Gabriella Alexis Cartagena was 24 years old, a mother to a three-year-old daughter, and a resident of Marinette, Wisconsin. On the evening of February 4, 2026, she left with her boyfriend. Her family never heard her voice again except once more, in a phone call that ended in a way no family should ever have to hear.
She was found dead days later in a wooded area across the state border in Michigan. The case became one of the most widely covered crime stories in Wisconsin in early 2026.
The Last Phone Call
The night Gabriella disappeared, she made a phone call to her family. During that call, relatives heard her pleading:
“Please don’t shoot me. I’m sorry.”
The call ended abruptly. Her family immediately contacted the police.
That call became the emotional center of the case, the detail that prompted urgent police classification of her disappearance as an involuntary missing person situation and launched what would become a multi-agency, multi-state investigation.
The Investigation Begins: Red Arrow Park
On February 5, 2026, officers responding to Red Arrow Park in Marinette, an area where Gabriella and her boyfriend Robert Chilcote were believed to have been before she disappeared, reported finding what appeared to be blood and signs of a disturbance. The park was treated as a potential crime scene.
Investigators began pulling together multiple threads simultaneously: surveillance camera footage from the area, cell phone location data, witness statements, and physical evidence collected at the scene. The evidence led authorities to identify Robert Chilcote as a person of interest.
Chilcote was not in Wisconsin.
The Arrest in Minnesota
On February 5 the same day Red Arrow Park was being processed as a crime scene Chilcote was located in Wright County, Minnesota, hundreds of miles away.
When deputies attempted to stop him, he allegedly fled. What followed was a 16-minute pursuit at speeds reportedly exceeding 100 mph. The chase ended after Chilcote lost control of his vehicle while trying to avoid tire-deflating stop sticks deployed by officers.
When he was taken into custody, investigators said multiple firearms were found inside his vehicle.
He was arrested on charges including fleeing a peace officer and being a fugitive from another state. At that point, he had not yet been charged in connection with Gabriella’s death, as her body had not yet been found.
The Search and the Discovery
For several days, a coordinated search involving multiple law enforcement agencies continued across the region. On February 10, police announced that Gabriella Cartagena had been “located” without immediately disclosing her condition.
Authorities later confirmed she had been found deceased in a wooded area near Birch Creek Road in Menominee County, Michigan. The recovery of her body formally moved the case from a missing persons investigation to a homicide investigation.
Her Family and Community
Gabriella was a daughter, a sister, and a mother. Her brother created a GoFundMe campaign to help cover funeral expenses, describing her death as sudden and devastating and sharing that she left behind a young child.
Community members in Marinette organized a candlelight vigil in her memory. The response both local and online reflected how deeply the case had affected people who did not know her personally but recognized the particular tragedy of what her family was experiencing.
Her daughter was three years old.
A Note on What Is Not Confirmed
Some questions circulating online about the case including speculation about the specific manner of her death are not addressed in publicly available reporting or official statements. The investigation involves ongoing legal proceedings, and certain details have not been released.
What is confirmed is that her death is being treated as a homicide, that Robert Chilcote was identified as a person of interest, and that the case remains active.
Conclusion
Gabriella Cartagena was 24 years old with a daughter who needed her. The phone call her family heard on February 4, 2026, set off a search that ended the worst possible way with her body found across the state border, in a wooded area far from home.
Her name deserves to be remembered as more than a case number. She was a young woman and a mother, and the people who loved her are still living with what happened.
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