Cook County prosecutors said an Oak Park man strangled a nursing student last month who he had met online.
Richard Chavez, 24, has been charged with first degree murder in the death of Charisma Ehresman, of Forest View. Prosecutors said Chavez told detectives back on January 25th that he had hooked up with the then-missing 20 year-old but claimed she was gone the next morning.
Three days before Charisma Ehresman’s body was found in the back seat of her car left abandoned in Austin, her phone had pinged at Richard Chavez’s house. That’s according to prosecutors who said a private security camera showed the 20-year-old nursing student entering the home with Chavez on January 23rd. Prosecutors claimed police found a half-packed suitcase in Chavez’s bedroom and a mask he was seen wearing on surveillance video after ditching Ehresman’s car.
The state’s attorney’s office said while he was in police custody, Chavez called his parents and told them to get his passport ready. A judge ordered him held without bond.
Chavez will have to stay in jail until his court hearing Wednesday on first degree murder charges.