A Loudoun County, Virginia, man will serve 12-and-a-half years in prison for murdering his 21-year-old pregnant girlfriend more than a decade ago.
Bethany Decker – mother to a 1-year-old son and five months pregnant – disappeared Jan. 29, 2011. In 2020, Ronald Roldan was arrested for her death.
"It was quite tragic for us to go from missing to murdered in just a sentence and in a day," said Decker’s mother, Kimberly Nelson.
As part of a plea deal with prosecutors, Roldan agreed to go on the record with his account of the murder.
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He claims they got into an argument in their Ashburn apartment, and he pushed her. She fell and hit her head on a windowsill.
He claims he checked for signs of life, but she was dead. He says he got scared, panicked and never called 911.
He says he put her body into a Christmas tree disposal bag and dumped her in the trash compactor at their complex.
In the weeks after her death, family and friends say they got Facebook messages from Bethany's account. They didn't know she was dead but said the messages didn't seem like her.
Prosecutors said digital evidence indicates Roldan was impersonating her, though Roldan never admitted to using her social media.
Wearing earrings Decker once gave her, her grandmother testified Tuesday that Decker was at her house the night before she was killed, and she thought Decker was staying the night because Roldan had been harassing her over the phone. Then Decker ran to the bathroom to answer the phone and ran out of her grandmother's house.
"I couldn't save her," she said through tears.
Then she told the judge, "I want you to save the next girl."
Roldan will be in prison only a few months longer than Bethany's family spent searching for her, fearing the worst, but they say they're grateful they finally have answers.
“The night before Bethany was murdered, she called me and she said, 'Mom, I love you,' is the last thing she told me," her mother said.
Between the time Decker was murdered and Roldan was arrested for killing her, Roldan was convicted of brutally attacking another woman in North Carolina and served time. The victim in that case was at Tuesday's sentencing, and she shouted an insulting profanity at him as he was escorted out in handcuffs.
