ORLANDO, Fla. (Court TV) — A woman apologized through tears in court on Wednesday after pleading guilty to murder in the disappearance of her roommate.
Gisselle Victoria-Gonzalez appears in court for her sentencing on Sept. 30, 2026. (Court TV)
Gisselle Victoria-Gonzalez, 44, pleaded guilty to second-degree murder in a deal with prosecutors that dropped charges of tampering with physical evidence, grand theft and interfering with a dead body. Victoria-Gonzalez was charged in the death of Runyleidy “Runy” Medina-Pacheco, 42, who disappeared on Christmas Day 2022.
Victoria-Gonzalez called the police to report her roommate missing on Dec. 27, 2022, and told officers she hadn’t seen Medina-Pacheco since Christmas. As police investigated, they discovered that before the victim’s disappearance, the two roommates had been at odds over $3,000 in cash that had vanished. Medina-Pacheco’s co-workers told detectives that the missing woman suspected her roommate had stolen the money.
Detectives determined that the last person besides Victoria-Gonzalez to speak to Medina-Pacheco had been the victim’s husband, who said he spoke to her via video chat on Christmas Day. Officers then found that the victim’s cellphone data matched Victoria-Gonzalez’s account of her own movements, as she described them to police.
When investigators followed the defendant’s phone data, they saw that she had visited a Lowe’s on Dec. 26. There, surveillance video showed Victoria-Gonzalez, alone, purchasing a gas-powered chain saw. The same debit card used at Lowe’s was used at Walmart to purchase 55-gallon trash bags, a pair of dishwashing gloves and dish soap.
In an interview with police, Victoria-Gonzalez said that she bought the chain saw for her uncle in the Dominican Republic. When investigators found no proof of the shipment, she claimed someone must have stolen the package. The defendant’s cellphone showed searches for “which side of the body the aorta is on,” “prices for an electric saw,” and “What do they do with the trash in Orlando?”
Runyleidy Medina-Pacheco (Orlando Police Department)
Searching the women’s shared apartment, officers found dried blood on the walls, doors, ceiling, baseboards, floor, television, entertainment center and furniture; officers also found two broken fingernails. DNA testing revealed the blood matched the victim’s profile.
During an interrogation, Victoria-Gonzalez eventually admitted to stealing the money from the victim — claiming it was $2,500 — and said that she got into a physical fight with Medina-Pacheco. The defendant said Medina-Pacheco may have gotten a bloody nose, but maintained in her interviews that the victim had left.
Medina-Pacheco’s body has never been found. After pleading guilty, Victoria-Gonzalez offered no explanation but said she was sorry. “I know I can’t bring her back. Please forgive me,” she said. “That woman, I wasn’t myself. I wish this could just be a dream and at some point I will wake up from this nightmare and everything will be back to normal.”
Medina-Pacheco’s uncle testified that her disappearance and presumed death have caused “irreparable damage” to her family and left the victim’s father hospitalized in a psychiatric facility. “What does the court think about those consequences?” he asked.
Judge A. James Craner sentenced Victoria-Gonzalez to 25 years in prison with credit for 665 days’ time served.
