Trial begins for Glen Ellyn man accused of murdering ex-wife
Juan Granados was a violent, abusive man who, when he learned his ex-wife was moving out of the Glen Ellyn apartment they shared in October 2011, raped and strangled her, DuPage County prosecutor Alexadria Levan argued Wednesday.
Granados' attorney, Laura Mitacek, painted an entirely different picture, arguing her client loved Nancy Bustos and she still had feelings for him.
They had consensual sex that day, but then Bustos sent Granados two videos, one in which she was having sex with someone else and one where her boyfriend was doing a striptease, "and he (Granados) loses it," Mitacek said.
Granados' trial on charges of first-degree murder and criminal sexual assault began Wednesday before a jury of nine men and five women in DuPage County Judge Brian Telander's courtroom.
Nancy Bustos, 36, was strangled and left in a bathtub, prosecutors said.
Granados then took their 4-year-old son to Granados' mother's apartment and left him there. He borrowed a brother's vehicle and fled to Mexico. Criminal charges were filed in 2012, and he was extradited in 2017.
Levan said evidence and testimony will show Granados physically abused Bustos during their marriage. After their marriage ended, they continued to live together with their young son and daughter.
But Bustos had a boyfriend and was making plans to move out, Levan said. Granados was jealous.
Levan said the boyfriend will testify that once, when Bustos put a call to him on speakerphone, he heard Granados say he would kill Bustos and then go to Mexico.
The day of the slaying, Granados texted Bustos, asking her to stay with him that night. "This is your last chance," the text said, according to Levan.
"He knew she was moving on and he could not stand her moving on if it did not include him," Levan said.
But Mitacek had a different take on the relationship - one in which a devoted Granados put up with Bustos' divorcing him to marry another man so that man could get legal residence in the United States.
Mitacek said Granados has taken responsibility for killing Bustos but that he is not guilty of first-degree murder. At pretrial hearings, attorneys have discussed whether he could ask the jury to find him guilty of second-degree murder - that he acted from a sudden, intense passion after being provoked by Bustos, negligently or accidentally killing her.
Their relationship was tempestuous, according to Mitacek. That stress increased when the company Granados worked for closed and he lost his job.
"Nancy was a liar. Nancy lied about everything to everyone, even to those close to her," Mitacek told the jury.
Mitacek said Bustos lied about her age to her boyfriend and her employer, telling them she was 25; lied to her family by saying she was a legal secretary for a judge, when she was just an office worker for a lawyer; lied about how she met the lawyer and her boyfriend; did not tell the boyfriend she was married; and lied to her father about having an order of protection against Granados.
And she lied to Granados about the nights and days she spent away from their home, telling him she was either working or going out with female friends, when she was instead with her boyfriend, Mitacek said.
Both sides mentioned a letter Granados sent to his former in-laws, a little over a week after the slaying, in which he admitted killing Bustos. Levan said it was "a story that would blame Nancy for what he did." Mitacek characterized it as Granados "pouring out his heart to the people he had wounded most."