TUCSON, Ariz. (KGUN) — The kidnapping of six year old Isabel Celis was a cold case—a painful mystery that went five years without answers. It took hard work and cooperation from prosecutors and police to convince a jury Christopher Clements was the killer. Homicide detectives will always have a new case to solve but the team that solved this case took time to talk with KGUN9.
Tucson Police Homicide Detective Josh Cheek says, “I think this was a case that stayed with a lot of us. I mean, as a detective, you don't like to see a case going unsolved, particularly a case of this nature.“
Detective Jeff Lockwood says, “In terms of the difficulty of the cases that I've investigated, this ranks up there, it's one of the one of the most difficult ones. You know, we worked it for a year and a half, pretty much straight.”
Detectives Josh Cheek and Jeff Lockwood are partners looking back at a terrible case that touched our community, and touched them.
When someone kidnapped six year old Isabel Celis out of her family’s home it made people ask if your child can’t be safe in your home, where can anyone be safe?
A jury has ruled the kidnapper—and killer is Christopher Clements.
Cheek says, “I would describe him as, he's devious, calculating. I don't know that I've ever come across anybody like him in the 24-some years that I've been doing this job.”
Lockwood says, “Unfortunately, he was good at what he did. Calculating is a good word.”
It’s still a mystery exactly how Clements removed the young girl, without alerting Isabel’s father, mother, two brothers and several dogs.
“And I think the answer to that is an experienced calculating careful burglar.”
Five years after Isabel disappeared Clements wanted to cut a deal to get out of jail. He told FBI agents, drop a burglary charge and he’d lead them to Isabel Celis—or at least her remains. He never said he killed her, he just sort of knew because he’s tapped into the criminal world.
Josh Cheek says, “This concept of well people talk at the jail and maybe somebody knew where Isa’s remains were and maybe he overheard that that's just a ludicrous concept to me.”
Detective Cheek says only Clements knew where Isabel was because he put her in that remote piece of desert.
Pima County Detectives used a partial DNA match to tie Clements to remains of another girl found nearby: 13 year old Maribel Gonzales. She disappeared ten years ago. Clements is serving a life term in her murder.
In the Isabel Celis case, time left her remains too degraded to yield a DNA connection to Clements.
One jury could not agree on a verdict so Clements faced a second trial. In trial number two jurors found Clements guilty after prosecutors offered evidence that Clements showed suspicious behavior near the time Isabel disappeared and in that time period cell phone tracking put his phone roughly near where Isabel’s remains were found.
Prosecutors say they plan to ask for a life sentence with no chance of parole.
But Detectives Lockwood and Cheek can not be sure Clements killing stopped with Isabel and Maribel. Clements mentioned four bodies in that lonely patch of desert.
Josh Cheek says, “We searched several occasions trying in an effort to locate additional remains. And unfortunately, we were not able to locate those but that doesn't mean necessarily that there aren't more victims.”
