Become an Apple Subscriber or Patron to listen!
There are few things more thrilling than pure, young love & the excitement & anticipation of spending the rest of your life with the person you love. 25-year-old Patrick De La Cerda was eager to begin his life with his fiance, 29-year-old Jessica Devnani. On the morning of Tuesday, February 27, 2018, he was notified that a package had been delivered to his Deltona, Florida home & assumed it was the arrival of the custom engagement ring he designed for Jessica. Instead, Patrick’s life tragically ended as he was gunned down in the doorway of his home, the killer leaving him for dead.
Patrick De La Cerda met Jessica Devnani in June 2017 on Plenty of Fish & the two went on to fall in love & get engaged. Patricia, Patrick’s mother, described her son as an absolute romantic. She said that he was an incredible person who loved kids & babies & she could not wait to become a grandmother at some point. As the couple excitedly planned their fairytale wedding & looked forward to starting their lives together, Patrick was brutally murdered & never had the chance to give Jessica her intended ring.
After meeting online, Patrick & Jessica’s relationship quickly progressed in a matter of months & they began traveling & exploring new destinations together. Jessica was smitten with Patrick’s movie-star good looks & saw him as the whole package. Meanwhile, when he spoke with his mother Patricia, he told her that Jessica was the one & his dad Max could easily see that there was something special between the couple & it was clear that they cared deeply for one another.
In December of 2017 Patrick proposed to Jessica & gave her a temporary engagement ring until he could have a custom ring designed for her. They had plans to get married in West Palm Beach, Florida or in France where his mother was from. They were also planning to relocate to West Palm Beach, 200 miles north of Deltona, to where Patrick’s mother lived.
About two months after proposing, it was February 2018 & Patrick was eagerly awaiting the arrival of Jessica’s permanent engagement ring. The morning of Tuesday, February 27, 2018 started out as a typical one; Jessica & Patrick texted their good morning messages & said they loved each other. Patrick got a call from his dad Max De La Cerda that a package was being delivered at the gate of the property where they lived together & he knew his son was excited to finally see the ring.
Right around this time, Jessica was arriving to work & when her typical check-in call from Patrick didn’t come, she began to worry. Jessica was more concerned than usual for Patrick’s safety & well-being because of threats she’d received in the recent past from her ex-fiance. Before she met & fell in love with Patrick, Jessica had been in a rocky eight-year relationship with a successful hedge fund manager, Greg Bender, who she described as an extremely possessive person. She elaborated that she was never scared for her own safety, only for the safety of the men she might be dating after their relationship ended.
Jessica indicated that after she & Patrick got engaged, it was eating away at Greg who often left threatening messages for her & Patrick. During an interview with 48 Hours she shared one of the voicemails: I’m making a phone call. I’m giving instructions & I’m gonna have my plan put into action.
When Jessica didn’t get her expected phone call from Patrick that Tuesday morning, her thoughts immediately went to Greg’s threats & she feared that something terrible could have happened. She immediately left work & headed to Patrick’s house to check on him.
In the meantime, a 911 call came through from a neighbor of Patrick’s & the Volusia County Police Department were notified of a shooting. The dispatcher asked the caller if she wanted to attempt CPR & the woman told the dispatcher that it was too late, Patrick was already deceased & cold to the touch.
Patrick was working in construction with his father Max when he met Jessica. Jessica lived in Orlando while Patrick lived in Deltona 30 miles away.
On the horrific morning of Patrick’s murder, Max was working 70 miles away at a construction job when he got a phone call from an unknown person indicating that a package intended for Patrick was being delivered to their property. There was a sign on the gate of the property that instructed those delivering a package to contact Max. When Max tried to call his son, there was no answer so he moved on to texting him, but there was still no response. He called Jessica to let her know what was going on & since she was also unable to get in touch with her fiance, she immediately rushed over, fearful that something terrible had happened. The property where they lived was owned by Max’s girlfriend Shannon Chamberlain & Max had also reached out to her that morning, asking her to check on Patrick.
Max, Shannon & Jessica each separately set out toward the home, Shannon arrived first, followed by Jessica who arrived before Max since she was closer. When she arrived, she approached the front door & found Patrick’s lifeless body in a pool of blood. Max soon arrived & saw his son lying by the front door, his feet elevated on the stairs that sat immediately to the right of the front door when entering the home. It was clear that the person who killed Patrick had stood on the front porch as they shot him dead, striking him four times in the head, face, chest & hip.
Officers wearing body cams arrived & entered the lush, 9 acre compound on the outskirts of Deltona which sits in Central Florida, about 25 miles inland from the Atlantic Coast & 30 miles northeast of Orlando. It’s not to be confused with Daytona Beach which is 30 miles northeast of Deltona. Officers were unsure if the killer could still be on the property, so they canvassed the area with their guns raised.
Officers spoke with 29-year-old Jessica, who was clearly traumatized. She recalls just walking in circles pacing around, trying to process what happened, absolutely grief-stricken by the sudden & violent loss of the love of her life. All that she imagined their future to be was gone. Jessica said that every single day, she still sees the images from that morning & went on to say that at that moment, My whole world was taken away.
It had only been two months earlier at the very location on that property that Patrick had asked Jessica to be his wife. Jessica was working as a bank teller at the time & before she met Patrick, she had only recently ended her tumultuous relationship with Greg. Jessica explained that when she met Patrick, they had an instant connection that felt like love at first sight.
Investigators found the front door of the home ajar, the glass from the window shattered, littering the floor with shards. It was immediately evident that what happened to Patrick was something he could have never even had time to react to. As he went to investigate the package, assuming it was the much anticipated engagement ring, there were multiple shots fired & Patrick was killed in an ambush-style assault.
It was obvious that this was a targeted killing & to investigators, someone clearly had a vendetta against Patrick based on the picture of the crime scene. The house & property was combed & investigators discovered that the killer had taken Patrick’s laptop as well as the hard drive from the home’s security system. They also found unique shell casings from 300 Blackout ammunition which are often used in semi-automatic weapons such as an AR-15.
Investigators became aware that this had not been the first time someone had shot at Patrick. One year earlier in 2017, he contacted the police after his neighbor fired shots at him because of an ongoing argument about trespassing. During that incident, the man was arrested & Patrick hadn’t been harmed. As they looked into the neighbors whereabouts, they noted that he was in custody at the time of Patrick’s murder which removed from the list of suspects.
When detectives asked Jessica if Patrick had any enemies or knew of someone who wanted to hurt him, she immediately told them about Greg Bender. She explained that he had not accepted their breakup & wouldn’t tolerate her seeing other men. Jessica had been living in fear because the man was basically shadowing her every movement as she continued on with her life after their breakup. When the couple met in 2009, Greg was twice Jessica’s age at 42-years-old & lived in the wealthy city of Windermere, a suburb of Orlando. She explained that Greg was the kind of guy that enjoyed flashing his wealth. He lived in a gorgeous home, drove fast cars & had a large gun collection.
After Jessica met Greg, but before they started dating, she was in a brief relationship with another man & Greg ended up stalking him. He knew exactly where the man lived & threatened to tie him up & hurt him. She admits that she was naive & despite the red flags, after a few years of dating, she accepted his proposal. Their relationship came crashing down when she made a surprise visit to visit Greg at the hospital after he had a procedure & found another woman sitting in his hospital room.
As Jessica explained to the woman that she was Greg’s fiance, she showed her the engagement ring that she wore. In response, the woman showed Jessica her own ring & said, I’m his wife! Jessica remembers her heart dropping when she realized that Greg had been living a lie & was a married man.
Several days later, he called Jessica to do damage control & explained that his marriage was basically a business arrangement & he’d only married her so her son could go to school in the district where he lived. Jessica gave Greg an ultimatum & told him he had until the end of the year to leave her & end whatever the relationship happened to be. When he failed to divorce the other woman, Jessica ended the relationship in 2017 & only one month later she met Patrick.
When Greg discovered Jessica’s relationship with Patrick through Facebook, he began sending threatening messages to Patrick. Detective Chad Weaver began looking through Patrick’s phone & came across the voicemails from Greg. When they heard the voicemail of Greg saying that he was going to put his plan into action, Jessica explained that he had previously threatened to hire a hitman or do the job of killing Patrick himself.
Jessica & Patrick reported the threatening evidence & a restraining order was issued against Greg. In the process, he was ordered to turn over his large collection of guns. Things were starting to settle down & Jessica was finally feeling more at ease at the time that Patrick was gunned down. However, on the morning of Patrick’s murder, Greg called Jessica out of the blue at work for the first time in two months, but since she saw his name on the caller ID, she didn’t answer. Even before she heard from Max, she felt unsettled because she had not heard from Greg in months & wondered why he was suddenly reaching out to her.
On the same day of Patrick’s murder, detectives asked Jessica to call Greg back so they could listen in on the conversation & she agreed & put the call on speakerphone. When she accused him of ruining her life & getting his revenge, he feigned ignorance & asked her, What are you talking about? He told Jessica that he saw what happened on the news & said, I feel sorry for you. When she brought up his previous threats about a hitman & killing Patrick, he denied ever saying it. When she outright asked if he had been the one to kill Patrick, he said, I’m your friend. I did not do this. Jessica was adamant that she could tell that he was lying.
Investigators didn’t have the evidence to make an arrest for murder, but they were able to arrest Greg that very day for violating the restraining order since he contacted Jessica on the phone. In the meantime, detective Weaver got a phone call from Greg’s ex-wife, Daymara Sanchez who said that she had some valuable information.
The following day, February 28, Weaver met Daymara in a secluded parking lot & he could immediately see that she was very nervous. She explained that about two months earlier, in December of 2017, she & Gregory divorced & she moved out of the home they shared. In the process of moving, she came across a blue spiral notebook that belonged to Greg & started reading. Daymara believed that what Greg wrote sounded like an elaborate murder plan & when she asked him about it, he claimed it was only a fantasy. She indicated that she moved out & forgot all about it, but when she saw the news report of Patrick’s murder, it sounded very similar to what she read in Greg’s spiral notebook.
The information she provided was enough for detectives to obtain a search warrant & Greg Bender’s home was searched that same day, February 28, 2018. They never fathomed that he would keep such a potentially incriminating piece of evidence, but when they entered his home office, they found the notebook that Daymara spoke about.
Sitting right inside the garbage can were a couple of crumpled pieces of paper with a written plan of Patrick’s murder complete with a drawn map of Patrick’s property.
Patrick’s address was written on the papers as well as notes as to how to enter & exit the property without being detected. The notes included: Dispose of clothes, plate, tracker, gloves. Put duct tape on the bottom of a second pair of shoes so no tread prints. Wait for confirm that he is alone. Then turn off cell phones. It was clear he had taken everything into account in terms of getting rid of the evidence but he’d overlooked the plans themselves. The only fingerprints found on the two pieces of paper were Greg’s.
Investigators also found ammunition & shell casings that matched those found at the crime scene. Only two of four shell casings had been found at the crime scene & during their search, detectives came across one shell casing in a desk drawer that was an exact match. The murder weapon has never been recovered, but Jessica confirmed that while she was dating Greg, he did own an AR 15. Detective Weaver speculates that the gun used in the murder is likely sitting at the bottom of a lake.
Detective Weaver theorizes that on the morning of the murder, Greg was lying in wait in the bushes on Patrick’s property & made a phone call posing as a delivery man. When Patrick was notified, he likely assumed that the highly anticipated engagement ring had arrived. As Patrick came to the front door, Greg Bender stood on the porch & fired four shots, killing Patrick.
Armed with this evidence, detective Weaver knew they had a solid case against Greg Bender & less than 48 hours after Patrick was murdered, investigators had an arrest warrant & he was charged with Patrick’s murder. By this time, he had been released from jail after his arrest for violating the restraining order & officers found him in his front yard.
During Jessica’s 30th birthday celebration, Patrick’s family presented her with her intended engagement ring that Patrick was never able to give her. She still wears the ring because she feels that Patrick will always be the love of her life.
The trial began three years after Patrick’s murder in 2021 & as she sat in the courtroom, The prosecution was fully aware that there was no murder weapon, no eyewitnesses that can attest to seeing Greg at the crime scene & no DNA evidence to prove that he was the killer. It was a case based on circumstantial evidence. Jessica wore her engagement ring in the courtroom each day & served as the prosecution’s star witness & was the first to testify. She explained that Greg was an incredibly jealous & controlling person who had made many threats before Patrick’s murder.
During the trial, it came out that Greg had made secret video recordings after he hired a private investigator to a lunch & dinner outing with Jessica in November 2017, a handful of months after she started dating Patrick. One of the videos depicts the two sitting together as Greg rubbed Jessica’s leg, held her hand & kissed her head. As this was happening, Jessica indicated that she was very confused since this wasn’t his typical behavior even when they were together. Greg had the videos recorded so he could give them to Patrick to cause upheaval in Jessica & Patrick’s relationship. His plan worked for a short time & after he gave the videos to Patrick, it caused turmoil & they broke up for a couple of days.
When the defense questioned why Jessica was out with Greg while she was in a relationship with Patrick at the time, she indicated that she was trying to diffuse the situation between herself, Patrick & Greg after he had failed to leave her alone & began making threats. She told them that according to Greg, if she spent time with him, no one would get hurt.
The defense tried to spin the story & indicated that Patrick’s father Max was attracted to Jessica, something both he & Jessica adamantly denied. They also said that Max had the means & motive to harm his son due to discrepancies in his whereabouts on the day of the murder. As Max was on the stand, he argued that as a construction worker, he was constantly moving from place to place with his various jobs & it’s possible that he simply got confused with his schedule.
Cell phone experts were also called to the stand to connect Greg’s personal phone to a burner phone that could be tied to the murder. It was the burner phone that was used to call Max on the morning of the murder.
Greg Bender chose not to testify in his own defense. The prosecution made closing arguments that the only person who had motive to kill Patrick was Greg. The restraining order was put in place because of his threats. The detailed murder plan was written by Greg & found in the trash can of his home office. A shell casing that matched what was found at the crime scene was also found in a junk drawer of his home.
After four days of testimony, the jury began their deliberations. Greg Bender was found guilty of first-degree murder as he sat emotionless as the verdict was read.
In Florida, a conviction of first-degree murder is an automatic sentence of life in prison without the possibility of parole. Standing only feet away from Greg, Patrick’s family was given the opportunity to address him in the courtroom. Max gave a tearful & strong victim impact statement as he stood & looked Greg square in the eyes. On top of losing his son in such a violent & sudden way, he had been accused of his own son’s murder during the trial.
Despite the guilty verdict, Patrick’s family still feel anger that the restraining order that was put in place to protect their son had failed. With the restraining order, Greg was ordered to turn over his gun collection to authorities at the Orange County Sheriff’s office. However, this was something he never did & without probable cause for a search warrant, the weapons were never seized.
One week after the conviction, it would have been Patrick’s 29th birthday. Jessica & Patricia went out to the beach to celebrate & honor his life.
References:
