Miami

Man Pleads Guilty, Sentenced to 45 Years in 2014 Killing of Miami Bartender

A man plead guilty and was sentenced to 45 years in prison as part of a plea deal for the 2014 death of a popular South Florida musician.

Raul Reinosa, 55, faced murder and burglary charges in the June 2014 killing of 28-year-old Louis Salgar. He entered the plea Friday, one day after the trial in the case began. 

Salgar, who was a bartender at the Broken Shaker, was found dead inside his home at Northeast 86th Street and 8th Court.

Police said Reinosa broke into Salgar's home. When he heard Salgar arrive home, Reinosa hid in a closet with a gun he found in the home, according to an arrest affidavit.

Salgar opened the closet and Reinosa pistol whipped him before shooting him three times, according to the affidavit.

"Three times in the front. Once in the head, once in the chest, once in the leg and then the back," prosecutor Scott Wartman said Thuesday.

Police said Reinosa then took Salgar's car, a Honda Civic, and fled the scene. Reinosa was arrested a few weeks later in St. Augustine and extradited to Miami-Dade County.

After the first day of the trial Thursday, Salgar's family members said they wanted justice.

"Hoping for justice, that will be the correct way to end it, you know that the guy is guilty, you know, and we’ve been waiting for three and a half years for this and we just want it to conclude as fast as it can," father Manuel Salgar said.

"It doesn’t get much easier, I can see him a million times and it will still be very hard to look at him," sister Nicole Salgar said.

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