A divorced father of three has gone viral on Twitter after a post about going on holiday with his Colombian blind date – who would soon become his fiancée – was updated to say he has been charged with her murder after allegedly allegedly killing her. have crammed body into a suitcase.
John Poulos, 35, could face up to 35 years for the murder of 21-year-old DJ Valentina Trespalacios, whose remains accused of cramming into a suitcase found in a dumpster in Bogotá.
But it wasn’t until December that Poulos responded to a viral Twitter trend asking users to share their “craziest first date,” to which Poulos responded with a selfie that showed him looking in love with Trespalacios.
“I invited a Colombian woman on vacation without meeting her first – now we’re getting married,” Poulos replied.
But just over a month later, Trespalacios’ body was found in a discarded suitcase by a homeless person.
John Poulos has gone viral on Twitter after a post about his first blind date going on holiday with his Colombian fiancé was updated to say he has been charged with murdering her
Colombian agents escort John Polos (second from right) after his arrival in Colombia on January 25
Valentina Trespalacios (pictured) dated her boyfriend John Poulos for eight months before her violent death
Surveillance camera captured the moment when John Poulos lifted a suitcase containing the dead body of Valentina Trespalacios and placed it in the trunk of the car
Twitter added a Community Note to Poulos’ post yesterday, stating, “The user who posted this tweet is now charged with the murder of the woman in question.”
It then linked to the DailyMail.com story in which Colombian prosecutors demanded a sentence of more than 35 years for Poulos.
Twitter users reacted in shock and disgust, including the original poster of the “craziest first date” question replying, “Go to hell you sick piece of shit.”
Poulos was initially married to his wife Ashely since 2009, and the couple had three children, including a son who was diagnosed with cancer at the age of four. The family was even invited as a guest by former House Speaker Paul Ryan at the 2018 State of the Union address.
However, she acknowledged that the marriage soured three years later and that Poulos abandoned the family, leaving them broke just before filing for divorce.
She said the relationship was abusive and she filed for divorce in 2021. Before filing the paperwork, she said Poulos transferred their entire matrimonial property to an offshore trust and left the family with nothing.
According to Ashley, John then left the United States and lived in other European countries, including Cyprus, Turkey and Ukraine. Not long ago she found out that he had traveled to Colombia for vacation and was living in Texas.
She added that John has abandoned their children and has not seen them in person since he moved out of their Franklin, Wisconsin home in January 2021.
Colombian prosecutors are seeking more than 35 years in prison for John Poulos, a US citizen charged with the January 22 murder of his 21-year-old DJ girlfriend, Valentina Trespalacios.
John Poulos (pictured) was taken into custody in Panama on Tuesday just before he was about to board a flight to Turkey and then fly on to Montenegro. He was extradited to Colombia on Wednesday evening to face charges for the murder of his DJ girlfriend, Valentina Trespalacios.
Valentina Trespalacios was beaten and strangled before being stuffed into a suitcase that was dumped in a construction dumpster near a park in Bogotá, Colombia, on Sunday. The 23-year-old was in a relationship with Texas resident John Poulos, who is accused of murdering her and is due to appear in court on Thursday for his indictment
John Poulos (left) had plans to live in Colombia full-time and marry his DJ girlfriend Valentina Trespalacios (right). He was arrested in Panama on January 24, two days after her body was found in a suitcase in a dumpster in the Colombian capital Bogotá.
An autopsy report found 21-year-old Colombian DJ Valentina Trespalacios had been strangled and beaten
At one point, Poulos met Trespalacios through an online dating app, when he asked her to go on vacation with him for their first date.
Poulos dated Trespalacios, a well-known electronic music DJ, for almost a year before they got engaged, and planned to get married soon.
A friend of Trespalacios said that Poulos had become increasingly angry with her for refusing to disclose their relationship on her social media networks.
He had previously traveled to Bogotá on January 19 before moving in with her in the apartment he claimed to have rented on a long-term basis in the north side of the city.
In their apartment in the early morning of January 22, Poulos had sex with Trespalacios and is accused of beating and strangling her.
A surveillance camera near the apartment showed Poulos pushing a supermarket trolley with luggage bags, including one in which Trespalacios’ body was stuffed and covered with a blanket because her head was sticking out.
Additional footage shows Poulos placing the cart next to his rented Volkswagen Voyage and struggling to retrieve the luggage before he could place it in the boot.
HHe then drove to the south side of Bogotá, where he left the suitcase in a dumpster and headed to El Dorado International Airport to flee the country on a flight to Panamá City, Panama.
Still image from the night of January 21 when Valentina Trespalacios (center) was seen alive for the last time before her boyfriend, John Poulos (right), allegedly beat and strangled her
John Poulos stands next to a supermarket trolley containing a suitcase containing the body of his late girlfriend, Valentina Trespalacios. He covered the suitcase with a blanket to block the 21-year-old’s head, which was sticking out of the luggage bag
John with Ashley Poulos, who filed for divorce in 2021, and their three children
A homeless man searching for recyclable materials made the gruesome discovery of Trespalacios’ body the same day.
The divorced father of three has been in custody since January 25 after being extradited from Panama.
Poulos had bought a one-way ticket to Tocumen International Airport in Panamá City, Panama. He was captured at the airport by Panamanian immigration and Interpol agents just before he was due to board a Turkish Airlines flight to Istanbul Turkey with a connection to Montenegro – a country that has no extradition treaty with Colombia.
He had also bought a one-way ticket from Panamá City to São Paulo, Brazil, as part of an effort to pay off his international manhunt.
Poulos told authorities in Panama that the defunct Medellín Cartel was behind Trespalacios’ murder and that he had fled Colombia because cartel members wanted to kill him. Colombian authorities have yet to confirm his version of events.
Poulos has yet to be found guilty and will stand trial at a later date.