A career criminal wanted for setting his girlfriend on fire has been arrested and charged with first-degree murder.
Margarita Blanco, 41, passed away at Jackson Memorial Hospital around noon Friday, succumbing to the severe burns and injuries she suffered at the hands of Jesus Alvarez.
Alvarez, also 41, was on the run since the crime and considered dangerous, Miami-Dade Police said.
Witnesses say Alvarez chased Blanco around the mobile home park in which they lived, repeatedly striking her as she ran. When she reached their own home and went inside to escape him, he followed.
“He beat her wherever: there, here, inside my own house, in the street," said Blanco's mother, Julia Mendez. "He beat her in front of people. He didn't not care."
Then, in front of her mother, Alvarez doused his girlfriend with a flammable liquid from a five-gallon container, lit her on fire, and fled.
Police say the wanted man was spotted by a family member near Northwest 17th Avenue and 23rd Street in Northwest Miami-Dade Saturday night and subsequently arrested.
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"Nothing is going to bring her back," said Blanco's 19-year-old son Andrew Perez. "What he has to do is rot in hell or get the life sentence or something, because nothing is going to bring her back."
