Wellington Nurse Rene Perez Charged With Murder in Colleague Linda Campitelli's Beating Death

Linda Campitelli left home on the evening of October 28, 2024, dressed in a red dress and black heels, telling her husband John she was going to dinner with friends. Within hours, she was dead — her skull fractured, her ribs displaced, her body dragged from her own Chevrolet Tahoe and left on the shoulder of Lyons Road in Palm Beach County.

Seventeen months later, the Palm Beach County Sheriff's Office arrested Rene J. Perez, 38, a registered nurse and Campitelli's secret boyfriend of two years, charging him with first-degree murder, use of a deadly weapon, and tampering with physical evidence. Perez was taken into custody in Miami on March 10, 2026, and ordered held without bail the following day by Circuit Judge Donald Hafele during a hearing at the county jail. A defense attorney who was present in court could not immediately be reached for comment.

The night Campitelli died, she had driven her Tahoe to the Retina Group of Florida building in Wellington, a location where Perez had previously worked. Surveillance footage captured the SUV arriving at the building and leaving around 9:59 p.m. Investigators say the attack occurred in the back of that vehicle, on top of a "Happy Birthday" blanket and Ultrasorb medical sheets that Perez allegedly took from Delray Medical Center, where he was working a shift that same night. A photo recovered from Campitelli's phone showed the rear of the SUV arranged with exactly that setup. Blood splatter marks inside the vehicle indicated a violent struggle, and detectives found additional blood stains that someone had attempted to wipe away. Investigators did not cite a specific murder weapon in the arrest report.

The case against Perez was built on cellphone data, surveillance footage, and WhatsApp messages that contradicted his account. Perez told investigators he had canceled the birthday meeting because his son became sick; text messages reportedly refuted that claim directly. The WhatsApp exchange included in the arrest affidavit shows Campitelli writing to Perez the day before the meeting: "I LOVE YOU, I FEEL KINDA WEIRD. I DON'T KNOW WHAT TO EXPECT TOMORROW. YOU'VE NEVER DONE ANYTHING LIKE THIS FOR ME BEFORE AND I FEEL A LITTLE NERVOUS." Perez replied: "LOL, IT'S NO BIG DEAL. JUST TRYING TO SHOW U THAT I CAN BE ROMANTIC. IT PROBABLY WONT BE AS GOOD AS WHAT YOUVE DONE FOR ME."

Both Campitelli, 35, and Perez were married at the time of their deaths. The two had first met as colleagues at Wellington Regional Medical Center, where Campitelli worked as a nurse and was described by investigators as a wife and mother of two. Perez, most recently living in Hialeah, admitted to the affair when interviewed by investigators. Campitelli's friends had reported the relationship to detectives in the wake of her death, which helped investigators identify Perez as a person of interest and ultimately track his movements through the night of October 28.

Perez now faces life in prison or the death penalty if convicted on the first-degree murder count.