Crystal Cortes, for years, has denied she was part of the murder-for-hire plot to kill Dr. Kendra Hatcher, the Dallas dentist shot and killed at her Uptown apartment's parking garage in 2015.
On Tuesday morning, Cortes confessed she was a part of it all.
”Probably two weeks after I met Brenda Delgado, we started planning this murder,” Cortes testified in the capital murder trial for Kristopher Love, the alleged gunman.
Cortes said Delgado was obsessed with Hatcher. She was angry that Hatcher was dating her ex-boyfriend, Ricardo Paniagua, and she wanted him back.
”She said that Kendra Hatcher, she hated her," Cortes said. "She pretty much said she wanted to do away with Kendra."
Cortes said they enlisted the help of Kristopher Love, who agreed to kill Hatcher for drugs and money.
”It was planned to be a murder," Cortes said, "to look like a robbery gone bad."
Prosecutors on Tuesday played a recording where you can her Cortes trying to buy a silencer for a 40-caliber gun used to kill Hatcher.
She went into detail on what happened on the day of the murder, and how she and Love waited for Hatcher at her apartment.
There’s a picture showing the Jeep they were in at that location.
”He exits the vehicle, and I hear Kendra scream, 'Help, help, help me!' and then I hear the shots fired," Cortes said.
After the murder, she said Delgado called her.
”She asked me if the task is complete, meaning, did we commit the murder?" Cortes said. "And I said yes.”
She said the two met up afterward at a friend's house. There is video there from a neighbor's camera.
Cortes said they left there and went to her grandmother’s house to burn some of the evidence.
Later, the two of them posed for a selfie, and Cortes took a picture of $500 shaped in a heart.
”That was my payment for completing the task of driving Kristopher Love to kill Kendra Hatcher," Cortes testified.
Cortes testified that on the day of the murder, her son was with her in the Jeep she used to drive Love to the murder.
Cortes was facing the death penalty but pleaded guilty to murder and a 35-year sentence in exchange for her testimony against Love and Delgado.