MMA fighter convicted of killing sex worker in California

A mixed martial arts fighter was convicted Wednesday of killing a sex worker in California seven years ago. Nain Isaac Nieto Hernandez was found…

By: Karim Zidan | 1 year ago
MMA fighter convicted of killing sex worker in California
Bloody Elbow 2.0 | Anton Tabuena

A mixed martial arts fighter was convicted Wednesday of killing a sex worker in California seven years ago.

Nain Isaac Nieto Hernandez was found guilty of second-degree murder in the Dec. 2015 killing of 23-year-old Sarai Alcaraz, an escort from Long Beach. The news was first reported by the Orange County Register.

According to the trial brief, Police were called to an office building after an escort service reported one of its employees missing there. The officers then encountered Jordan Beltran, a driver who had brought Alcaraz to the office at 10pm and had been waiting for her to reemerge. Beltran informed the officers that Alcaraz had texted him at 10:29pm saying she got the money and was coming out.

However, while waiting for Alcaraz to remerge, Beltran saw a man leave the building and decided to confront him about Alcaraz’s location. The man, Hernandez, reportedly worked in the building as a janitor but appeared “very nervous” when confronted. When pressed by the driver, he claimed that Alcaraz had robbed him. He then drove away in a minivan.

When Beltran could not reach Alcaraz on her phone, he contacted the escort service, which notified the police. Officers arrived on scene and found the victim stuffed in a trash can in the supply closet. The victim had sustained “severe head and facial trauma” with “Blood running from both ears and her nose.”

Hernandez, whose driver’s license was found at the scene, pled not guilty and testified that he acted in self-defense when he claimed the victim attempted to rob him.

Hernandez is scheduled to be sentenced in October, 2022.

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About the author
Karim Zidan
Karim Zidan

Karim Zidan is a investigative reporter and feature writer focusing on the intersection of sports and politics. He has written for BloodyElbow since 2014 and has served as an associate editor since 2016. He also writes for The New York Times and The Guardian. Karim has been invited to speak about his work at numerous universities, including Princeton, and was a panelist at the South by Southwest (SXSW) film festival and the Oslo Freedom Forum. He also participated in the United Nations counter-terrorism conference in 2021. His reporting on Ramzan Kadyrov’s involvement in MMA, much of which was done for Bloody Elbow, has led to numerous award nominations, and was the basis of an award-winning HBO Real Sports documentary.

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