A Queens man, 25, received a 30-year prison sentence on Thursday after tying up his ex-girlfriend, stuffing her in a small suitcase and leaving her to suffocate at the side of a Connecticut road.
Javier Da Silva Rojas pleaded guilty to a single count of kidnapping for the fatal abduction of Valerie Reyes, 24, in 2019.
On Thursday, the illegal immigrant, who was living in New York City, was sentenced to 30 years in prison.
Javier Da Silva Rojas, 25, was sentenced to 30 years in prison and an additional two years of supervised release for murdering his ex-girlfriend Valerie Reyes, 24, in 2019 after shoving her in a suitcase and leaving her on the side of the road in Connecticut
Reyes (pictured) told her mother 'she was nervous, anxious and afraid someone was going to murder her.' Rojas apologized the family at the trial on Thursday and said he was 'repulsed' by his actions
The White Planes, New York, federal court had heard how he drove to Reyes's house on January 28, 2019, and switched his phone to airplane mode before entering her New Rochelle home.
The couple allegedly got into a vicious alteration that left Reyes with a head trauma and bruising around the face, prosecutors reported.
Reyes, who was still breathing, was then bound by Rojas with packing tape and twine before he shoved her inside a suitcase. He drove 10 miles from her home to Greenwich, Connecticut, and ditched the suitcase the in a wooden area, court documents said.
Rojas told investigators that Reyes fell to the floor and hit her head after they had sex at her home a week before her body was found, federal authorities said.
He told investigators that he put packing tape over her mouth, bound her
