CA Businesswoman Killed Outside Burger Restaurant In Murder-For-Hire Plot: Cops

SAN BERNARDINO, CA — Five men face charges in a murder-for-hire plot in which a businesswoman’s estranged husband paid to have her killed outside a San Bernardino restaurant, police announced Tuesday.

Yesenia Torres was shot just before noon on Jan. 10 at Burger Point in the 400 block of West Mill Street, according to police, who said the attack looked like a robbery but was in fact a calculated plot to kill the woman spanning over a year.

The shooting occurred in broad daylight in front of customers and employees of the restaurant, police said during a press conference streamed by FOX 11 via YouTube.

Detectives quickly identified the gunman and getaway driver as Gerardo Llamas-Torres and Arnoldo Ruelas, according to police, who took them into custody on Jan. 16, recovering a large sum of money linked to the killing in the process.

Also in custody is Reynaldo Ruelas, an intermediary for the hired killers and their clients, Sergio Reveles and Juan Perez, the victim’s husband and Reveles’ business partner, police said.

At the heart of the plot was a contentious divorce between the couple, who were fighting over the division of multimillion-dollar assets, according to police, who said at the press conference the two owned a pallet company in San Bernardino.

Search warrants executed Feb. 6 at the homes and businesses of Reveles and Perez yielded over $286,000 in cash and multiple guns, police said.

All five men are charged with murder with special circumstances of robbery, financial gain and lying in wait, according to police.

The men all pleaded not guilty and are being held without bail, police said, adding they are set to appear for a hearing on March 14 at the San Bernardino Justice Center.