Suspect in murder of UNC student Faith Hedgepeth left DNA on blood-covered rum bottle, prosecutors say

The trial of a man accused of killing a North Carolina college student 14 years ago began Wednesday with the prosecution alleging she was killed in a fit of rage by a stranger who left his DNA all over the crime scene. The defense said the evidence did not add up.

Miguel Salguero Olivares is charged with first-degree murder, rape and burglary in the death of Faith Hedgepeth. She was a 19-year-old sophomore at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill when she was found beaten to death in his off-campus apartment in September 2012.

In her opening statement, Assistant Prosecutor Angela Garcia-Lamarca said the defendant left his DNA about the murder weapon – a bottle of rum found covered in blood – inside Hedgepeth’s body and about a note written on a fast food bag found at the scene.

“The evidence in this case is louder than the noise around it,” she said.

She described Hedgepeth as a caring friend who was loved by all who knew her and who was on her way to becoming the first person in her family to earn a college degree.

“You will see from the evidence in this case that the defendant committed these acts against Faith in a fit of rage, not because he knew her,” she said. “He didn’t do this to her because of who she was, he did it because of who he is.”

Garcia-Lamarca said Hedgepeth and her roommate were at a popular club that evening and that Hedgepeth, the designated driver, drove them home around 2 a.m. The roommate was drunk and sick, she said, but then called a friend to come pick her up around 4 a.m. She returned a few hours later and found Hedgepeth dead.

“This case is not complicated. It’s devastating, it’s horrible, it’s a family’s worst nightmare… but it’s also simple,” the prosecutor said. “The evidence is clear and clear.”

In his opening statement, defense attorney James Rainsford said prosecutors left out key details and urged jurors to ask, “Where is the rest of the evidence?”

The friend who picked up Hedgepeth’s roommate told police he saw what looked like blood on her hands. A downstairs neighbor reported hearing loud noises between 3 a.m. and 4 a.m. Police later lost evidence related to what appeared to be blood in the apartment’s bathroom.

“Is it just noise or are you starting to hear things that don’t add up?” » he said. “It may be noise to some people; to others it looks like forensic evidence.”

Salguero Olivares was arrested in 2021, more than nine years after the murder. His arrest came after a DNA sample submitted to the state crime lab by the State Bureau of Investigation and the Chapel Hill Police Department matched a profile found at the original crime scene, authorities said.

“Finding something doesn’t mean a crime was committed. You have to connect them,” Rainsford said of DNA evidence. “It doesn’t mean what you think.”

The prosecutor said the message on the fast food bag – “I’m not stupid (expletive) jealous” – recalled an old adage.

“Men, some men, are afraid that women will make fun of them,” she said. “Women are afraid of being killed or raped.”

Among their first witnesses, prosecutors called Karena Rosario, who found the lifeless and beaten body of her roommate.

Rosario said she found Hedgepeth’s body on the bed with his shirt pulled up to the top and nothing on his body from the waist down, CBS affiliate WNCN reported.

Rosario sobbed as she described the 911 dispatcher asking her to touch Hedgepeth to see if she was warm.

“And I told them she was cold,” she said through tears. As she waited for an ambulance to arrive, Rosario said “it seemed like a thousand hours.”

The prosecutor asked Rosario how it felt not knowing what happened to her roommate and friend, WNCN reported.

“I felt like I was going crazy. I felt like I was living a nightmare,” she said. “It was like one day I was like a normal student, and the next day I felt like my whole life was turned upside down, and the one person I wanted to be there with me wasn’t.”