Jacksonville Seaside police to announce ‘important’ replace in Jared Bridegan homicide investigation
The Jacksonville Seaside Police Division stated Tuesday that it “will announce a major improvement within the February 2022 homicide of Jared Bridegan” on Wednesday at midday.
State Legal professional Melissa Nelson and JBPD Chief Gene Paul Smith shall be on the information convention at JBPD headquarters.
Fox News Digital learned that Shanna Gardner-Fernandez, Bridegan’s ex-wife has moved 2,800 miles from Florida to the Pacific Northwest.
Practically one 12 months after the daddy of 4 was executed in front of his toddler, Bexley, in north Florida, Gardner-Fernandez quietly uprooted her 10-year-old twins with Jared and relocated to West Richland, Washington.
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When requested Monday to touch upon the numerous improvement within the case, she responded, “No, I’m sorry.” Minutes later, she was noticed in her white Tesla in a grocery retailer car parking zone, talking on her cellphone.
Gardner-Fernandez, who additionally goes by Gardner, told Action News Jax in a June interview that regardless of every little thing her household has been by way of, they’d no intention of leaving Jacksonville Seaside.
Jared’s second spouse, Kirsten Bridegan, with whom he shares 3-year-old Bexley and 1-year-old London, stated she was shocked Gardner-Fernandez had moved so far-off.
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“Truthfully, I used to be shocked,” she advised Fox Information Digital in an interview Monday. “First, the twins misplaced their dad, then they had been utterly reduce off from their very own sisters, and now they’re being taken away from their college, associates, their sports activities groups. They’re so remoted, and that’s what issues me.”
Jared had custody of the twins each different week, however quickly after his homicide, Gardner-Fernandez ended all contact together with his household, based on Kirsten.
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“It’s been an added loss,” she stated. “On prime of shedding Jared, my kids have misplaced their siblings. I’ve misplaced my step-kids. I’ve tried for months and months to make contact and have gotten nowhere.”
Gardner-Fernandez, 35, and Bridegan, 33, divorced in 2016 — however they continued to battle over funds and custody of the twins in household courtroom till his dying on Feb. 16, 2022.
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A law enforcement source advised Fox Information Digital that an arrest is anticipated as early as Wednesday however wouldn’t elaborate.
Gardner-Fernandez and her second husband, Mario Fernandez, stay suspects within the mysterious killing, based on a second supply.
Within the June interview with Motion Information Jax, we asked Gardner-Fernandez, “Did you’ve something to do with Jared’s homicide?”
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Gardner answered, merely, “No. I didn’t have something to do together with his homicide.”
After the homicide, the couple retained high-powered legal protection lawyer Henry Coxe III, who declined to remark for this story Monday.
Lower than one 12 months after the youngsters traumatically misplaced their father, Gardner-Fernandez pulled them out of their personal Jacksonville Seaside college and moved them right into a six-bedroom, four-bathroom home within the Tri-Cities area of southeastern Washington.
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Property data present that the fashionable ranch house was bought in September for $1 million by Whitesand LLC, which lists the Alpine, Utah, handle of her dad and mom, Shelli and Sterling Gardner.
Shelli Gardner based the paper-craft firm Stampin’ Up, which has an estimated annual income of greater than $100 million a 12 months, based on IncFact.
Her dad and mom are outstanding fixtures within the Mormon group referred to as the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints (LDS).
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They had been in West Richland this previous week visiting their daughter and grandchildren — and attended a service solo Sunday at a neighborhood LDS church.
Jared was a religious adherent of the religion. Gardener-Fernandez drifted from the faith after their 2010 marriage after which allegedly had an affair, triggering their acrimonious break up, Fox Information Digital beforehand reported.
Her second marriage can also be faltering. Shortly after the homicide, neighbors stated they now not noticed Fernandez on the couple’s $1 million Jacksonville Seaside house, which they co-own, and he didn’t be a part of her for the cross-country transfer.
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It was listed on the market Oct. 27 then taken off the market Jan. 3, public data present.
Gardner-Fernandez’s main connection to West Richland seems to be a buddy she met at a baking convention in 2020, Marla Rogers, who owns the house subsequent door.
Rogers runs Marla’s Cookie Co. out of her home very like Gardner-Fernandez operated her personal now-shuttered baking firm, Seaside Baked 904, from her house in Florida.
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Gardner-Fernandez made a short look Sunday in a video Rogers posted to her firm’s Instagram page.
As Rogers is seen cleansing up after educating a cookie adorning class, Gardner-Fernandez enters her kitchen sporting a shirt emblazoned with the phrase, “PLEASE DON’T MAKE ME DO STUFF!”
Jared was gunned down Feb. 16, 2022, in Jacksonville Seaside after taking his twins and Bexley, then 2, to dinner. The software program engineer had simply dropped off the twins at their mom’s home when he encountered a tire within the one-way street.
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He stepped out of his Volkswagen Atlas to maneuver it and was repeatedly shot by an unknown assailant as Bexley watched from her automotive seat.
“She has good days the place she’s completely happy,” Kirsten stated. “Nevertheless it’s going to be a lifetime for her of processing these emotions and the trauma of what she went by way of.”
Few particulars have been launched concerning the investigation, a joint effort by the Jacksonville Seaside Police Division and the State Legal professional’s Workplace for the Fourth Judicial Circuit led by Melissa Nelson.
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Early within the probe, police requested for the general public’s assist figuring out a dark-blue Ford F-150 captured on surveillance footage close to the crime scene, and there’s a $55,000 reward for info resulting in an arrest.
Kirsten stated she and her daughters try to heal however New 12 months’s was significantly difficult.
“We ended the final 12 months that we had been a whole household and began a wholly new 12 months that won’t have these recollections or Jared in them,” she stated. “That was very troublesome.”
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