Kirsten Bridegan took the witness stand Monday as Mario Fernandez Saldana’s murder trial opened in Florida.
Bridegan, 36, faced the man accused of plotting her husband Jared Bridegan’s 2022 roadside killing for the first time in a Duval County courtroom. Prosecutors allege Fernandez Saldana, 38, helped plan and finance the murder-for-hire plot that left the Microsoft executive dead while his toddler daughter watched from her car seat. Fernandez Saldana has pleaded not guilty to first-degree murder and solicitation to commit a capital felony.
On Tuesday, jurors watched Nest and Ring footage that prosecutors said traced Bridegan’s black Volkswagen Atlas and a blue two-tone truck through South Jacksonville Beach in the minutes before the killing. A Jacksonville Beach corporal testified that another camera showed a person prosecutors identified as Henry Tenon walking, then running, from the scene, while nearby audio captured gunfire. The recordings placed the truck near Ocean Cay and Builders Choice about 6:50 p.m., but investigators could not make out its license plate, the corporal said.
Kirsten’s testimony detailed a fractured co-parenting relationship among Bridegan, his ex-wife Shanna Gardner-Fernandez and Fernandez Saldana. “There’s absolutely no trust,” Kirsten told jurors, saying the families relied almost entirely on texts and emails to communicate. She described disputes over parenting time, medical expenses, schooling and religious decisions involving Bridegan’s twins.
Prosecutors say the years-long conflict helped fuel the alleged murder-for-hire plot. Bridegan, 33, had just dropped off the twins after taking them and his daughter Bexley to dinner when the ambush unfolded, prosecutors say. Kirsten testified that the Wednesday outing was a long-standing routine, Bexley always went with him and Bridegan typically drove the black Volkswagen Atlas.
Kirsten said she spoke to Bridegan after he dropped off the twins and Bexley excitedly told her they had gotten ice cream. The call then ended in an unusual silence, she testified.
“It was strange. I remember feeling like it was strange because after I was like, ‘All right, well, love you, I’ll see you soon.’ He was just quiet,” she said. “I was like, ‘Okay, it’s kind of weird,’ and hung up, but it was like a pause and just quiet.”
When Bridegan did not return home, she began calling and drove toward Jacksonville Beach with her mother until a police officer answered her husband’s phone and directed her to the police station. Officers initially would not tell her what had happened, Kirsten testified. She said they questioned her about Bridegan before eventually informing her that he had been shot and killed.
Jurors also watched a recorded interview on Tuesday, in which Fernandez Saldana suggested Bridegan may have been killed over money, offering an alternate theory of motive while detectives were still investigating the case.
“We don’t know s–t,” Fernandez Saldana said before raising the possibility that Bridegan had been involved in a money-related problem.
He also described Gardner-Fernandez as furious with the school for notifying parents about the killing and discussed ongoing hostility over co-parenting and control of the children.
In the viral moment that spawned three arrests and multiple trials, Bridegan encountered a tire placed in the middle of a dark, secluded Jacksonville Beach road on February 16, 2022. He stepped out of his Volkswagen Atlas to move the tire at about 7:30 p.m. And was repeatedly shot, authorities said. Bexley, then 2, remained strapped into her car seat as bullets entered the SUV. A passerby pulled her from the vehicle about three minutes later. Prosecutors allege Tenon was the gunman, Gardner-Fernandez helped orchestrate the plot, and Fernandez Saldana financed it through checks to Tenon and dozens of phone communications around the killing.
Tenon initially pleaded guilty to second-degree murder under a cooperation agreement but later withdrew the plea, altering the prosecution’s path. Judge London Kite ordered Gardner-Fernandez and Fernandez Saldana to stand trial separately. A jury of seven women and five men, plus four alternates, was selected after four days of questioning. Defense attorney James Hill told jurors in opening statements that “Henry Tenon murdered Jared Bridegan” and that “Mario Fernandez had no involvement in the murder of Jared Bridegan.”
Kirsten testified she had never seen or heard of Tenon before the killing, and that she and her husband had no issues with anybody else. “He just really liked Coke Zero,” she said of Bridegan, noting he had no dangerous hobbies like gambling or drugs.
Jury selection in Gardner-Fernandez’s case is scheduled to begin Aug. 31 in Jacksonville.