what did you think? >> it sounds like the mind of a sociopath. kill your dog and help you go find it. >> a tale of love, videotapes, and murder. an explosive teenage love triangle. >> just now, we've got a verdict. >> two boys, best friends, vying for the same girl. and even killing for her. here tonight, her first network interview. tonight, a look into the mind of a teenage killer. but which one?

>> was there a moment you said, i'm speaking to a murderer? >> to the witness stand. >> now, this person was staring at me. >> tonight, two's company, three's a crime. here's david muir. >> tonight, as so many parents help their kids pack and get ready to head off to college, another family this evening remembering sending their son off. disappearing just weeks later. and then, the gruesome discovery where he had been left. and his girlfriend talking with us about being>úyqñ trapped in e triangle. matt gutman, with the case from

the start. >> reporter: it's a twisting obstacle course through swamp and thicket. carlos aguilar knows this rutted drive like a father knows the contours of his son's face. it's a route he's driven so many times -- leading to the site where the body of his teenage son, christian, was discovered two years ago. the dirt track is getting narrower and narrower. it's amazing that anyone found this body. we've been following carlos now for almost 30 minutes off of state road 24 in the wooded wastelands of north central florida. >> the road is not that bad. >> reporter: this road? >> yeah. >> reporter: no, it's not that bad. but it's not easy. >> yeah. now that you've seen this, you know that it was impossible for us -- even with 500 people -- to find him. >> reporter: this hard working immigrant family from colombia, plucking weeds and wetting the earth with their tears. considers this sacred ground. there's a cross with rosary beads, the name "chris" is spray painted on a nearby rock.

he's like a father's dream. >> yes, the name of christian means a gift from god. he was a gift from god. >> reporter: you said that god has been with you through grief. >> he chooses this cross for me. >> reporter: life wasn't supposed to end here so soon for the 18-year-old scholar with the dancing eyes and the megawatt smile. what was your brother like? >> he was shy with people he didn't know, but once he got to know you, he would just open up. he would just start cracking jokes, start telling you things about himself, just, any way to get you to laugh. he would try to find a way. >> reporter: so how did christian aguilar end up in this marshland, bound, face down in a shallow grave? what the cops call an "enemy style" burial? >> this was some type of nefarious act, somebody was trying to conceal the body of a person. we find that most generally in cases of murder. >> reporter: it's a story that made headlines up and down the florida turnpike.

>> a missing university of florida student. >> reporter: and got national attention. >> i still feel my son is still alive. in my heart. >> reporter: the twisted murder mystery started at this elite charter school in miami. christian aguilar was known for his easy-going cool, his charisma and his taste for hip-hop. so that's one thing that you and christian had always shared is love of hip-hop and specifically kanye? >> i mean, to this day i still love kanye west so, yeah. we would just hop in his car, hang out for a while. >> reporter: at the time, erika friman was dating christian's close friend, class clown, pedro bravo. so tell me more about pedro in high school. >> he was always quite sarcastic. quite funny. he was able to make me laugh so easily. he was very much an animal lover

and he liked action movies. you know, he liked superheroes. >> reporter: the beauty with the big hazel eyes is the center of pedro's world. >> we would go out. we would go on dates. we texted all the time. >> reporter: did you say you loved each other? >> yes, we did. we did say we loved each other. and for a long time i thought that was kind of what love was like. >> reporter: it seemed their love is built to last. >> i mean, not many relationships go almost three years, but -- >> reporter: especially not in high school. >> yeah, it's, it's kind of unheard of. >> reporter: they all go to prom together. but as graduation approaches, pedro and erika's puppy romance is almost over. at one point, you decided this relationship wasn't working for you. >> yes, i did. i had talked to him about it, maybe we should go on a break. i don't think i'm happy. i felt like he almost manipulated me at that point of my life. >> reporter: erika breaks up with pedro and abruptly the class clown's laughter is

replaced with tears. >> he was very emotional about it. he was very, you know, he, he cried a lot. he was very, i mean, it was not what i was expecting at all when i broke up with him. >> reporter: so when you broke up with pedro, somewhere in your mind were you thinking, well, maybe i could start something with christian? >> there was a little part of me that kind of hoped that, you know, christian made me really happy and we had so many things in common, but a larger part of me was like, you know, it's never gonna happen. >> reporter: she would leave pedro behind to attend santa fe community college in gainesville and study biology. coincidentally, christian is heading to gainesville also, but to "the swamp," home of the orange and blue -- the university of florida gators. his future is full of promise. he has a scholarship, gets financial aid, and plans to

study biomedical engineering. and when he and erika run into each other in gainesville, suddenly, sparks fly. >> it was crazy. we had these smiles on our faces from ear to ear and, i mean, we just looked at each other and like with these dumb faces, like, "is this really happening?" >> reporter: that sounds like true love in a way. >> i think we were soul mates. >> reporter: erika has moved on. her ex has not, abandoning his plans to study engineering at a college in miami and moving to gainesville to enroll in erika's college. when is the first time that you realize, "oh man, pedro's in gainesville?" >> he actually sends me a text message. and i'm kind of thinking, how, this is, this doesn't sound normal, you know? no one just packs up all their stuff and moves to a different city, you know, so far from their family for a girl. >> reporter: no, it wasn't normal. neither was the journal pedro kept. a brooding meditation on his quest to win erika back.

"no one will stop me," he wrote. "i will get out of miami and into gainesville, and i will get her back." >> i just was, kinda like, "oh, my god, what are we going to do? should we tell him? should we not tell him? or should we just live our lives and kind of -- if he sees us, or meets us or something, we will worry about it then." >> reporter: "20/20" obtained that sketchbook and journal. it detailed his plan to get rid of acne, whiten his teeth and even wear a red shirt because he thinks it will be more eye-catching to the opposite sex. his hand written musings winding around seemingly unrelated sketches of cartoon characters, monsters, and sometimes sentimental doodlings. >> they almost looked like he could've been a cartoonist, you know? i mean, they were very beautiful pieces of art. >> reporter: his drawings. what kind of drawings were they? >> i just saw, you know, pictures of hearts. there was captions next to the

hearts. you know, there were broken hearts, and hearts in tiny pieces. >> reporter: adding insult to injury, pedro now hears through the grapevine that his true love's heart now belongs to one of his best friends, christian. the journal reveals his increasing anguish -- "i feel as if someone stabbed me and i bleeded out and died." "i want her back, please. i'll give anything." it's september 7th and this is the 34th street wall. erika agrees to meet pedro here. it's a place where for years u.f. students have come to paint grafitti but this is an awkward moment at best because right away pedro asks her if she's dating christian. she says no. >> reporter: he confronted you with the pictures of you and christian. >> he showed me a picture of me standing next to christian. and i was just like, "listen, we're friends, you know, we're hanging out. you know, we're not dating, we're just hanging out." >> reporter: but you lied to him. >> i did lie to him, yes.

>> reporter: why did you lie? >> i just felt like it wasn't the appropriate time to tell him that. i don't want to push this kid at all, i don't want him to think anything, you know, that might throw him over the edge. >> reporter: but pedro is spinning out of control. he's even been talking suicide. and then, curiously, he calls christian for help. >> pedro calls christian on a pay phone and he's like, i'm really depressed. and i was wondering if we can talk, you know, so maybe you can give me advice about how to deal with this, you know, depression. >> reporter: did he ask you if he should go, what you thought? >> we were a little concerned, that maybe he would try to fight him, or something of that sense, but you know, we talked about it, you know, you're going to meet on u.f. campus. you're going to be fine. >> reporter: they met at "the hub" -- the college bookstore here at the heart of this throbbing campus of the university of florida. and what happens soon after will change three lives forever. >> i started calling him. i started texting him. he was not answering.

i was like, well, i have to do something. >> reporter: when "2020" continues. garnier anti-sun damage. a different daily moisturizer. different, because it helps correct signs of past damage, even dark spots. [ male announcer ] clinically tested with vitamin c, it corrects uneven tone and reduces dark spots. even those just below the surface. and see more even, more radiant skin in just 2 weeks. amazing. [ male announcer ] so impressive, 85% saw the difference. so forget about spots and get on with life! [ male announcer ] anti-sun damage daily moisturizer. from garnier. i make a lot of purchasesi-sun foand i get ass.isturizer. lot in return with ink plus from chase. like 50,000 bonus points when i spent $5,000 in the first 3 months after i opened my account. and i earn 5 times the rewards on internet, phone services and at office supply stores. with ink plus i can choose how to redeem my points. travel, gift cards, even cash back.

agprsmart. cleput' out of gainesville, far enough away where it's in another jurisdiction. it's a lot harder for the police to investigate a crime that's outside their jurisdiction than one in their own. >> reporter: 4:00 a.m. in the morning and christian is still missing. >> i call pedro, and it starts ringing. and it's ringing, it's ringing and then finally he answers. and you know, the first thing i ask him was like, "where's christian?" and he's just like, no, you know, i dropped him off, you know, we got into a verbal argument, you know. i'm freaking out. and he's just like, no, listen, you know, it's late, i'm sure he made it home, he just didn't call you. >> reporter: by daybreak, erica is panicking. you call his apartment, he's not there. he's not at your place, either. >> i call pedro, and at this time, i'm not asking him, i'm telling him, like, listen, you need to come with me to the police station. >> reporter: 9:44 in the morning and both erika friman and

pedro bravo go to the campus police station to report their friend is missing. sergeant steve wilder was suspicious from the get-go. >> when you first saw pedro bravo come in there, into that room, what was your first impression? >> it didn't take long, interacting with him and talking to him, that i knew that there was really something that he was holding back. >> i don't know where he is. >> reporter: at what point do you begin being suspicious of pedro? >> honestly, we even walked into the police station. i still didn't think pedro was capable of doing something so horrendous. i mean, this guy that's, you know, shy, and, you know, he wouldn't hurt a fly, you know, he loves animals, and you know, he's hard working in school. >> reporter: never seemed violent. >> never seemed violent. >> reporr: g r me >> god, today for the aguilar family. >> reporter: candlelight vigswaf gainesville.likehis sense of

verwhelming pain. te it's the yoplait greek taste-off and we're asking this sports wn which blueberry greek yogurt is their champion. a tastes better. it's yoplait! i knew it! do you want to see which one yoplait greek ani.♪ once more, matt gutman. >> reporter: as life in the college town of gainesville rolls on, investigators spent two years building their murder case against pedro bravo. ik roesa acto k..l.all-ravo.

now, more of two's company, three's a crime. with matt gutman. >> reporter: what would a hardcore gang member know about the intimacies of a teenage love

triangle? in this case, prosecutors claim, quite a bit -- as they call to the stand a prisoner named michael angelo. with gun, drugs, and kidnapping chargdlm'ráh'ame, he's a true renaissance man of crime. >> are you a convicted felon? >> yes, sir. >> do you know how many times you've been convicted? >> nine times. >> the plot thickened with michael angelo's testimony. >> reporter: the felon shared a cell with pedro bravo in the fall of 2012 and when they met, angelo dispensed with the small talk. >> i was like, "you probably killed that kid," you know? >> what was his response to that? >> he really didn't answer. >> reporter: later, when bravo does speak, it's of his two main preoccupations -- writing and death. >> he had asked me, you know, to borrow a pen and my shoelace and i asked him, "what for?" and he said so that he could write a suicide letter to his parents and to use the shoestring to kill himself. >> reporter: bravo was put on

suicide watch for a few weeks. angelo says when the young man returns, bravo has shifted his mindset from suicidal to scheming. now he's concocted a way to walk free. what did you think it was? >> a way to basically get the charges thrown out in his case or get the charges dropped against him. >> and did you believe it was offering you money to help? >> yes, sir. >> reporter: bravo's plan was to use angelo's outside gang contacts to commit murders similar to chris' to make it appear that a serial killer was on the loose. thus leading suspicion away from bravo. >> was it ever brought up about the shovel and what you would need to do with the shovel as part of the plan? >> reporter: the prosecutor keeps digging for more details, specifically about that shovel bravo purchased.

>> i would have to go get the shovel to -- i guess, copycat that murder to make it look like somebody else had did it. >> reporter: but angelo had a plan of his own. he cut a deal with prosecutors to become a jailhouse snitch earning bravo's trust and extracting incriminating details like these. >> he was going to try to poison him with a mixture of sleeping pills and pesticide mixed with soda. his backup plan was to have a knife, you know, to cut his throat. and his main plan was to choke him with a moving strap. >> reporter: eventually michael angelo completes his masterpiece. a full confession from bravo. one the aguilar family must now endure as the last moments of their son's life play out in graphic detail. >> he told me he basically put a moving strap around the kid's neck and braced himself against the seat.

and he remembers watching the radio -- the clock on the radio -- and said it took like 13 minutes for the kid to, you know, i guess, die. >> did he ever make any comment to about security guards at walmart? >> yeah. he -- at one point, he said that he kinda got freaked out because while he was holding onto the strap that -- the security guard had rode by. >> reporter: angelo is a full service snitch. he even leads cops to the hidden location of that now-infamous shovel. >> did he tell you where he hid it? >> a wooden walkway. >> reporter: bravo's defense says angelo's credibility is shot since he's testifying in exchange for a reduced sentence, but can they overcome all that video? >> surveillance video at walmart and at his apartment, you can

see those two together. >> reporter: with all that physical evidence piling up against him, the most important defense witness is pedro bravo himself. in fact, the 20 year old is the only witness the defense calls. >> there were some reporters that even squealed. two of them gasped. everyone was waiting for that moment. >> reporter: as his parents look on stoically, bravo tries to charm the jurors, resurrecting the old class clown, conversational, even jovial at times. bravo describes his last ditch effort to win erika back. >> i still loved her. and i really wanted to get back with her. i had this idea that, i'm going to go get her back. i'd keep telling myself, "you can do this, you can do this, you can do this." >> reporter: but what exactly was the "this?" bravo admits that when he discovered that erika was dating christian, he snapped. >> they've been going out for about, like, two or three weeks. and at that moment, i'm just instantly -- like, i'm crushed.

because he's one of my best friends. >> reporter: he says that as he descended into a life of despair he was consumed by thoughts of suicide that had plagued him for years. >> i was too nervous to do anything -- i don't like pain -- and i couldn't bring myself to hang myself or anything like that. i tried to take some pills, see what would happen, but lo and behold, i'm still here. >> reporter: speaking of suicide, remember that shovel? bravo can explain that away too. >> tell the jury why you bought a shovel. >> it was gonna be part of my idea to kill myself. in a way, i was gonna go find a spot, and i was gonna mark my tomb and i was gonna dig it. >> reporter: even as the prosecution goes over his version of events, with dripping sarcasm, bravo remains cool. >> now, you're on your way to kill yourself, right? >> correct. >> but you gotta get gas first? right? >> correct. >> okay. 'cause you can't kill yourself without a tank of gas, correct?

>> correct. >> reporter: and now, pedro's biggest challenge is keeping all his stories straight. >> it seems like pedro was changing his story to make it more believable depending on the evidence out there. >> reporter: one piece of testimony that pedro tries to finesse deals with the end of his encounter with christian -- the alleged scuffle that began inside the suv as the two boys argued over friman. his friend's nose now bloody, bravo claims he pulled in here behind this motorcycle shop. now the two start fighting and tumble out of the car and at this point and claims things got really heated. >> as i exit the car, he comes up and something went from my head, and i just -- i got mad. i basically pushed him. as i pushed him, i followed behind him and i swept him off his feet. as he fell down, i fell on top of him as well. >> reporter: bravo claims that's the last time he ever saw

christian. alive and above ground. >> but all i -- i could tell was that he didn't get up right away, but that he was still moving. >> still breathing? >> yes. >> reporter: but here's the thing -- so much of this story was captured by security cameras. but the one piece of video pedro needs to be on tape simply doesn't exist. >> we don't know of any video that shows the two had an encounter or a fight. >> reporter: no video. and for 22 days, no aguilar. until his body is discovered face down in that shallow grave, buried, as cops say, "enemy style." >> the defense tried to come up with a credible story. now, do we believe that? i'm not sure. >> reporter: but what does the jury believe? we're about to find out because as we were conducting this interview, a voice from the courthouse calls out. >> we got a verdict! >> let's go!

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"20/20" continues, with matt gutman. >> reporter: judgment day for pedro bravo. the aguilar family hustles in for a decision. carlos, the anxious patriarch needs a moment to gather himself. everybody is starting now to move back into the courtroom. christian aguilar's family has gathered here en mass. all day, carlos has looked very calm. right now, this is the tensest we've seen him. this is the culmination of two years for him. it has already been a long day for the family. nearly eight hours of closing arguments. the prosecution and defense taking their last shots at a jury of eight women and four men. >> i think you'll find the fight did happen at streights. you'll find law enforcement did nothing to check out whether or not the fight happened at streights, and when you do that i think you'll find my client is not guilty. >> reporter: the prosecution says bravo's the mastermind of a

murderous plot, reminding the jury of pedro's police interrogation and his curious choice of a past tense. >> thourt the interview, he refers to chris, was a good friend. >> reporter: as the jury takes the case to the deliberation room, all the aguilar family can do is wait and worry. >> there's that moment when the jury's deliberating, that you're just thinking, "what's taking them so long?" what happens if they find something? what happens if there is a reasonable doubt? >> reporter: there are nine days of testimony and more than 1,000 pieces of evidence to consider. but after a mere three hours, the jury is back. >> we, the jury, find the defendant -- pedro bravo in this case, guilty of murder in the first degree.

>> reporter: bravo, stonefaced after being found guilty of all charges. the aguilar family, always respectful inside the courtoom, takes to the hallways for a rare moment of catharsis. alexander, how do you feel? >> i don't know. i can't really describe this. >> reporter: the judge said this is your day of reckoning to bravo. do you think life in prison is enough him? >> i think that as the maximum that he can pay for the life of my son. >> reporter: later, they return to remind the judge of the toll this case has taken on them. >> i can't tell you or quantify the pain we've gone through. >> reporter: their brief moment of victory comes to an abrupt halt as and the killer gets one last twist of the knife. >> i know in my heart and my actions, and i know god as well knows that i did not kill christian aguilar.

i will tyke we are sentence you decide to give me. >> you know this was a person we knew. >> this was your friend. this had been your former love. >> yes, yes, it just makes it all so worse. >> this is your day of reckoning. >> reporter: judge james colaw giving him exactly what he asked for. >> as to count one, i sentence you to natural life in prison with no possibility of parole. >> reporter: after the verdict, family and friends go their separate ways. the aguilars once again making that long drive to that makeshift shrine in the middle of nowhere. and the girlfriend, who still has her whole life ahead of her, just not the one she thought she was going to have. >> i think we would've gotten married eventually. he was such a good person. he was just so kind, and so considerate, and so compassionate. i almost feel like when i describe him, i'm never describing him enough, you know? like there's something missing. you know, you had to meet him.

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serial rapist hears verdict of a jury to day. trouble shooters tracks down long lost wedding videos next his name is joshua benson, today a jury found him guilty of the most heinous crimes, involving ten teenage girls. joshua benson will be going to

prison for a very long time. it is friday night, and the big story