Email

Print

We got that information from her mother who agreed to an interview at her home in the Lake Independence Area today so that she could set the record straight. First, she says her daughter was not 24, as has been widely reported; she was 21, the mother of 3 children, ages 6, 4, and 2 - and she wasn't a prisoner inside Kimmy's - she asked to appear of camera:..

VOICE OF: Maria - Mother of Jacqueline Arteaga
"I want to thank everybody what they are feeling with me the pain that I am going through and next thing that I want to say is that she was not 24, 25 or 23, she was 21 years old and she was a nice young girl, friendly and always like to party and things like that. I don't want anybody to be saying that she was forced to work there because that is not true. She works wherever she wants to work. She had just work one week and then about one month after she told me that she is going to work another week. She went to work another week and then she stop and then afterwards she came and tell me that Ms. Merlyn was going to rent her a room there."

Her mother says she and her family spent extended time with Jacqueline on Sunday and Monday. She told us about their last exchange:..

VOICE OF: Maria - Mother of Jacqueline Arteaga
"I left her like 9 o' clock and she told me that she didn't eat yet and I ask her why and she told me that she didn't want to go to the shop. I ask her if she wanted me to go buy something for her and she said yes and at the same time a man who was selling meat pies passed and I bought 3 meat pies for her. We were there in front of the seaside because I couldn't go in her room because they had dogs. She went upstairs to get a charger for me and a key and then threw a perfume for me through the window."

Reporter
"She didn't confide anything at all with you; any concerns or anything that she may be having?"

VOICE OF: Maria - Mother of Jacqueline Arteaga
"Yes, she told me that she was afraid to be there because they had already gone there to try to kill "butches" two times. "Butches" name is Mandy and she told me that she was afraid and that one of these times she would be dead. She wanted to move and when I ask her if she really wanted to move she told me that she will wait a week more this week and she will move with me at my house."

Reporter
"Why did she put it off and off?"

VOICE OF: Maria - Mother of Jacqueline Arteaga
"Because she likes the freedom, she likes to live on her own. Say if she comes to live at my house she will have rules - like you will can't do this and you have to come home at a certain time - no friends are allowed to come visit and things like that. That is the situation and she is a person who was free, she likes the freedom."

Jules Vasquez
"Was she free to leave this place as she wanted?"

VOICE OF: Maria - Mother of Jacqueline Arteaga
"Anybody that would carry something for her would just have to text her and she will come down downstairs and ask "butches" to hold the dog because she was afraid of the dogs. She would always come down. The dogs were not there because they had her kidnapped or anything like that. She was there by her own will. The only thing that I feel that is hurting me is that they didn't help her to come out of the house because I know that they could have helped her to come out of that place. I am really sure that they could have helped her, but I will leave that to God."

Jules Vasquez
"Who should have helped her?"

VOICE OF: Maria - Mother of Jacqueline Arteaga
"Well the person who she save his life. He knows who he is and I think he could have done his best to help her just like the help he got to come out he could have helped her to come out but he never did his best and will always have that pain in my heart. But I don't blame them because this was already in God's book that this was going to happen. I don't blame them because she use to love them people with all her heart. She use to defend them with everything - they use to treat her good. She always use to tell me that these people treats her good."

Jules Vasquez
"There were a lot of people who say she came by the thing but she didn't want to jump. You have any idea....?"

VOICE OF: Maria - Mother of Jacqueline Arteaga
"I don't think that is true because my daughter was never that type of person. She was not afraid of anybody for anything. She use to be a person who would always try - if they told her to jump, she would have jumped, but something happened. She has problems with asthma, I don't know if the smoke took her and she fainted. I can't tell you what happen because I was not there."

And while no one can say for sure what Artega's last minutes were like - her mother has said she had asthma and today her boyfriend confirmed this to us. Dean Bodden lives on Hunter's Lane just behind where Kimmy's was located. Bodden told us that he knew the fire would be her end:..

Dean Bodden, Boyfriend of Jacqueline Arteaga
"I heard there was a fire in the area and I heard it was the spot, the first thing that ran in my head Jules, my woman will be dead in there now. Right away I chant 2 psalms and I was praying and asking the Father to please don't let my woman die because I already knew that this woman suffered from asthma. When you hear of a fire, just the smoke will be a problem for her. I just hope and prayed that my woman doesn't get burnt up in there and so said so done, she was the bad luck one. She was also 3 months pregnant for me too, she was supposed to have my kid. It's really sad for me."

Jules Vasquez
"Do you think it's a set fire?"

Dean Bodden
"That has to to be a set up thing. That can't be any natural thing because the way how the place was going - before that, there were problems coming to the spot."

Jules Vasquez
"Explain to me what kind of living situations Jacqueline had up in that house?"

Dean Bodden
"Well, the living situation was like she was in jail Jules. It's a straight jail living, she couldn't come out when she wanted to. The only time that she came out was when they let her out. Once the club opens then she is free up. Once that club is close she could not come out of that house any at all."

Jules Vasquez
"Why though?"

Dean Bodden
"Because then the situation is that they had two pit bull dogs at the back door and then she couldn't come out."

Jules Vasquez
"Explain to me, you use to take food for her?"

Dean Bodden
"I use to take food for her everyday and I had to throw the food up to her because it didn't make the run-bag to pull it up."

Jules Vasquez
"What do you mean by run-bag?"

Dean Bodden
"A string that you could just... like how we do it in jail; like when we wanted something from another cell, we would throw a bag and then we would fish it in that. It's the same jail style I come visit right here with this woman."

Jules Vasquez
"For real mein?"

Dean Bodden
"For real Jules, I am not telling you "b*******" - jail style. I told her that better she makes a run-bag and she smile and tells me that she is in jail - like she was taking it like a joke."

Jules Vasquez
"Maybe you are taking it the wrong way, maybe they just had the dogs for security, but her mom says that she was afraid of the dogs and that was why she didn't deal with the dogs. But she could leave as she pleases except that somebody has to hold the dogs."

Dean Bodden
"That part I can understand because then I see that too, but what I am saying is put all of this at the front; if you will leave a dog at the steps where you know your workers has to pass down and you know that dog was a bad dog because pit bulls doesn't respect anybody and it's not like the dogs are use to her. She can't come out, so they put that do there intentionally to make sure that she stay up there and no try bring me up there who is her boyfriend. She was renting a room up there, but she is my baby mom and then I can't go to sleep with her up there. The only time I sleep with her is when she comes to my house through the alley here."

Jules Vasquez
"Her mom says that you are not her boyfriend and her mother says that she doesn't know about any pregnancy."

Dean Bodden
"Well to tell you the real thing Jules, I came out of jail and I am out here for 3 months and when me and Jackie linked up was because I had like 2 weeks out here and then she "breed" for me - ended up catching a belly and she wanted to keep that on a down low. She didn't want anybody to know until when the time is right."

Jules Vasquez
"Do you believe that in fact they were telling her to jump and she didn't want to jump?"

Dean Bodden
"I heard that talking too. A lot of people were saying that they told her to jump and she didn't jump. But I don't understand that bed thing because I don't think that was in bed and there was a big fire. She was out in the hall at the same back door where I told you that I threw up food."

As you heard in the interview, her mother says she didn't know of any boyfriend and did not want to talk about pregnancy. She says that if her daughter had someone she would have gone to live with them.

But, getting away from that subject, Jacqueline's last conversation with her mother was full of portent. She told her mother how she had bumped into her fisherman brother at a local club recently and that they were dancing - which was a first:...

VOICE OF: Maria - Mother of Jacqueline Arteaga
"She tell me and I ask why is she telling me that and then she said that she will soon die because it's the first time I am dancing with one of my older brother so good and I ask her what she was dancing and she said that she was dancing Punta and I enjoyed myself and afterwards he took us to go eat. She said that she felt so happy and she was telling me that if she dies, she will die happy - that's all she told me. I can't tell you why she told me that but that was her last words that she told me."

Two of 21 year old Jacqueline Areteaga's older children live with her mother Maria, and the other one leaves with her father's mother. We'll have more on the fire's aftermath later on in the news.