Teresa Guzman

• Missing Since 12/01/2008
• Missing From Las Vegas, Nevada
• Classification Endangered Missing
• Sex Female
• Race Hispanic
• Age 22 years old
• Height and Weight 5'4, 130 pounds
• Distinguishing Characteristics Hispanic female. Black hair, brown eyes. Guzman speaks only Spanish.

Details of Disappearance

Guzman's family last saw her in Las Vegas, Nevada during December 2008. She has never been heard from again. She left behind three young children, and her family didn't believe she would have abandoned them.

She told her family she wanted to move to Colorado or Oklahoma, but her estranged husband, Francisco Vazquez-Rosas, wouldn't let her take the children with her. Vazquez-Rosas said his wife had run away with another man, but her family stated she would not have left Las Vegas without telling anyone.

Guzman's brother-in-law reported her missing in May 2009. In January 2010, Vazquez-Rosas was indicted for his wife's murder. They had been separated for about three months by the time of her disappearance.

In December 2009, the couple's five-year-old daughter told an adult female relative that she'd seen her father choke her mother and then put her in a closet, then in a trash bag. The child's seven-year-old sister told a similar story, saying her parents had been fighting and then she saw her father put her mother in a garbage can.

The police interviewed Vazquez-Rosas, and he failed a polygraph test. He eventually confessed to Guzman's murder. According to him, on December 13 he and Guzman were together at an apartment in the 3100 block of south Nellis Boulevard. Guzman told him she was leaving and taking the children, and she wouldn't say where she planned to go.

They began fighting and he pushed her out the door, and she fell down onto the asphalt. He hid her body in a closet when he realized she was dead, then later put it in a trash bin.

A photograph of Vazquez-Rosas is posted with this case summary. His attorney stated he is innocent and suggested Guzman left of her own accord. Both he and Guzman are undocumented immigrants from Mexico, and his attorney claimed Vazquez-Rosas didn't report his wife's disappearance to authorities because he feared deportation.

The murder charge against Vazquez-Rojas was dismissed in April 2010, four months after he was indicted, after a judge ruled his confession had been coerced. Charges could be brought against him again, however, if more evidence surfaces.

Foul play is suspected in Guzman's disappearance due to the circumstances involved.