Army officials reveal new details in Vanessa Guillen case.
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On the night she vanished, three soldiers saw Guillen while they stood by a tree, smoking outside the arms room, Maj. Gen. Donna Martin, the Army’s provost marshal, who heads the Army’s Criminal Investigation Command, told “20/20.”She said the soldiers told investigators that they saw Guillen at “a time that would’ve indicated she had left Spc. Robinson’s arms room.”
While searching Robinson’s phone records, investigators found that Robinson had called Aguilar multiple times on the night Guillen vanished. The calls raised suspicion as Robinson initially told investigators he had been with Aguilar all night. Aguilar later changed her story, according to court documents, claiming that she and Robinson went on a drive to look at the stars that night.
Robinson “was not detained,” Martin explained. “He was not in police custody because of [how] the legal process works.” Nevertheless, investigators were suspicious he was involved in Guillen’s disappearance. Because the investigation is still ongoing, Army officials are not disclosing where or how he got the gun, but Martin said that the “firearm, I can tell you, was not a government weapon. So he did not get it from his arms room.”
At the time of Guillen’s death, he was a specialist and Guillen was a private first class. She ranked one level below him but she was also about to become a specialist. Martin said that she believes the allegation pertaining to the shower incident may have been a misunderstanding with a completely separate soldier rather than Robinson. Martin explained that during field exercises, soldiers would use baby wipes to clean themselves and referred to it as a “hygiene shower.”“She was actually behind a bush and she was conducting field sanitation,” Martin said.
Cecily Aguilar allegedly helped Aaron Robinson dismember and bury Guillen’s remains near the Leon River in Belton, Texas. “I think what happened was that [Robinson] was [a] friend for Cecily,” she added. “He was someone she could lean on.”When asked why Aguilar might have helped Robinson dispose of Guillen’s body as alleged by authorities, Clough said, “I think she was scared. The only way I can see her doing something like this is for the fear of her life.”