Almost immediately, a large part of the public started pointing fingers at different people, and in 1984, Echevarría was formally accused of her husband's death.
Her trial was one of the most sensational in Puerto Rican history, with a media circus atmosphere because of the celebrity status of the couple.
[2] In 1986, she was found guilty and sentenced to 208 years in a women's prison in Vega Alta, Puerto Rico.
[4] However, her health deteriorated and in 1999, Governor Pedro Rosselló allowed her to leave jail to live at home under a curfew.
[2] Glendaly Vigoreaux, the couple's eldest daughter, died by suicide in her Arizona residence on July 15, 2008, however, her lawyer, Fátima Seda Barletta, stated that she may have been murdered and that the investigation was incomplete.