Christopher Clements is facing two separate trials for the alleged kidnappings and killings of Isabel Celis, 6, and Maribel Gonzalez, 13. His trial in connection with Maribel's death is first.
Caitlin Schmidt The first in a pair of trials for a man accused in the kidnappings and killings of two Tucson girls is set to begin Tuesday, four years after officials announced his arrest.
People are also reading… In March 2017, Clements led investigators to Isabel's remains, in a desert area northwest of Tucson, while he was trying to cut a deal to get an unrelated burglary charge dropped, court records show. Clements, a convicted sex offender who has a criminal history spanning more than two decades and four states, is accused of taking Isabel from her midtown home as her family slept in April 2012.
By the time he was 16, Clements was a registered sex offender in Oregon. He failed several times over the years to register as a sex offender — a requirement of his sentence. He was convicted of a felony assault charge in Washington in 2002, and in 2006, of felony theft in Oregon, both of which resulted in sentences of probation. In 2006 and 2007 he was convicted of failing to register as a sex offender in Florida and Oregon, receiving probation in both cases.
Court documents show that investigators found a letter written by Clements that implied there were actually four bodies left in the desert area. Clements was originally set to stand trial in 2021, but a change in judges and negative television coverage led to delays, court records show.
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