23-year-old Kenier David Murillo Aleman was sentenced to 16 years of prison after confessing in an abbreviated trial to having killed a 50-year-old French woman at the Pachamama Jungle River Lodge in Punta Uva, Cahuita, Limon.

The events occurred in October 27, 2016 when apparently three men participated in the robbery of the hotel, which was property Estelle Marie-Claire Jeanne; when the woman tried to intervene she was attacked and asphyxiated with a piece of cloth.

Her body was found by an employee of the hotel, lying on the floor; he explained that Clare lived alone and when the employees left the boutique hotel the day before the crime there were no guests. The woman had been living in Costa Rica for six years as an investor-resident.

Murillo was arrested in connection to the murder in December 2016 in his home in Hone Creek, during the search the police found evidence connecting him to the crime. Judiciary Investigative Police (OIJ) was not able to determine the identity of the other two men who participated in the robbery and murder.

The sentence was dictated by the Court House of Talamanca.

According to national daily La Nacion, Murillo also has another 5-year prison sentence as responsible for an aggravated assault, since he was identified along with another man as the responsible of assaulting two men who sold cheese in the county of Talamanca, event that occurred November 29, 2014.