The two women and the American man met in a well-known Tijuana strip club. They were young, attractive, and dancers. He frequently went out with just one woman. He set up a Valentine’s Day date with another. To accompany him to a hotel, he paid a third. Then, according to Mexican authorities, he allegedly killed them mercilessly.
Iván Carpio Sánchez, the attorney general of Baja California, said the guy displayed “violent and psychopathic behavior” in December and likened him to Ted Bundy, one of American history’s most notorious serial killers.
The victims’ relatives grieved for more than a year, their suffering made worse by the fact that the suspect seemed to vanish into thin air.
The suspect was then detained by American officials on July 6, nearly two years after he is said to have started his killing rampage. He was recognized as Downey, California native Bryant Rivera. Witnesses described him as being in his 30s, 5’6″ tall, with a light brown complexion and a face ravaged by acne.
The only reason U.S. authorities wanted Rivera’s arrest was for the alleged murder of 20-year-old Angela Carolina Acosta Flores in January 2022, even though Mexican authorities have branded him a serial killer and charged him with the deaths of three others. Mexico wants Rivera for extradition.
“The United States understands that Mexico may add additional charges when it submits the formal request for extradition,” according to the June 29 complaint filed by the U.S. attorney’s office before a federal magistrate judge in Los Angeles.
The complaint, which asks for a temporary arrest order and lists the evidence against Rivera for killing Acosta, was made public after he was apprehended.
According to the complaint, Rivera and Acosta met on January 24, 2022, at the Hong Kong Gentlemen’s Club. One of the most popular strip clubs in Mexico, the club advertises on its website “intimate VIP pleasures, amazing stage shows, hot tubs and shower shows.” Americans frequently cross the border to visit the club, and it is rumored that limos transport American customers from the point of entry. Dancer and sex worker Acosta had a career.
Rivera and Acosta entered the Cascadas hotel at 10:11 p.m. The hotel is above the club and is run by the same business.
Acosta texted her mother to let her know she would be in room 404 with a client for 30 minutes as a precaution.
Rivera departed the room by himself at 11:49 and made his way out of the hotel by taking the stairs. A surveillance video at the San Ysidro Port of Entry recorded Rivera entering the country on foot thirteen minutes later. No other people could be seen entering or leaving the hotel room, according to the surveillance camera.
Acosta’s mother went to the Hong Kong Gentlemen’s Club about midnight to hunt for her daughter because she wasn’t returning calls. She was informed by a club manager that Acosta “probably still busy.” Around three in the morning, Acosta’s boyfriend showed up at the pub, similarly certain that something was amiss. According to the U.S. attorney’s lawsuit, a manager at Hotel Cascadas declined to look for Acosta because the room had been rented out until 1 p.m. the next day.
Hotel staff entered room 404 on January 25 just before noon and discovered Acosta’s death. She was strangled to death, an autopsy revealed.
Carpio Sánchez claims that Rivera killed another dancer he met at the Hong Kong Gentlemen’s Club just three weeks later.
After embarking on a Valentine’s Day date with an American man she met at the club, Elizabeth Martnez Cigarroa, 25, vanished. On February 17, 2022, her body was discovered with apparent evidence of assault in the back of her abandoned truck.
According to Zeta Tijuana, Rivera is also accused in the 2021 murder of a young woman who had previously worked as a sex worker and temporarily at the Hong Kong Gentlemen’s Club. Prior to August 30, 2021, when he allegedly set up a rendezvous with her at a motel in Tijuana, Rivera was the woman’s frequent client. Days later, her body was discovered in a trash can. She had been killed by being battered and strangled.
Other victims haven’t been ruled out by investigators.
