AFTER college student Christian Aguilar disappeared from his college campus, investigators questioned Pedro Bravo, the last person to see him alive; finding his stories inconsistent – and inaccurate.
Christian Aguilar’s murder, and the case made against Pedro Bravo, are the subject of ABC’s 20/20true crime exposé, Killer on Campus, airing on Friday, March 1, 2024, and streaming exclusively on Hulu the next day.
Who is Pedro Bravo?
Pedro Bravo was born on October 29, 1993.
He was a student at the Doral Academy Preparatory School, a charter school in Miami, Florida.
Bravo attended the school along with his girlfriend, Erika Friman, and friend, Christian Aguilar.
Friman would later testify in court that she broke up with Bravo shortly before moving to Gainesville, Florida, to attend Santa Fe Community College.
This led Bravo to change his post-graduation plans, and he transferred from Florida International University to Santa Fe College to try and win Friman back.
Aguilar, meanwhile, began attending the University of Florida, studying to become a biomedical engineer.
The trio remained friends, and according to Bravo’s journals, he was steadfast in trying to woo Friman back as his girlfriend.
After their breakup, Bravo documented his thoughts in several journal entries.
“I wish this is just the break we needed between us then we will be back together. Though I don’t understand I will seek to make some things better,” he wrote.
On July 11, 2012, he wrote, “Am I a fool? Am I silly to still love her deeply even through all this? I just wish she felt the same?”
“She cut me out on Facebook today,” he wrote, referring to Friman, on July 29, 2012.
“I feel a piece of my world ending already. Though now begins my journey to win her back.”
There was just one small problem.
Aguilar had recently started dating Friman, Bravo’s ex-girlfriend, and their mutual friend, at the beginning of their college freshman year.
On August 1, 2012, Bravo wrote, “I miss her, what’s wrong with me? I’m scared if she’s OK, but now I’m more scared that someone will take her from me. That I really don’t want.”
On September 20, 2012, Aguilar agreed to meet with Bravo, who he believed was struggling with depression over his failed relationship.
“He was thinking of it as a friend — maybe there is something I could tell him that would help him get through it,” Friman said of Aguilar, as reported by The Gainesville Sun.
“Christian wouldn’t fight. He was not much of a fighter and would walk away,” she added.
By then, Bravo had already long discovered the relationship between his best friend and his ex-girlfriend, leading to a build-up of jealousy and rage.
He believed Aguilar had gone behind his back, and lost trust in him as a friend and confidante.
On August 9, 2012, Bravo wrote, “My life slowly ended in Miami, so I came up with a plan to have it brought back again. And nothing will keep me from leaving here to Gainesville. Nothing.”
“Even after all you have put me through all the heartbreak and questioning and long days I still love you more than anything itself,” Bravo wrote on August 23, 2012, talking about Friman.
Erika Friman would later testify that she had had a conversation with Bravo in early September about their relationship, or lack thereof.
“I was trying to calm him down, I cared about anyone who was suicidal, I was concerned since he was suicidal.”
“I thought talking to him would help him. Please God, don’t do anything crazy. Please let me talk to you,” she said.
“He asks me if me and Christian were dating. I told him we were not, so I lied to him. I lied because it was a very sensitive time in his life,” Friman said.
She confirmed that she also told Bravo later that month that she “didn’t see a future with him.”
“I hope I made myself as clear as possible that I didn’t see a future with him.”
What happened to Christian Aguilar?
On September 20, 2012, Christian Aguilar agreed to meet with Pedro Bravo.
Friman said that she knew the two were meeting that day, and became concerned after she didn’t hear from Aguilar later in the day.
Aguilar didn’t respond to several calls and texts, leading Friman to call Bravo the following day.
“He said they [Bravo and Aguilar] got into a verbal argument and that Christian asked to get out of the car,” Friman said.
“I thought that was strange because my sister has a car and he would have called her to pick him up.”
Friman immediately went to the police to report Aguilar as a missing person and asked Bravo to join her at the station, which he did.
Bravo initially told police the same story he told Friman; that the duo had met up to get a bite to eat, went to Best Buy to buy a Kanye West CD, and that Aguilar left after they had gotten into a verbal fight.
However, he later changed his statement, adding that he had punched Aguilar and left him on the side of the road.
Police continued to find inconsistencies with Bravo’s story, and obtained a search warrant for his vehicle.
They found a Gatorade bottle and a roll of duct tape inside the car.
A Florida Department of Law Enforcement analyst would later confirm that the bottle “contained acetaminophen, diphenhydramine, and other substances,” and that Bravo had allegedly given the bottle to Aguilar to drink.
Law enforcement officials also found blood on a car floor mat that matched Aguilar’s DNA.
A search warrant obtained for Bravo’s home found a receipt for a shovel, journal entries filled with disturbing images and writing, and Aguilar’s backpack.
A consultant also analyzed Bravo’s computer and found searches for sedatives, murder, and other criminal topics.
On September 24, 2012, Bravo was arrested and charged with first-degree murder.
On October 5, 2012, the search for Aguilar was called off.
However, just days later, on October 13, 2012, a group of hunters found Aguilar’s remains in a shallow grave in a wooded area in Levy County.
Investigators were later able to confirm that Bravo’s vehicle had gone to Levy County in Gainesville and that Bravo had used his flashlight application on his phone the night of Aguilar’s disappearance.
They were able to piece together what happened that night – that Bravo had drugged Aguilar, killed him with a moving strap found in the back seat of his vehicle, and drove out the woods, where he dug a hole and buried the body.
Duct tape recovered from Aguilar’s remains matched the same roll of tape found in Bravo’s vehicle.
Bravo’s former cellmate, Michael Angelo, later testified that Bravo had told him it took about “13 minutes to kill Aguilar” that night, which Bravo still vehemently denies, as reported by WUFT News.
Months after Bravo was charged, and after Aguilar’s body was found, his parents visited Aguilar’s gravesite on what would have been his 19th birthday.
“It’s a father’s nightmare, it’s no way that I can express it, it’s painful,” Carlos Aguilar, Christian’s father, said, fighting back tears, as reported by NBC 6 South Florida.
Where is Pedro Bravo now?
In another journal entry read by Erika Friman at the trial, Pedro Bravo wrote, “I am a monster for having hurt Christian the way I did.”
“No apology will be enough to make up for what I have done.”
On August 15, 2024, a jury convicted Bravo of his charges.
He was charged with:
- First-degree murder
- Kidnapping and false imprisonment
- Poisoning food or water
- Improper transportation of human remains
- Tampering with evidence
- Giving false information to law enforcement officers in a missing person case
- Providing false reports following the 2012 disappearance of Aguilar
Bravo “looked stoic during the reading of the verdict,” while Friman and Claudia Aguilar, Aguilar’s mother, “were seen crying in the courtroom after the reading of the verdict,” as reported by WUFT News.
The judge presiding over the case, Judge James Colaw, sentenced Bravo to natural life in prison, meaning Bravo will never be eligible for parole, on count one of murder in the first degree.
For his remaining charges, Bravo received anywhere from 60 days in the county jail, for “improper transportation of human remains,” to 30 years in jail for poisoning.
Before his sentencing, Bravo maintained that he did not kill Aguilar.
“I know in my heart and I know in my actions that day and God knows that I did not kill Christian Aguilar,” he said.
Bravo is currently serving his life sentence at the Okeechobee Correctional Institution in Okeechobee, Florida.
He’s been incarcerated since August 21, 2014.
After nearly a decade of silence, Bravo agreed to speak to 20/20 about the case and continues to maintain his innocence.
“No, I did not kill Christian,” Bravo told ABC News correspondent Victor Oquendo in an exclusive prison interview.
Meanwhile, Christian Aguilar’s father, Carlos Aguilar, told 20/20 that he has “zero doubt” that Bravo is guilty.
“I wish he can repent,” he told 20/20 reporters.
“I wish he can realize that he destroyed his family and my family, and being able to, once, say the truth and accept what he did,” he added.
Bravo’s interview will be a part of the 20/20 episode, Killer On Campus, airing at 9 pm ET on Friday, March 1, 2024.
The episode will also be available to stream the following day, exclusively on Hulu.