wrong guy. They also asked jurors to pay close attention to unanswered questions during the trial, including questions of motive.

“This was not a crime committed by a complete stranger,” Assistant Public Defender Sawyer Hicks said. “This was someone who had a grievance. Someone who wanted to humiliate Ms. Morin to the greatest extent possible.”

Despite receiving over 1,000 tips about the case, the only evidence pointing to Martinez-Hernandez is the DNA, Hicks said.

But the DNA is reliable, precise and scientific, Healey argued.

Detectives collected DNA from several places on Morin’s body and developed Martinez-Hernandez as a suspect, according to prosecutors. After interviewing some of his relatives, detectives matched DNA from the scene with DNA collected from socks that Martinez-Hernandez left behind when he fled Maryland “with no warning and never came back,” Healey said.

They also linked him to a 2023 home invasion in Los Angeles.

In the months after Morin’s death, Martinez-Hernandez had searched online for information about the case and taken a screenshot of a media report, prosecutors said.

After obtaining an arrest warrant, authorities tracked him to Tulsa, where they found him sitting at a bar, officials said. He was arrested and extradited to Maryland.

Martinez-Hernandez appeared in court Friday in a crisp white button-down shirt. He showed almost no emotion and used headphones to hear a Spanish translation of the proceedings.

Morin, 37, left behind five children. Her 14-year-old daughter was the first witness to testify, fighting back tears as she described the immediate aftermath of her mom’s disappearance.

Morin suddenly stopped responding to text messages and calls not long after arriving at the trailhead. Loved ones reported her missing later that night and became increasingly worried as the hours ticked by.

Her phone and Apple watch were later found smashed and destroyed near her body, according to prosecutors.

That hiking trail was one of her favorite places, her boyfriend Richard Tobin testified.

“It was her peace,” he said.

Several other family members watched Friday’s testimony from the courtroom gallery.

Some have become vocal supporters of Trump, who reached out to Morin’s mother after Martinez-Hernandez was arrested. Patty Morin later appeared with Trump during his campaign and has testified before Congress in support of Trump’s plans to crackdown on immigration at the southern border.

Peer-reviewed academic studies have generally found no substantive link between illegal immigration and violent crime.

Although the case has received extensive attention from politicians and the media, Judge Yolanda Curtin recently denied a request from defense attorneys to move the trial to a different venue.