Christian Bajina Rivera: 5 Fast Facts You Need to Know





  • Updated Aug 21, 2018 at 5:16pm



Christian Bajina Rivera.

Christian Bajina Rivera has been arrested in the death of University of Iowa student Mollie Tibbetts. The 20-year-old from was found dead on August 21, more than a month after she went missing in a case that drew nationwide attention, according to reports.

The 24-year-old Rivera is being held on an immigration detainer and police said they confirmed with the Department of Homeland Security that he is an “illegal alien.” He has been charged with first-degree murder. Rivera is a resident of rural Poweshiek County, Iowa, and has been in the area for about four to seven years, police said at a press conference. He faces a penalty of up to life in prison without parole.

Investigators first approached Rivera on August 20 and police said he was cooperative and was willing to talk about what happened. According to police, surveillance video from Brooklyn residents helped them identify Rivera through a car spotted on a video that showed Tibbetts running before her disappearance.

Tibbetts was last seen the evening of July 18 when she went for a run in her hometown of Brooklyn, Iowa. She had been staying at her boyfriend’s brother’s house, where she was dog-sitting while her boyfriend, Dalton Jack, his brother and his brother’s fiancee were out of town, according to police and her family. She texted her mother that night and sent Jack a Snapchat message, but was not heard from again. When she didn’t show up for work at a day camp on July 19, she was reported missing. Local authorities from the Poweshiek County Sheriff’s Office were soon joined in the search by the Iowa Bureau of Criminal Investigation and the FBI.


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Mollie Tibbetts.
Brooklyn is a city of about 1,400 people in eastern Iowa, located midway between Des Moines and Cedar Rapids. The community rallied around the Tibbetts family as the search for Mollie stretched to over a month. Tibbetts spent part of her childhood in the Oakland, California, area, where her father still lives, and then moved to her mother’s native Iowa along with her two brothers. She graduated from Brooklyn-Guernsey-Malcom High School in 2017 and was about to enter her sophomore year at the University of Iowa, where she was studying psychology.

This report will be updated with more information about the suspect as it is made available. Here is what we know so far about Christian Rivera and the death of Mollie Tibbetts:

1. Rivera Led Investigators to the Corn Field Where Tibbetts Was Found Dead in a Cornfield, Concealed by Corn Stalks, Police Say

Mollie Tibbetts’ body was found in Powieshiek County, Iowa, according to Fox News.

Police said at a press conference that Christian Rivera led them to Tibbetts’ body after he was interviewed about her. Her body was found in a corn field, where her remains were covered up by corn stalks, according to police.




Todd Magel
✔@ToddMagelKCCI
The Mollie Tibbetts scene near Guernsey, Iowa. Media from across the state on Highway 21 just south of I-80.
12:03 PM - Aug 21, 2018


Her body was located in a rural part of Powieshiek County, about 12 miles away from her hometown of Brooklyn. The body was found on 460th Avenue off Highway 21, southeast of Brooklyn, between Guernsey and Deep River. Police blocked off a gravel road in an area near five farms. The road had been closed since at least 5 a.m. local time, farmers told KCCI-TV.



Tommie Clark
✔@TommieClarkKCCI

BREAKING: We just watched a medical examiner vehicle drive down this road off HWY 21 near Guernsey, IA. DCI confirms body found in rural Poweshiek County. Crimestoppers of Central Iowa says believes body is of #MollyTibbetts No word yet if this is in fact the location. @KCCINews
10:21 AM - Aug 21, 2018

The state medical examiner’s office arrived at the scene about 10 a.m., the news station reports.

2. He Told Police He Saw Tibbetts While Running & Approached Her


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Mollie Tibbetts with her boyfriend, Dalton Jack.

Tibbetts had last been seen about 7:30 p.m. on July 18 by a neighbor while jogging in Brooklyn, according to police. She sent a Snapchat message to her boyfriend, Dalton Jack, which he opened about 10 p.m., but it was not clear when she sent it. “Just a selfie with a caption like any other normal snapchat, but the background looked like she was indoors,” he said. Jack was ruled out as a suspect early on in the investigation.

During the investigation, police used Tibbetts’ electronic devices, including her computer, phone and information taken from her FitBit fitness tracker in an effort to locate her.

Her cousin, Emily Heaston, said police searched the home where Tibbetts had been staying. “Everything is right where she left it. Wallet, laptop, everything else was all right where she last placed it,” Heaston told KWQC-TV.

3. Tibbetts Family & Friends Called Her a ‘Fighter’ & Said It Was Unlike Her to Disapear


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Mollie Tibbetts.
Mollie Tibbetts’ aunt, Kim Calderwood, told the Des Moines Register that she remains hopeful because she knows her niece. “She’s strong and sassy and a fighter and stubborn and she is not a quitter,” Calderwood told the newspaper.

She added she is a “a “beautiful, positive girl.” Tibbetts graduated from Brooklyn, Guernsey, and Malcom High School in 2017, according to her Facebook page. Her aunt told the Register that Tibbetts was on the debate team, ran track and was involved in her local Catholic church, St. Bridget Church.

Calderwood told WOI-TV, “This is not like her at all. She’s a very responsible and conscientious young woman.”

Laura Calderwood told The Gazette her daughter loved life at school, “She’s very intelligent and she loved college and really enjoyed studying. She loves life and lives it to the fullest. She is very happy and social, she loved to sing and perform and she loves caring for the kids at the day care where she works.

Tibbetts’ mother, Laura Calderwood, lives in Iowa, while her father, Robert Tibbetts, lives in Oakland, California. A family member posted on Facebook that Mollie had recently returned home from a visit with her family in California. She has two brothers, Jake and Scott and is the middle child in her family.

“It’s exhausting, I don’t know where she is, I don’t know if she’s safe,” Tibbett’s mother Laura Calderwood told KGO-TV. Mollie spent some of her childhood living in the Bay Area, where her father still lives. Her father was in Iowa helping in the search, but returned home a day before his daughter’s body was found.

4. Police Searched Several Areas Around Brooklyn, Including a Pig Farm Multiple Times & Narrowed Down to 5 Locations, Including a Car Wash, Commercial Strip & a Truck Stop


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Mollie Tibbetts.
During the month that Tibbetts was missing, police followed several leads and searched many location around Brooklyn. The rural area made the search more difficult, authorities said.

Powieshiek County Sheriff Kriegel told ABC News, “We’re surrounded by farm ground: corn and soybeans. Right now the corn is probably eight, nine feet tall. The only way you can search it is basically walk down every other row. It’s difficult. Even the planes flying over have a difficulty looking down in the corn rows.”

Police searched a pig farm in Guernsey, Iowa, multiple times and interviewed a man who was connected to the farm. The man took a polygraph test as part of the investigation, but was eventually cleared.

In the days before Tibbetts’ body was found, police had narrowed the search to five locations in the Brooklyn area, including a car wash, a commercial strip and a truck stop, according to Fox News. It is not clear why police focused on those areas
5. A $400,000 Reward Was Raised to Help Find Tibbetts & Police Received Many Tips During Their Investigation


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Mollie Tibbetts.
More than $400,000 in reward money was raised for information leading to Mollie Tibbetts being found as the case captured the hearts and minds of people all across the country. Greg Willey, the vice president of Crime Stoppers of Central Iowa, told The Associated Press the money would be used to catch and convict a suspect or suspects in Tibbetts’ death. It is not clear if any of the reward money has been claimed as a result of the discovery of Tibbetts’ body and the arrest of a suspect.

Police were inundated with tips throughout the investigation and set up a website, findingmollie.iowa.gov, because of the extensive interest in the case.

Her disappearance rattled the small town of Brooklyn.

“We’re a close-knit community and I couldn’t even imagine this happening to one of my kids. We love Mollie. They’re family and we look after each other,” Carla Kriegel told the Globe Gazette.

“A daughter to anybody in this community is a daughter to everybody. We all hope the same effort would be made toward our own children,” town resident Joy Vanlandschoot, who has helped with the efforts, told the Des Moines Register.

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