SANTO DOMINGO, Dominican Republic -- Witnesses told police in 2021 that NFL veteran Michael Pennel Jr. had an ongoing relationship with a young woman whose body was found on a property he owned when she went missing, an ESPN investigation found, contradicting Pennel's claim that he did not know her.
Pennel did not respond to a message seeking comment before this story was published. After it was published Thursday afternoon, however, Pennel called a reporter to insist he had no relationship with Carli Franchesca Guzmán Roche, whose body was discovered in January 2026. He directed ESPN to an attorney in the Dominican Republic, Ariel Durán.
"I don't understand any of this. I don't know who you're talking to, who's saying this -- I don't know this woman. I wasn't in the country (when Guzmán disappeared)," Pennel said.
Durán said Pennel had nothing to do with Guzmán's death and that documents will exonerate him. But he also said he expects Pennel to be charged in the case because the body was found on his property, and that if he is charged, Durán might not represent him because the two are currently in a dispute over money. He did not say what he expected Pennel to be charged with.
According to interviews with people close to the victim and police records reviewed by ESPN, Pennel and Guzmán frequently spent time together when Pennel was in the Dominican Republic, where he owned a property in the resort area of Puerto Plata until 2025. Her family reported her missing on Sept. 11, 2021, but her body was not found until January 2026, when the new owner was doing excavation work.
Records also show that several people told police early in the 2021 search that Pennel had connections with Guzmán worth investigating. But investigation records show no indication that police interviewed him, despite having visited his property with several of her family members days after she was reported missing.
Pennel acknowledged he was never contacted by authorities about Guzmán's disappearance in 2021.
During that September 2021 visit to Pennel's neighborhood, Guzmán's grandmother and a family attorney told ESPN, a strong odor of decay was obvious, but police told the family the smell probably was from a dead animal, and they did not expand their search to the place from where the smell was emanating -- Pennel's backyard.
Durán told ESPN on Thursday that it was Pennel's two associates, one of whom was staying at the villa at the time of Guzmán's disappearance, who told police they had sprayed the property for pests and that's what probably caused the smell.
Guzmán's body was identified last March. Dominican officials reopened the case at that point and told ESPN that Pennel is a "person of interest" in her death.
Prosecutors say they are pursuing the case as a homicide, although no cause of death has been released.
Pennel said in an April text in reference to the identification of Guzmán's body: "This isn't a story. I'm not legally involved. This is fake news being reported. I'd advise you to speak with my agent/lawyer ... before writing a false story. Damaging my reputation."
Pennel signed with the Atlanta Falcons on Sept. 15, 2021. The police search got underway when Guzmán was officially declared missing on Sept. 13.
Police documents also showed:
Guzmán's grandmother was so insistent with police that Pennel's property could contain clues to her whereabouts that they let her accompany them to his address.
Two American friends of Pennel, identified as LeAndre Kemont Jefferson and Tyree Lamont Davis, were interviewed by police. Jefferson's local address was in the same gated community as Pennel's. Neither man could be reached for comment.
The man identified as Lamonte told an investigator that Pennel and Guzmán were friends and Pennel had last seen her in January 2021 at the airport in Santo Domingo before they departed together in a taxi.
ESPN determined that the mobile phone number Jefferson provided to police as his own was actually registered to Pennel.
Pennel told ESPN on Thursday that it was Davis who had a relationship with her, not him. Durán said Pennel, Davis and Jefferson were lifelong friends who grew up playing football together. Durán said Jefferson is living in the Dominican Republic but does not know where Davis currently lives. In his 2021 statement to police, Davis said he and Pennel had a falling out months earlier because of a dispute over a woman.
Records show that Jefferson was arrested for trying to smuggle two kilograms of cocaine into the United States in 2020, but in January 2026, the case was dropped at the request of then-U.S. Dept. Attorney General and current acting U.S. Attorney General Todd Blanche.
According to media reports in the Dominican Republic, Pennel had a previous encounter with Dominican law enforcement. Reports said that Pennel and two different American men, Torrey Johnson and Jabrion Burnside, were arrested for possessing a 9 mm pistol in May 2021. The two men could not be reached, and law enforcement officials would not release an arrest report, saying it was confidential under Dominican law.
Durán told ESPN that the gun belonged to one of the other men, not Pennel. A court document reviewed by ESPN shows that Pennel was never formally charged in the case.
Multiple sources told ESPN that the case has been deeply sensitive within the Dominican Republic, which relies on foreign tourists and has worked in recent years to promote an image as a safe vacationing site and shed a reputation for political and law enforcement corruption.
Sitting in her home with two ESPN reporters, Guzmán's grandmother, Paula González, said Guzmán used to talk about Pennel, usually referring to him as "el futbolista," or "the football player," and that when he would come to the island, he usually sent a taxi for her to come spend time with him. González said she once saw Guzmán talking to Pennel over videoconference, and that González had seen him in person. Shown a picture of Pennel, González said, "Yes -- no doubt. Strongly, no doubt" that he was the person her granddaughter was seeing.
Pennel denied ever speaking to Guzmán on a video call.
"I was never on FaceTime or [met] any of her family." In 2021, "the grandmother [didn't] even know my name to tell police. Because I don't know her," he said via text.
In September 2021, González said, Guzmán told her she was going back north to be with "her athlete friend." She said her granddaughter called her Sunday, Sept. 5, and said she was still with Pennel. She said she was fine but that she wasn't feeling well and would come back home Monday morning, González said. By late the next day, no one had heard from her, and the family became concerned. González said she called a friend of her granddaughter, who according to investigation records told police she wasn't with Guzmán but believed Guzmán had been with Pennel in recent days. González said she then called police, telling whoever answered the phone that her granddaughter was missing.
"He said, 'Look, you should come here, because this smells fishy. Here in Puerto Plata ... this is a cemetery. Here is where young girls disappear,'" González said.
ESPN was able to review a document from the Dominican Investigative Court of the Judicial District of Puerto Plata known as a "certification" that states that "there is not any Criminal Lawsuit filed against MR. MICHAEL MAURICE PENNEL JR" as of May 25, 2026.
Such a letter is given after being requested by one of the parties. It means the person has not been charged as of a certain date, but does not rule out that the person could be under investigation or face future charges.
Pennel, who is currently a free agent, said he shared that document with the NFL.