Man illegally in U.S. charged in death of Iowa college student

MONTEZUMA, Iowa — A man from Mexico living in the U.S. illegally has confessed to kidnapping college student Mollie Tibbetts while she was running in her small Iowa hometown, killing her and dumping her body in a rural field, authorities said Tuesday.

Cristhian Bahena Rivera, 24, was arrested and charged with first-degree murder in the death of Tibbetts, a University of Iowa student whose July 18 disappearance set off a search involving state and federal authorities.

Rivera led investigators early Tuesday to a body believed to be Tibbetts in a cornfield about 12 miles southeast of Brooklyn where Tibbetts was last seen running, Division of Criminal Investigation special agent Rick Rahn said.

Investigators said they zeroed in on Rivera after obtaining footage from surveillance cameras.

An affidavit attached to the criminal complaint against Rivera alleged that he admitted to investigators he got out of his car and started running alongside Tibbetts.

Tibbetts grabbed her phone and said she was going to call the police. The affidavit says Rivera panicked and then said he blacked out. Rivera next remembers seeing her earphones on his lap, and taking her bloody body out of the trunk of his car, it said.

“The defendant further described during the interview that he dragged Tibbetts on foot from his vehicle to a secluded location in a cornfield,” the affidavit said.

Investigators believe that Rivera is from Mexico and had been living in the area from four to seven years, Rahn said.