Bronx District Attorney Darcel D. Clark announced on Monday, April 18, that a Bronx man has been sentenced to 25 years to life in prison after being found guilty by a jury of second-degree murder for stabbing his girlfriend to death.

According to the investigation, on August 9, 2016, the victim, Juana Alvarez, 52, was reported missing. It is believed she lived with her then-boyfriend Miguel Bonilla, the defendant, and her dog. On August 22, 2016, Bonilla was arrested for not paying his subway fare. In a statement to police, he confessed to stabbing his girlfriend and disposing her body in a dumpster. The investigation led detectives to an upstate landfill, but the body was never located.

A search warrant of the victim’s home found traces of her blood in the apartment. Detectives also obtained surveillance video showing Alvarez walking her dog outside the building, daily, until July 27, 2016, the last time she was ever seen. Two days later, the defendant was captured on video pushing a shopping cart dripping with blood.

The case was prosecuted by Assistant District Attorney George Suminski, homicide counsel, under the supervision of Christine Scaccia, chief of the homicide bureau, and under the overall supervision of James Brennan, deputy chief of the trial division, and Theresa Gottlieb, chief of the trial division.

Clark thanked Beryl Wright, clerical associate of the homicide bureau, Violeta Sambula, director of interpreting services, and Stalin Crespo, video technician in the video unit, for their assistance in the case.

She also thanked NYPD Detective Albert Crawford of the arson and explosion unit (formerly of the 44^th precinct), and Detective John Entenmann of the crime scene unit, as well as retired NYPD Detective Sean O’Leary of Bronx homicide for their investigation in the case.