Eric Israel Mercado’s remains were found in 2022 beneath an outdoor staircase at a San Bernardino home after a tip reopened the long-dormant case.
SAN BERNARDINO, Calif. — A San Bernardino woman was sentenced March 27 to 15 years in prison in the 2014 killing of her boyfriend, whose remains were discovered nearly eight years later in a concealed burial space beneath an outdoor staircase at her home.
Trista Ann Spicer, now 46, was sentenced after a jury convicted her in November 2025 of second-degree murder in the death of Eric Israel Mercado, 42. The sentence closed the trial phase of a case that began as a missing-person report and later became a homicide investigation after police searched the property in 2022. The case drew unusual attention because of the long gap between Mercado’s disappearance and the discovery of his remains, and because jurors had to weigh Spicer’s claim that she acted in self-defense against prosecutors’ argument that the killing and the concealment were deliberate.
Mercado disappeared in October 2014 after living with Spicer at the San Bernardino residence, and relatives reported him missing when they could not reach him. For years, the case remained unresolved. Family members circulated missing-person posters, and police later issued a formal poster as the search stretched on without public answers. The turning point came on Aug. 23, 2022, when San Bernardino police homicide detectives received information about possible human remains at the house in the 1400 block of East Davidson Street. Detectives obtained a search warrant and entered the property that afternoon. In a department press release issued days later, police said investigators found what appeared to be a makeshift tomb and located human remains inside. Police said the remains were identified as Mercado’s, and detectives concluded that Spicer was responsible for his death. She was arrested in Yucaipa on Sept. 2, 2022, and booked on a murder charge.
At trial, the prosecution and defense offered sharply different accounts of what happened inside the home in 2014. According to local coverage of the proceedings, Waylan Gentry, who was dating Spicer in 2022, testified that she told him Mercado had been buried beneath the stairs and that she wanted help because she was planning to move out of California. Gentry said he did not believe her at first and later went to police after speaking with his mother. That testimony gave jurors an explanation for how the old missing-person case reopened. Spicer, however, testified that Mercado became angry after she served him dinner and that the confrontation turned violent. She said he had a history of verbally and physically abusing her and that she struck him with a cast-iron skillet and cut his neck during a struggle. Prosecutors argued the evidence did not support self-defense. Some details remain unclear in public reporting, including the full sequence of movements inside the home that night and whether anyone besides Spicer knew at the time what had happened.
The case resonated beyond the courtroom because it carried the weight of both a homicide and a family’s years-long uncertainty. Mercado had been missing long enough for the disappearance to slip into the background of everyday news, yet relatives continued trying to keep attention on it. When police found his remains in 2022, the discovery turned a cold and painful absence into a confirmed killing. Trial testimony also added context that jurors had to sort through carefully. Spicer said Mercado had abused her, and local reports said former friends of Mercado testified that they believed he could be violent. Prosecutors countered that her conduct after the killing mattered as much as the fight she described. They pointed to the long concealment of Mercado’s remains and argued that the injuries were more consistent with him being attacked while asleep than with a split-second act of self-protection. Jurors ultimately sided with that view, rejecting the self-defense claim and finding Spicer guilty of second-degree murder.
By the time sentencing arrived this spring, the case had moved from a missing-person mystery to a completed criminal prosecution with a prison term. Spicer was convicted in November 2025, and the March 27 sentencing set her punishment at 15 years in state prison. Local coverage of the verdict said jurors also found true a sentencing enhancement tied to the use of a deadly weapon. The sentence did not erase the unusual timeline of the case, which stretched from Mercado’s disappearance in 2014 to the discovery of his remains in 2022 and then through a trial more than a decade after the killing. The legal record that has emerged publicly centers on Spicer, and no additional public charges had been widely reported in connection with the burial space or the concealment itself. The next formal phase is likely to unfold in appellate proceedings, with the conviction and sentence now part of the court record and any further challenge expected to move through the review process rather than through a new fact-finding investigation.
The physical setting gave the case part of its lasting force. On paper, the address was an ordinary San Bernardino home. In the investigation, it became the place where detectives said they uncovered a hidden burial site beneath an outdoor staircase. That contrast, an everyday residence and a concealed grave, shaped how the case was remembered in local reporting. Gentry’s account added another layer of tension, because the breakthrough did not begin with a random forensic lead or a fresh witness from 2014. It began when someone close to Spicer years later said he was told what had happened and decided to go to police. Mercado’s relatives, who had spent years without a clear answer, finally got one only after that tip led detectives back to the property. The case now stands as a reminder of how old disappearances can remain unresolved for years and then shift quickly once a single witness, a search warrant and a specific location bring investigators back to the beginning.
As of April 4, Spicer had been sentenced and Mercado’s disappearance had been resolved in court as a homicide. The next public milestone is expected to come through any appeal or later court filing that follows the March 27 judgment.
Author note: Last updated April 4, 2026.