Family desperate to find remains of Cecilia Huerta Gallegos as her husband prepares to stand trial for murder
HOUSTON - FOX 26 continues to shed a light on the thousands of people from the greater Houston area who have vanished without a trace.
In this edition of 'The Missing', the family of Cecilia Huerta-Gallegos says it was after she went behind her husband's back, and filed for a divorce that they learned about the danger she was in. The day she disappeared, she called her family and delivered a chilling final message.
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"She told my older sister Margie that if something happened to her, it was her husband who murdered her," said Cecilia's sister Mireya Lopez.
That phone call was made on July 8, 2019, it was the last time anyone would ever hear from 29-year-old Cecilia Huerta Gallegos.
"We reached out to my uncle, he took the police up there that next morning, but her husband said she left with someone else. But he did have scratches all over his neck and his face," Lopez recalled.
Lopez says when Cecilia married her husband, she became distant from their family, the couple lived out in San Antonio while her other family members lived in Houston, and anytime they got to see her, they say her husband always had to be around.
"She wouldn't even talk in front of him. My brother took him to the store, and I asked her is something was going on, and she said no. She was acting weird," said Lopez as she recalled the last time she saw her sister.
It wasn't until Cecilia vanished that they realized the extent of what she'd been dealing with during her five-year marriage. Homicide detectives quickly got involved following her disappearance and what they found on the home surveillance footage was alarming.
"You can see her walking in the house, walking in her bedroom, then he goes in the bedroom as well. This was around 7:40 p.m. By 2 a.m. you see him shutting down the cameras and turning them back on at 3 a.m. He left at 5 a.m. and came back unloading a chainsaw and shovels. Homicide did tell us that it's 100%, she's deceased," Lopez explained.
Lopez claims footage also shows him grabbing garbage bags, and chemicals, and walking in and out of the room.
It's been more than three years and Cecilia's body has never been recovered. But it wasn't until 2021, two years after she disappeared, that detectives charged Cecilia's husband, Reyes Gallegos, with murder.
Lopez says a week after Cecilia vanished, she went to their home and pleaded with Reyes for answers.
"All he said, he got on his knees, he started crying, and he said she changed a lot," Lopez said.
Cecilia was a mother of four, two of those children were shared with her husband, Reyes Gallegos.
"At this point, we really don't care what time they give him. All we want is her, we want her back," said Lopez.
Reyes Gallegos is currently out on bond. He is set to stand trial for the murder of Cecilia Gallegos on Thursday, March 30.
Anyone with information about Cecilia's disappearance should call the San Antonio Police Department at (210) 207-7781 or CrimeStoppers at (210) 224-STOP.
Click here for a look at an official record of long-term missing persons throughout the state of Texas.