Shadowscope

26-year-old Israel Mireles was ordered to stand trial today in the murder of Emily Sander back in November of 2007. During a preliminary hearing Judge David Ricke ruled that prosecutors had enough evidence to try him on charges of Rape, Aggravated Criminal Sodomy and Murder. The trial date has been set for November 2nd.

If you’ll remember, I wrote a couple of quick stories about Emily Sander/Zoey Zane when it first happened, which I will rehash in the extended entry.

Emily Sander (her old MySpace) was last seen alive in a bar in El Dorado, Kansas on November 23rd 2007. Sander met Israel Mireles at a bar that evening and left with him to go back to his hotel room, where he brutally murdered her and then fled El Dorado with his 16-year-old girlfriend Victoria Martens (MySpace). He dumped Emily’s body about 50 miles from El Dorado and then headed to Mexico where he was arrested in Mexico in December 0f 2007.

Mireles decided to fight extradition and it took until earlier this summer for the U.S. Government to get him back into Kansas. He had his first hearing back on June 26th 2009 and was held with no bond.

One of the reasons that Emily’s murder made national coverage rather than just the few crime blogs that follow this stuff is that she also did nude modeling and web cam stuff on the Internet at her web site, zoeyzane.com (which is now down of course). Emily Sander/Zoey Zane was touted on the Internet (and I also fell into using it) in headlines as a “Secret Internet Porn Star” when really she was just trying to make a few bucks and having a good time doing it.

While I don’t think it had anything whatsoever to do with her murder, the fact that she did the nude modeling was brought up in cross-examination today when a friend of Sander’s was being questioned. I guess that would be the defense’s way of sullying the case, making it look like Sander deserved what she got. I don’t see any other reason for them to have brought it up.

You can find my prior posts on the topic at the links below:

• Missing Teen a Porn Star
• Body of Emily Sander Found
• Autopsy Slated for Secret Porn Star
• Israel Mireles Arrested
• Israel Mireles Back in the United States