Trial opens for man accused of arranging Microsoft manager's killing

Mario Fernandez Saldana, accused of arranging the murder-for-hire ambush of Microsoft design manager Jared Bridegan, went on trial on Monday in Jacksonville, Florida, more than four years after Bridegan was shot outside his car with his two-year-old daughter strapped inside.

Fernandez Saldana, 38, faces two counts in Duval County court: first-degree murder and solicitation to commit a capital felony. Prosecutors dropped conspiracy and child abuse charges in July, shortly before jury selection. The trial is scheduled to run to August 28 and is the first of three to reach a jury in a case that has moved through the courts for more than four years.

Investigators say a tire was deliberately placed in a Jacksonville Beach road on the night of February 16, 2022, part of a plan to distract Bridegan and draw him out of his vehicle. He was repeatedly shot as his youngest child, Bexley, then 2, sat strapped into a car seat behind him.

The night of the killing

Bridegan, a father of four from St. Johns County, had taken his children to dinner that evening. He was driving home to St. Augustine after dropping his twins, Abby and Liam, at the Jacksonville Beach home of his ex-wife, Shanna Gardner, and Fernandez Saldana. His youngest, 2-year-old Bexley, was still in the car.

Bridegan and Gardner were granted a divorce in 2015, but the split did little to end their conflict. The years that followed were marked by bitter disputes over religion and the parenting of their twins. In a written order after a bond hearing in 2024, Judge London Kite summarised the police evidence as showing that Gardner hated Bridegan, hated sharing custody and wanted him dead. In court on Monday the prosecutor put it more plainly: they fought over everything, and it was not good on either side.

Three people have been charged. Gardner, 39, faces first-degree murder, conspiracy to commit murder, solicitation to commit murder and child abuse, and has pleaded not guilty. Henry Tenon, 65, a former tenant of Fernandez Saldana whom prosecutors identify as the gunman, has also pleaded not guilty. Two other men named in Monday's opening statements, John and Juan Biggerstaff, have been given full immunity and are not charged.

Fernandez Saldana has pleaded not guilty. His attorney, James Hill, told the jury on Monday that there is no physical evidence placing him at the scene, no DNA, no fingerprints and no forensics, and that his phone has no cellular data for the time of the killing. The defence conceded that Bridegan was murdered by Tenon but disputes any link to Fernandez Saldana. More than 50 motions have been filed in the case since his arrest, according to the Florida Times-Union.

Seating the jury

Jury selection began on August 10 and the panel was sworn on August 13, after four days. Attorneys evaluated more than 250 potential jurors before settling on twelve jurors, nine women and seven men, and four alternates.

Mr. Tenon stated that this was the first of many payments that were supposed to be an investment into his pallet company which was actually payment for the homicide.

Johns gave that account of a $5,000 check dated April 4, 2022, nearly two months after the killing. The check, drawn on First Choice Home Rentals, the company Gardner and Fernandez Saldana jointly owned, carried a memo line reading Kickstarter Good Luck, and was signed by Fernandez Saldana.

Prosecutors say Tenon was paid $10,000 in three cheques signed by Fernandez Saldana in the weeks after Bridegan's death, and that he had been offered as much as $150,000 to carry out the killing, in instalments dressed up as an investment in his pallet business.

The alleged gunman's deal

Tenon pleaded guilty to second-degree murder in March 2023 and agreed to testify against both Gardner and Fernandez Saldana. In January 2025 he said that testimony had been false, and in February this year Judge Kite allowed him to withdraw the plea, unopposed by prosecutors. He was re-indicted, pleaded not guilty in March, and is due to stand trial on March 29, 2027. Neither he nor Gardner will testify at this trial, which removes the cooperating witness the state had once expected to put on the stand.

Tenon's arrest was announced on January 25, 2023, by Jacksonville Beach Police Chief Gene Paul Smith and State Attorney Melissa Nelson. He now faces first-degree murder, conspiracy to commit murder, accessory after the fact, child abuse and possession of a firearm by a convicted felon. Prosecutors say phone tracking data and surveillance video placed him along Bridegan's route that night, that GPS showed two practice runs of the route in January 2022, that his DNA was on the tire, and that he and Fernandez Saldana were in contact more than 60 times.

Gardner was arrested in August 2023 in Washington state, roughly a year and a half after the killing. She faces charges of first-degree murder, conspiracy to commit murder, solicitation to commit murder and child abuse.

Gardner's case will not be tried alongside her husband's. Jury selection there is set to begin August 31, with the trial itself starting September 8 in the same Duval County court.

What the state must prove

State Attorney Melissa Nelson's office has framed the killing as a murder-for-hire scheme rooted in years of custody and divorce acrimony between Bridegan and Gardner. Investigators say the plot centered on distracting Bridegan long enough for the gunman to reach him.

By the state's account, Bridegan stopped his car to move the tire from the road and was shot as he stood outside the vehicle. Prosecutors told the jury on Monday that four 10mm rounds were fired and that two of them entered the car, inches from where Bexley was sitting.

Fernandez Saldana, whom prosecutors describe as the man who hired the gunman, has denied the charges, and his not-guilty plea stands as his answer to every count against him.

Four years to trial

More than four years passed between Bridegan's killing and the opening of the trial. As of August 10, the Florida Times-Union counted 1,636 days since he stopped to move the tire, and 1,243 days since Fernandez Saldana became the second of three people arrested in the case.

Bridegan worked as a design manager at Microsoft and was a father of four living in St Johns County. He shared the twins, Abby and Liam, with Gardner, and had two younger daughters, Bexley and London, with his wife, Kirsten Bridegan. She has campaigned publicly through the years of the investigation, founding the Bridegan Foundation and creating Bexley Boxes, kits of toys and supplies for children brought into police stations, now in about 70 law enforcement offices. She has also filed a wrongful death suit against all three defendants, and Gardner's lawyers have won access to some of her text messages.

Who is on trial first

Fernandez Saldana's trial is the first of the three to reach a jury. The order follows the court's calendar rather than the sequence of the arrests, with Gardner's case set for September and Tenon's not due until the spring of 2027.

The financial evidence, including the check and Detective Johns's account of the payments, was first detailed at Gardner's bond hearing in May 2024. It has not yet been put before this jury, which was sworn on August 13 and had heard only opening statements as of Monday.

Prosecutors have cast the payments to Tenon, and the message written on the check, as the financial trail of the scheme.

Two men named in Monday's openings, John and Juan Biggerstaff, were given full immunity and have not been charged.

The Jacksonville station Action News Jax said it would carry live updates and a stream of the trial, which is being heard in Duval County court.

What comes next

If the schedule holds, the case will occupy Florida courts into 2027. Gardner's trial is set to open September 8, and Tenon's on March 29, 2027, with each of the three defendants tried separately in the killing of Jared Bridegan.