MIAMI – Anna Kepner was violently raped by her younger stepbrother on a cruise ship last fall before she was likely placed in a chokehold and squeezed so hard her eardrums burst, an assistant U.S. attorney told a Miami federal judge Wednesday.
Kepner, 18, was found dead on the Carnival Horizon in November, one day before the cruise ship returned to Miami.
A federal grand jury recently indicted Kepner’s 16-year-old stepbrother, Timothy Hudson, on homicide and aggravated sexual abuse charges. He has pleaded not guilty to the charges.
Now that Hudson is being prosecuted as an adult, government lawyers have asked a magistrate judge to order Hudson detained until his trial. Hudson has been living with an uncle in Hernando County under GPS monitoring since he was first charged with juvenile delinquency in February.
[WATCH: Anna Kepner’s father wants stepbrother in custody until trial]
Hoping to convince the magistrate that Hudson is a danger to others and should be detained, Assistant U.S. Attorney Alejandra L. Lopez detailed some of the government’s evidence against the 16-year-old during a hearing Wednesday.
According to Lopez, surveillance cameras on the cruise ship confirmed Hudson and Kepner entered the stateroom they shared a little after 7:30 p.m. on the night before housekeepers found Kepner’s body hidden underneath a bed.
Prosecutors believe Kepner was still alive around 8:14 p.m. when she reportedly communicated with someone using the social media platform Snapchat.
Surveillance cameras showed Hudson poke his head out of the stateroom door at 10:13 p.m., look both ways down the hallway, and then leave, Lopez said. Kepner never emerged from the room.
WiFi routers located throughout the ship indicated Hudson took Kepner’s phone out of the room and carried it to another deck, where he likely disposed of it in an area where a trash can is located, the government alleged. The phone was later recovered from a trash collection bin by a cruise ship employee, according to Lopez.
When Kepner’s body was discovered, the prosecutor said Kepner’s pants were on but that her underwear was twisted and partially inserted into her vaginal canal, suggesting she was the victim of non-consensual sexual intercourse.
Semen found inside Kepner’s vagina contained DNA that Lopez said had a “high probability” of belonging to Hudson.
According to court records unsealed Wednesday, a different minor who lives outside of Florida had sexual intercourse with Hudson during the cruise. His DNA was tested and determined not to be a contributor of the DNA found in Kepner’s body, investigators said.
An autopsy concluded that Kepner died from mechanical asphyxiation, which Lopez said was “likely” caused by Hudson placing her in a chokehold and squeezing for three to five minutes.
“He squeezed so hard her eardrum burst,” Lopez told federal magistrate judge Edwin G. Torres.
Torres said he is considering the government’s request to detain Hudson before trial, but before needed additional information from the U.S. Marshal’s Office about potential juvenile facilities where Hudson could be held.
Hudson’s attorney, federal public defender Evan Kuhl, did not address most of the prosecution’s allegations during Monday’s hearing but argued that Hudson should remain free.
“He’s going to show up in court and he’s not going to hurt anyone while he’s out,” Kuhl told the magistrate.