All it took was a look, a "bad face," and what began as a rivalry over a girl became a vicious stabbing that left a South Florida high school student dead on the ground in a pool of blood.
New documents were released yesterday that paint the picture of the tragic scene as it unfolded at Coral Gables Senior High, when 17-year-old Andy Rodriguez fatally stabbed classmate Juan Carlos Rivera.
The documents, obtained by the Miami Herald, include a taped police statement by Rodriguez, as well as surveillance video from the school.
According to the statement by Rodriguez, Rivera made a "bad face" to him in the moments before the Sept. 15 stabbing occurred in the school's hallway.
Rodriguez described the weapon as a boxcutter that he'd found while walking home from work. He said he'd decided to bring it to school to defend himself against Rivera.
"In case he attacked me first, like he did," Rodriguez said.
The two were reportedly in a dispute over Rodriguez's girlfriend, Daimilsis Salgado, who lived in the same building as Rivera. Salgado had given Rivera rides to school on a few occasions, which apparently angered Rodriguez.
Rodriguez and Salgado split, but later patched things up.
``It's when...when I got back with my girlfriend that he started looking at me funny," Rodriguez said. "I want to clarify the issue here that I never got in any fights over my girlfriend...I never even told her that he was looking at me funny."
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The day before the stabbing, the two had a confrontation at school, with Rivera bumping into Rodriguez. "Be careful," Rodriguez told Rivera. The next day things escalated further, when the two bumped into each other again, according to Rodriguez.
"I wasn't sure if he was going to attack me, but then I looked back and I saw him charging at me. I took several steps back and I put my feet firm on the ground, and then he came at me and I went at him and we went at it," Rodriguez told police.
After exchanging blows, the knife came out.
"I took it out of my pocket, and I got him like that, from the side," Rodriguez said. "Here in the side, and the other one, I think -- I don't know -- maybe around the back."
After he stabbed Rivera, Rodriguez told police that Rivera "attacked me with a pen," though no one could corroborate this detail.
With five stab wounds, including one to his heart, Rivera died on the ground.
Rodriguez's lawyer, Alexander Michaels, said it was self-defense.
"I don't like to talk strategy in the media," Michaels told the Herald. "But I believe we have a solid self-defense claim."
Rodriguez, who is facing second-degree murder charges, will be charged as an adult.
