July 8, 2024 • 33 mins
The personal lives of Danielle Imbo and Richard Petrone were filled with drama in the months before they vanished. Danielle was reeling from her husband’s affair while Richard unexpectedly became an empty nester. This led the two longtime friends, Danielle and Richard, to become more than friends. That changed when Danielle’s ex-husband re-entered the picture.
If you would like to reach out to the There and Gone Team, please email us at thereandgonepod@gmail.com.
If you have any tips on the disappearance of Richard Petrone and Danielle Imbo, please contact the Citizens Crime Commission at 215-546-TIPS (8477).
See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.
Mark as Played
Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Speaker 1 (00:01):
Then y'all get going on on a few dates with Richard.
But at that point she had started to find herself again,
like she had just started to turn a corner, and
I was so happy for her. And then she's gone,
and there's nothing we can do.
Speaker 2 (00:21):
I'm Andrea Gunning and this is there and Gone. South Street,
Episode two, Personal.
Speaker 3 (00:29):
I Know.
Speaker 4 (00:33):
Is I say in my dream, reached out on the
door for you and last to me, I'll never give up,
no matter how.
Speaker 1 (00:51):
I open my.
Speaker 4 (00:55):
Define Gone.
Speaker 2 (01:00):
Just to note that the views and opinions expressed in
this podcast are solely those of the individuals participating. This
podcast also contains subject matter that may not be suitable
for everyone. Discretion is advised. The iconic South Street is
(01:22):
a melting pot of Philadelphia's culture. It has something for everyone.
That's where I recently met with FBI agent Fido Rosselli.
As you can imagine, he spent a good amount of
his career on South Street investigating Danielle Imbo and Richard Petrone,
the two that went missing in February of two thousand
and five.
Speaker 5 (01:42):
Soud Street very popular area.
Speaker 6 (01:44):
You got different bars on one side, you got you know,
some of the hard rock headbanging bars, you know, on
the other side of the street blues bars. It's a
one way nightmare with with drunks you know, running in
between between the cars, so everybody has to drive slow,
and you got people blasting their music, you know, into cars.
It's so it's a pretty lively place. It's not a
(02:06):
place just for locals. It's a very touristy spy. Anybody
comes to Philly comes here. You got famous stake places,
you know, that are right across the street from each other.
So South Street is a hot happening spot. It's a
crowded spot. There's always people here, but it's a nice spot.
Speaker 2 (02:23):
It was cold, dreary the day I met up with
Fido for our South Street walk. The wind would kick
up from time to time as we re walked the streets.
The weather felt fitting to the topic of conversation. As
we made our way down the four hundred block, Fieto paused.
I looked up and realized we were standing in front
of the building where Danielle and Richard went that fateful night.
Speaker 7 (02:48):
Danielle and Richard were last seen between eleven thirty and
eleven forty five pm, leaving Abilene's bar. Abilene's was a
very popular bar that had a lot of bands that
would come in.
Speaker 2 (03:05):
I have a picture of Veto from that day. He
is standing inside what was then Abilene's, staring off in
the distance searching. My heart aches a little when I
look at it. The building is a restaurant now, but
in two thousand and five, Abilenees was a two story bar.
On the first floor, there was a narrow bar on
the right hand side. On the second a bar and
(03:26):
stage for live music.
Speaker 5 (03:27):
On the weekends, that particular area fourth in South Street
is usually more crowded because you have some popular bars
that cater to the whole genre of you know, partygoers.
Speaker 2 (03:42):
I asked Vito what Abilene's was like that night.
Speaker 8 (03:45):
Abilene's was crowded both first and second floor. The band
that Abilene's had that night was a locally popular band.
Rich Patron's friend, Anthony Valentino, asked them to meet him
that because he favored that band. That's why Richard was there,
and he had asked Danielle earlier in the day to
(04:07):
meet him out and she agreed. They were not planning
to go out this night.
Speaker 7 (04:11):
Matter of fact, a lot of their friends, both on
Richard's and Danielle's side were surprised that they were together
that night.
Speaker 2 (04:19):
They weren't supposed to be together that night. That stuck
with me. When I talked to the families, I got
the sense that Danielle and Richard were close. The relationship
was nuanced, but if you do any digging into this case,
it's widely reported that they were a couple. We'll get
into that a little later. The end of last episode,
(04:40):
Vido's colleague Jerry Williams called what happened to Danielle and
Richard personal.
Speaker 9 (04:47):
When Danielle Mbo and Richard Petrone disappeared, initially there was
a concern, a public safety concern, but as everyone learned
a little bit more or it started to look like
this may have been a very personal crime.
Speaker 2 (05:07):
That also stuck with me. So I want to spend
the next two episodes getting personal. Specifically, I want to
know who Danielle and Richard were as people, who they
were to one another, and why they were together. And
according to Vito, both Danielle and Richard's lives looked a
lot different a year before they disappeared. So I decided
(05:28):
to go back to the families to understand what was
going on in their lives in the years leading up
to their disappearance. I mentioned in episode one that Richard's
family owned a bakery called Biking Pastries. It was an
old fashioned Swedish bakery located in Ardmore, Pennsylvania, less than
ten minutes from where I grew up. For a couple
(05:52):
dozen years, Viking Pastries turned out sweet treats like pies, cupcakes,
and danishes. It's also where you'd find Richard Patrone. He
was either working in the kitchen at Viking or upstairs
in his apartment. Here's Richard's mother, Marche.
Speaker 10 (06:08):
He worked very hard in the bakery. He lived right upstairs,
so it was convenient we'd hear his thirteen steps down.
Speaker 1 (06:17):
He really ran everything in there.
Speaker 2 (06:20):
Marge told me Richard never settled down and got married,
but he was well known by bride's to be. You see,
Richard was famous for his wedding cakes. I'll tell you
what he did so beautifully.
Speaker 10 (06:33):
He made the roses and a bride could come in.
You know, how you give a swatch of a color
you would.
Speaker 1 (06:38):
Like your roses to be. I'd say, you know.
Speaker 10 (06:41):
I don't know if we're going to be able to
match it exactly. I'm Richard would say, stapled onto the order,
I'll do it. They would be perfect.
Speaker 2 (06:51):
Most people were surprised that these gorgeous wedding cakes came
from a guy who liked to blast heavy metal and
classic rock at the bakery.
Speaker 10 (06:58):
My outgoing, bubbly nature he definitely got from me. His
love of sports and music he definitely got from his father.
He made him listen to music from when he was
in the crib.
Speaker 2 (07:10):
Richard's best friend Frank, he.
Speaker 11 (07:13):
Can go from being like in a mosh pit to
then going to work to the dance floor in the
same night. Like he can go listen to Metallica to
listen to Madonna. You know, that's how wide his music
range was.
Speaker 2 (07:24):
Going to concerts was Richard's thing, and he loved sharing
that with his family. His youngest sister, Elisa, said Richard
drove her to see her first concert, no doubt.
Speaker 12 (07:36):
He took me to my second concert also.
Speaker 10 (07:38):
I think it was a lotus more set.
Speaker 12 (07:40):
It was the nineties.
Speaker 2 (07:43):
Richard's cousin Stacy Richard had every rock album under the
song on cassette.
Speaker 12 (07:49):
Metallica, Iron Maiden, and Bruce Springsteen.
Speaker 2 (07:55):
Bruce Springsteen was always a favorite of Richard and his father's.
Stacy said, whenever Richard and his father were working together
at the bakery, they always had on Bruce. That was
their thing. And no matter what mood Richard was in,
she said, whenever a song from Springsteen came on, there
was Richard covered in flower dancing like no one was watching.
Speaker 12 (08:15):
There was always laughter and noise and music from his
bench where he worked.
Speaker 2 (08:22):
Stacy also worked at Viking Pastries.
Speaker 12 (08:25):
I'd come around the bend and lo and behold, there'd
be a cupcake in my face. That was Richard.
Speaker 2 (08:32):
He was a practical joker. I had heard about Richard's
love of hockey, and according to Stacy, he was always
trying to get a group together to play.
Speaker 12 (08:41):
If it was a sports related activity, Richard drove in
and generally it was some kind of hockey, just wondering
whether or not it was going to be a punk
and how scared you.
Speaker 1 (08:53):
Had to be.
Speaker 12 (08:54):
You were hoping for the ball, not the puck. And
I'll just never forget. We were out in the driveway
and he just was drilling me with slap shot through
slap shot, trying to defend them. But I couldn't and.
Speaker 2 (09:10):
All he could do is just live, but just in
the most fun way. But it wasn't all jokes and pranks.
Richard had a soft and sensitive side to him, and
that was on full display with his daughter. Richard became
a dad young in life. He was only twenty years
(09:31):
old when he had a daughter named Angela or Anne
Jessie Calder.
Speaker 12 (09:35):
He stepped right into the role of raising that.
Speaker 2 (09:38):
Child by himself.
Speaker 12 (09:40):
I can remember teaching him different hair styles.
Speaker 2 (09:47):
He did Angela's hair in the morning, and he made
sure that.
Speaker 12 (09:50):
She was fed and that she was fooled, and that
she was loved, and that she had everything that she
could possibly need.
Speaker 2 (09:59):
He was a good He was a very good father.
He took very good care of her. That's Richard's former
girlfriend Julie, who's also Ange's mother. After Julie got pregnant,
she moved in with Richard, but she said it was
a struggle for both of them. They were just too young.
Julie admits she wasn't ready to settle down and become
a wife, much less a mother.
Speaker 13 (10:21):
I had Angela and then I was partying all the time,
you know, drinking with the friends and going to bars
and stuff like that. So, you know, we had a
child young, so we weren't ready to settle down.
Speaker 2 (10:33):
But Richard stepped up and became the primary caregiver.
Speaker 13 (10:36):
That that was kind of a wild child and I
couldn't really give Angela what she needed. So she went
and moved in with Richard and it was carved when
both of us.
Speaker 2 (10:48):
Julie said she credits Richard for being the parent to
Ange that she wasn't ready to be.
Speaker 13 (10:53):
I know he could have used somehow by which I was,
you know, available a little more, but he was very.
Speaker 2 (10:58):
Good, managed to get a lot of help from his family,
especially March.
Speaker 3 (11:04):
They talked every day.
Speaker 13 (11:06):
I think it's pretty much in the Italian culture that
you know, the boys are more like mommy boys.
Speaker 2 (11:12):
And he was very very close with his mother.
Speaker 13 (11:15):
You know, they were a tight Italian family.
Speaker 3 (11:19):
My dad raised me up until I was about thirteen
fourteen years old.
Speaker 2 (11:26):
That's Richard and Julie's daughter. Ang.
Speaker 3 (11:28):
We lived on top of the bakery that my family owned.
He was basically a girl dad.
Speaker 2 (11:36):
Today Ange has a child of her own and said
she's constantly amazed at how much her dad was able
to juggle back in the day.
Speaker 3 (11:43):
He would literally be rushing to finish wedding cakes, like
whipping up maybe five wedding cakes in a matter of
two hours or so, rushing to get me out the
bakery door to make it to soccer games. And I'll
never forget that. He would just be covered in cake,
standing out there watching me play soccer. And back then
I would be like, oh my goodness, my dad looks crazy.
(12:06):
But I mean, now, when I think about it, how
hard it is to juggle everything in life. He did
a remarkable job.
Speaker 2 (12:15):
As Ange developed into a teenager, she decided the time
was right to move in with her mom. And this
was around two thousand and four.
Speaker 3 (12:23):
I was going through certain girl things. It was hard
for him to grasp or understand, and at the time,
I just felt like, you know, I needed my mom
a little closer, and so I decided to move in
with her.
Speaker 2 (12:37):
From age twenty to about thirty four, Anne said Richard's
life revolved around her and the bakery. So when she left,
she said, Richard really struggled with being an empty nester.
Speaker 3 (12:48):
It was really hard for him. It was hard for
me too. It was an adjustment.
Speaker 2 (12:53):
Richard decided to get a tattoo on his left arm
that said Angela, but it didn't fill the void.
Speaker 3 (12:59):
Not long after he said, you know what, you're too
far away. He packed up and moved maybe five minutes
up the street.
Speaker 2 (13:09):
Richard moved out of the apartment above his parents' bakery
and into South Philly. Ange lived right down the street,
but he found himself with a lot more independence. For
the first time since Richard's ten years, he suddenly had
free time. More specifically, he was able to start dating again.
(13:34):
Danielle Imbo's brother, John A. Toobray, has been a reluctant
spokesperson for his family ever since Danielle vanished back in
two thousand and five. I sat down to speak with
John a few times over the course of a year,
but I have to say that initial interview wasn't easy
to get.
Speaker 1 (13:51):
I told Veto, I don't do these anymore. He called
me three or four times and he said, Johnny, I
need you to do it. Said if you need me
to do it, I'll do it.
Speaker 2 (14:02):
As my team set up our equipment around the Tobrays
dining room table, I told John, I try to keep
this whole experience as painless as possible. But who was
I kidding? How could this not be painful?
Speaker 1 (14:14):
I was speaking to one of my mentors, telling him
about it, and he's like, John, when's enough going to
be enough? When are you going to stop torturing yourself? Right?
And I said, you know what, It'll never be enough
because I owe it to her to do this every
day for the rest of my life, because I owe
that to her to never give up, because she would
(14:37):
never give up if it were me.
Speaker 2 (14:39):
John was not just Danielle's little brother. They were incredibly close.
Speaker 1 (14:45):
I actually considered her one of my best friends. You know,
I could tell her anything. She told me everything.
Speaker 2 (14:51):
In their early days, Danielle was John's protector.
Speaker 1 (14:55):
I do remember being a freshman and walking down the
hallway and this kid is calling to beat me up.
I'm getting ready to get into a fight with a
kid that I don't even know, and here comes Danielle
to the rescue. Danielle directs guys to chase him, and
here I am, like, you want to mess with me?
You got to talk to Danielle. It was cool. And
(15:17):
then she came home and then she told my parents.
She goes, oh, yeah, Johnny almost got beat up by
a junior today, I had to get involved, like I
didn't almost get beat up it. I was fine, I
had had all under control.
Speaker 2 (15:27):
In fact, their four person family unit was incredibly tight.
John more like his mom, Danielle much like her dad.
Speaker 1 (15:36):
They were each other's fan club. They just were so
identical in so many ways, from the singing career to
their personality to the way each one of them can
just take over the room. Everybody just wants to be
around them all the time.
Speaker 2 (15:54):
John said their father used to be a famous do
wop singer. He went by the name Johnny October. Danielle
inherited her dad's voice in stage presence. John has a
handful of old VHS tapes of Danielle singing in a
local cover band called the Schoolboys. Even through the grainy footage,
(16:21):
Danielle stood out commanded the stage. She had shoulder length,
jet black hair and fair skin. She also had a
smile much like Madonna, you know, with that ever so
slight gap between her two front teeth. And I don't
hesitate to say this, she was beautiful.
Speaker 1 (16:38):
I always envied that I didn't have the confidence and
self esteem as Danielle and my father. I didn't have
the voice of Danielle and my father.
Speaker 2 (16:48):
At twenty one, Danielle met an older guy. In a
matter of months, they got engaged and then married.
Speaker 1 (16:55):
The marriage it didn't last. I think Danielle was just
a little too young to commit and he was very possessive.
Speaker 2 (17:03):
She wanted to live her life. She moved to New
York City and had that experience for a few years.
She even worked as a blackjack dealer at an Atlantic
City casino. Then she followed in her dad's footsteps in
the car business, and that's when she met her second husband,
Joe Imbo.
Speaker 1 (17:21):
Joe was from New York had lived in San Diego
for the life of me. I have no idea what
he was doing in Burlington, New Jersey, but he was
driving up the highway where the dealership was, and as
luck would have it, as car broke down right in
front of the dealership.
Speaker 2 (17:41):
Joe and Danielle quickly hit it off. And John understands why.
Speaker 1 (17:47):
He reminded me a lot of my father. He was short,
he was stocky, Italian, real dark skin, dark hair, dark ice.
And I'm saying to myself and I wonder why Danielle
fell for him.
Speaker 2 (17:57):
There is a saying that women married guys to remind
them of their father, and that's what happened with Danielle.
In two thousand and one, she and Joe tied the knot,
and unlike Danielle's first husband, Joe fit right in with
Danielle's family.
Speaker 1 (18:13):
I got him a job. We started working together. I
started teaching and training and mentoring him in the card business.
We bought jet skis together. We would go jet skiing.
We got along, you know, as.
Speaker 2 (18:24):
You can imagine to grow up and have your sibling
close to your partner and go through life together, it's
a dream for most. Here's Jody, John's wife.
Speaker 14 (18:33):
I have a younger brother, so I never had a sister.
And it was just the fun and excitement. Like she
liked fashion, I liked fashion. She liked sports like I did.
It was an instant connection.
Speaker 2 (18:46):
Danielle and Jody were inseparable, and we're more like sisters
than sisters in law.
Speaker 14 (18:52):
She had a convertible, so we would go pick up
her paycheck on a Friday and just put the top
down and drive all the way down the shore, pick
her pay check up and then watch Friends on TV.
You know, things like.
Speaker 2 (19:04):
That, and it wasn't just Jody and Danielle who hung out.
The two couple spent most weekends together.
Speaker 14 (19:11):
We always had a great time when we went out
with them, you know, when she would sing, Joe would
pick me up and me and Joe would drive into
the city watch her sing there.
Speaker 2 (19:23):
Late nights. Smokey bars eventually went away when Jody got
pregnant with twins. And then came another surprise.
Speaker 14 (19:32):
John and I were watching Sopranos. It was a Sunday
night and everyone knew do not call the house when
Sopranos is on Sunday night, Like, we are watching our show,
and the phone rings and it's Danielle and you know,
back then there was no pause or rewind on your TV.
And John saying, tell her we'll call her back, tell
(19:53):
her will call her. And I said, is everything okay?
And she said it is, but in her voice she
sounded sad. So I said, are you all right? And
she said I'm pregnant and I screamed that you could
probably have heard me in Florida. I was like, oh
my goodness, we're going to be pregnant together. This is amazing.
Speaker 2 (20:14):
And she starts crying and she's like you're not mad?
Speaker 14 (20:17):
And I said mad.
Speaker 7 (20:18):
Why would I be mad?
Speaker 14 (20:20):
And she said, because I don't want it to be
like I'm stealing your thunder.
Speaker 2 (20:24):
You're pregnant.
Speaker 14 (20:25):
I'm like, this is amazing. I said, no, I am
not mad. I am so happy for you guys.
Speaker 2 (20:34):
They were going to have each other and their kids
were going to grow up together. Three boys all around
the same age. The life Theotobrays wanted to build one
that prioritized family was coming together.
Speaker 14 (20:49):
Every night after work, Her and I would go and
get ice cream because at this point we were like Mattie.
Speaker 2 (20:55):
You know, with the big belly.
Speaker 14 (20:56):
I mean we would both sit there and just rest
our hands on our her stomach and like eat the
ice cream as it was dripping down our chins and
not even knowing it.
Speaker 2 (21:06):
The twins were born in March of two thousand and two,
and Danielle gave birth to her son, Joe Junior, two
months later.
Speaker 14 (21:13):
In Nay.
Speaker 2 (21:15):
John remembers how happy his sister was.
Speaker 1 (21:19):
She would just look at him and she huge, stark crisch.
Isn't he the most beautiful thing you'd ever say? We're like, yeah,
Danielle's beautiful. We got it. Yes, She was a great mom.
I think her exact words were, now I know what
it's truly like to be in love with someone, like
instant in love. The three of the kids would just
(21:39):
be crawling all over each other, like just barely like
walking right, and Danielle and Jody would be Indian style
on either side, and they would just play all day
with the kids all day. She loved those kids. I
have so many pictures of Danielle with them as babies.
Speaker 2 (21:56):
Life was good for the Atobreys and the Inmbos, any
family memories, but that would all be short lived.
Speaker 1 (22:05):
That football trip happened and it just it ruined everything.
Speaker 2 (22:18):
By two thousand and four, Danielle and Joe Imbo were
still newlyweds. They'd only been married a couple of years
and life was just getting started for the two thirty sethings.
They owned a condo in New Jersey and just had
a baby boy, also named Joe. There was even talk
of Danielle and Joe moving into a house across the
street from Danielle's brother John, but things never got to
(22:41):
that point because of what happened at a football game.
Speaker 1 (22:45):
Joe, you know, he was in the football of course,
he was in the gambling, so Sunday he fit right
in with the family watching the games.
Speaker 2 (22:53):
Football was a Sunday ritual at John's house. John said
he and Joe even started a tradition where the two
of them and a few of their friends would fly
down to the Super Bowl every year.
Speaker 1 (23:03):
So we went to one super Bowl, then we went
to the next super Bowl together. We talked about it
being a tradition and as the boys get older, we'll
take the boys with us.
Speaker 2 (23:13):
Their kids were all less than a year old in
two thousand and four, so John and Joe made plans
to fly to Houston with some friends to go to
the game.
Speaker 1 (23:22):
We're getting ready to go to the Super Bowl and
we get this massive blizzard. There's like two feet of
snow on the ground.
Speaker 2 (23:29):
First it was mother Nature, then the flu bug tour
through John's house. His wife and twin boys got sick,
and so did Danielle.
Speaker 1 (23:37):
Both the girls are sick, my wife, my sister definitely ill.
The kids are babies, they're infants. They're sick, and I
bail out. I said Joe, I'm not going to go.
This is crazy. I want to go, but I can't leave.
Jody and the kids home sick like that, and he said, well,
I'm still going, and he goes with my friends.
Speaker 2 (23:56):
John's wife, Jody, said, Danielle wasn't happy with Joe's decision.
Speaker 14 (24:01):
I think she was expecting the same from Joe, and
then when she didn't get it, I think it was
more of at first angry, but then more her. You
know that the super Bowl would be more important than
your son being really sick with a high fever and
your wife not feeling great and still having to take
care of him because it's baby.
Speaker 2 (24:24):
You might remember the two thousand and four Super Bowl
for Tom Brady and the Patriots holding on to beat
the Panthers. That was the game with the halftime show
that featured the infamous wardrobe malfunction between Janet Jackson and
Justin Timberlake. That was a memorable game, and Joe Imbo
got to see it all, at least he was supposed to.
Speaker 1 (24:47):
He meets this girl on the plane and has an affair.
Speaker 2 (24:52):
John said. As soon as word got back to him,
he immediately called up every one of his friends who
went on that trip to find out what the hell happened.
Speaker 1 (25:00):
And they're like, dude, I don't know all I know
is he met this girl. He was sat next to
her on the plane. He was talking to her the
whole time, and we didn't see him the whole trip.
Speaker 2 (25:08):
John learned that while all of his guys were at
the game, Joe was busy fumbling away his marriage. But
things were about to go from bad to worse.
Speaker 1 (25:18):
Joe comes home. Then y'all still sick, the baby's still sick.
Then y'all said, hey, Han, Howard's your trip. And he's like,
I don't love you. I was never in love with you,
and I'm leaving. He moved out and filed for divorce.
That's how the bomb was dropped. Next thing you know,
(25:40):
he's talking about moving to Atlanta to go live with
this girl and her kid.
Speaker 14 (25:45):
It's like a movie, you know, like one day you
wake up and you're angry that your husband left you
and your child while you were sick, needs to grow
on a plane, and then just leaves you.
Speaker 2 (25:55):
Jody told me she was shopping with her twin boys
at Target when she got a phone call from Danielle.
Speaker 14 (26:01):
I was pushing the kids in a stroller in the
parking lot and I stopped in and I was like,
excuse me, and she said, yeah, he just packed up
all of his stuff. Where are you can I come over?
I just waited for in the parking lot and she
got there, put little Joe in the stroller, and you know,
she was hysterical. I don't know what to do do
I just keep calling them and telling them that try
(26:22):
to work this out. I don't want this. We literally
walked through Target for three hours, just talking about different
things of what she wanted to do.
Speaker 2 (26:35):
Just to put this into perspective, all of this happened
just about a year before Danielle and Richard disappeared, and
John said, once Danielle and Joe's marriage started falling apart,
it sent Danielle's spiraling.
Speaker 1 (26:49):
It just got dark. She didn't eat, she didn't sleep
this whole time, she's asking him, why are you doing this?
I don't understand what happened. Everything was fine, and you left,
you came back, and now you never loved me, like
you don't love me anymore.
Speaker 2 (27:07):
Joe packed up and moved down to Atlanta to be
with the woman he had an affair with at the
super Bowl. By that spring of two thousand and four,
Danielle and Joe's son celebrated his first birthday. There was,
of course, cake and ice cream and plenty of presents,
and Danielle was doing it all by herself.
Speaker 14 (27:25):
He was living his new life with this girl. And
each day she would call him and you wouldn't answer,
or if he did, he just didn't want to be bothered.
Some days she would call me sad and crying, saying
I miss him. I do want him back, I do
want him to come home. I don't want little Joe
to grow up without a father. I just want everything
(27:47):
to be the way it was.
Speaker 2 (27:49):
But according to John, the damage was already done.
Speaker 1 (27:52):
She was not the same person after that. She was
self conscious, pride all the time, Chaine smoked, lost a
ton of ways. She would call herself a two time loser.
Here I am a two time loser with two failed marriages.
Speaker 2 (28:13):
Most surprising, Jody said, Danielle was still open to reconciling
with Joe.
Speaker 14 (28:19):
I don't know if it was necessarily that she loved
him so much that she wanted to get back with him.
She just did not want little Joe growing up in
a broken home if it meant him coming home after
what he did. But little Joe had a father, at
home and always grew up with a family. She would
have done that for him.
Speaker 2 (28:41):
But Jody had some advice for Danielle.
Speaker 14 (28:44):
My answer to her was, if you two are only
going to be fighting in front of him, it's not
good for him. So if you want to just walk
away from this, no one will think any less of
you that you are a single mom raising a child
on your.
Speaker 2 (28:56):
Own, John said. Danielle was also afraid she couldn't make
it financially.
Speaker 1 (29:02):
She didn't know if she could afford the condo on
her own, and I told her, pack up your stuff
and move in with us. We'll sell your house, it's
in your name, pay off the condo, pay off your bills,
and you stay with us until you get back on
your feet again.
Speaker 2 (29:23):
Danielle wasn't ready to do that yet, but she became
a picture at their house. Sometimes she was crying, other
times she seemed to be moving forward with her life.
Speaker 1 (29:34):
Even through all those dark times that she was going
through with her husband. The fact that the three of
us could be together it was great.
Speaker 14 (29:43):
It was probably about five or six months at that point.
It was kind of like, I think I'm done with him.
Speaker 2 (29:50):
Danielle and Joe went to a mediator to start the
divorce process.
Speaker 14 (29:55):
And they had gone two times, basically to discuss who
gets the who gets that, will sell the place, will
split it down the middle, all that kind of stuff.
Speaker 2 (30:05):
Eventually, Jody started to see less and less of Danielle.
Speaker 14 (30:09):
When things started happening with her and Joe. Obviously she
was here a lot. And then when she had met
up with Christine, I had started to see her a
little bit less and she was spending a little more
time with Christine Chris. Christine was going through a divorce
at the time.
Speaker 2 (30:26):
Too, Christine as in Christine Patrone, Richard's sister. Christine and
Danielle had been friends since high school and seemed to
bond over both of their impending divorces, and all of
that time with Christine led Danielle to Richard.
Speaker 1 (30:43):
She's known Richard her whole life. Richard was a single parent,
and it was just good company. The two of them
would go to a movie together, go to dinner.
Speaker 2 (30:52):
As two thousand and four were on, Danielle finally seemed
to be turning the page on everything that happened with Joe.
And that's when John said it all came to a
screeching halt. Something flipped in Joe and all of a sudden,
Joe did a one eighty.
Speaker 1 (31:11):
That's when he started pressing her to get back together
and it row wined her. It real wind her.
Speaker 2 (31:26):
That's next time on There and Gone. If you have
any information about the disappearance of Danielle Imbo and Richard Patron,
please call the Citizens Crime Commission tip line at two
on five five four six eight four seven seven, or
you can reach out to the show in our team
by email at varngonpod at gmail dot com. That's There
(31:49):
and Gone pod at gmail dot com. Thank you so
much for listening. One way for you to show support
is by subscribing to our show on Apple Podcasts. Don't
forget to rate and review because five star reviews go
a long way. A big thank you to all of
our listeners. Therein gonn is a production of Glass Podcasts,
(32:10):
a division of Glass Entertainment Group in partnership with iHeart Podcasts.
The show is executive produced by Nancy Glass, Ben Fetterman,
and me Andrea Gunning. It's hosted and written by me
Andrea Gunning, with additional reporting and writing by Ben Fetterman.
The series is also written and produced by Todd gans.
Our associate producer is Kristin Melcurrie. Research by Mason Klinder,
(32:33):
Anna Hamilton, and Bella riki Our iHeart team is Ali
Perry and Jessica Krincheck. Audio editing and mixing by Matt
del Vecchio, Additional editing support by Nico Ruka. Therein. Gonn's
theme and original compositions were composed by Oliver Bains and
Darry mcaulay of Neuser Music Library provided by my Music
(32:54):
Special thanks to both the Patrone and and toe Ray families.
For more podcasts from iHeart, visit iHeartRadio, app, Apple Podcasts,
or wherever you get your podcasts
Then y'all get going on on a few dates with Richard.
But at that point she had started to find herself again,
like she had just started to turn a corner, and
I was so happy for her. And then she's gone,
and there's nothing we can do.
Speaker 2 (00:21):
I'm Andrea Gunning and this is there and Gone. South Street,
Episode two, Personal.
Speaker 3 (00:29):
I Know.
Speaker 4 (00:33):
Is I say in my dream, reached out on the
door for you and last to me, I'll never give up,
no matter how.
Speaker 1 (00:51):
I open my.
Speaker 4 (00:55):
Define Gone.
Speaker 2 (01:00):
Just to note that the views and opinions expressed in
this podcast are solely those of the individuals participating. This
podcast also contains subject matter that may not be suitable
for everyone. Discretion is advised. The iconic South Street is
(01:22):
a melting pot of Philadelphia's culture. It has something for everyone.
That's where I recently met with FBI agent Fido Rosselli.
As you can imagine, he spent a good amount of
his career on South Street investigating Danielle Imbo and Richard Petrone,
the two that went missing in February of two thousand
and five.
Speaker 5 (01:42):
Soud Street very popular area.
Speaker 6 (01:44):
You got different bars on one side, you got you know,
some of the hard rock headbanging bars, you know, on
the other side of the street blues bars. It's a
one way nightmare with with drunks you know, running in
between between the cars, so everybody has to drive slow,
and you got people blasting their music, you know, into cars.
It's so it's a pretty lively place. It's not a
(02:06):
place just for locals. It's a very touristy spy. Anybody
comes to Philly comes here. You got famous stake places,
you know, that are right across the street from each other.
So South Street is a hot happening spot. It's a
crowded spot. There's always people here, but it's a nice spot.
Speaker 2 (02:23):
It was cold, dreary the day I met up with
Fido for our South Street walk. The wind would kick
up from time to time as we re walked the streets.
The weather felt fitting to the topic of conversation. As
we made our way down the four hundred block, Fieto paused.
I looked up and realized we were standing in front
of the building where Danielle and Richard went that fateful night.
Speaker 7 (02:48):
Danielle and Richard were last seen between eleven thirty and
eleven forty five pm, leaving Abilene's bar. Abilene's was a
very popular bar that had a lot of bands that
would come in.
Speaker 2 (03:05):
I have a picture of Veto from that day. He
is standing inside what was then Abilene's, staring off in
the distance searching. My heart aches a little when I
look at it. The building is a restaurant now, but
in two thousand and five, Abilenees was a two story bar.
On the first floor, there was a narrow bar on
the right hand side. On the second a bar and
(03:26):
stage for live music.
Speaker 5 (03:27):
On the weekends, that particular area fourth in South Street
is usually more crowded because you have some popular bars
that cater to the whole genre of you know, partygoers.
Speaker 2 (03:42):
I asked Vito what Abilene's was like that night.
Speaker 8 (03:45):
Abilene's was crowded both first and second floor. The band
that Abilene's had that night was a locally popular band.
Rich Patron's friend, Anthony Valentino, asked them to meet him
that because he favored that band. That's why Richard was there,
and he had asked Danielle earlier in the day to
(04:07):
meet him out and she agreed. They were not planning
to go out this night.
Speaker 7 (04:11):
Matter of fact, a lot of their friends, both on
Richard's and Danielle's side were surprised that they were together
that night.
Speaker 2 (04:19):
They weren't supposed to be together that night. That stuck
with me. When I talked to the families, I got
the sense that Danielle and Richard were close. The relationship
was nuanced, but if you do any digging into this case,
it's widely reported that they were a couple. We'll get
into that a little later. The end of last episode,
(04:40):
Vido's colleague Jerry Williams called what happened to Danielle and
Richard personal.
Speaker 9 (04:47):
When Danielle Mbo and Richard Petrone disappeared, initially there was
a concern, a public safety concern, but as everyone learned
a little bit more or it started to look like
this may have been a very personal crime.
Speaker 2 (05:07):
That also stuck with me. So I want to spend
the next two episodes getting personal. Specifically, I want to
know who Danielle and Richard were as people, who they
were to one another, and why they were together. And
according to Vito, both Danielle and Richard's lives looked a
lot different a year before they disappeared. So I decided
(05:28):
to go back to the families to understand what was
going on in their lives in the years leading up
to their disappearance. I mentioned in episode one that Richard's
family owned a bakery called Biking Pastries. It was an
old fashioned Swedish bakery located in Ardmore, Pennsylvania, less than
ten minutes from where I grew up. For a couple
(05:52):
dozen years, Viking Pastries turned out sweet treats like pies, cupcakes,
and danishes. It's also where you'd find Richard Patrone. He
was either working in the kitchen at Viking or upstairs
in his apartment. Here's Richard's mother, Marche.
Speaker 10 (06:08):
He worked very hard in the bakery. He lived right upstairs,
so it was convenient we'd hear his thirteen steps down.
Speaker 1 (06:17):
He really ran everything in there.
Speaker 2 (06:20):
Marge told me Richard never settled down and got married,
but he was well known by bride's to be. You see,
Richard was famous for his wedding cakes. I'll tell you
what he did so beautifully.
Speaker 10 (06:33):
He made the roses and a bride could come in.
You know, how you give a swatch of a color
you would.
Speaker 1 (06:38):
Like your roses to be. I'd say, you know.
Speaker 10 (06:41):
I don't know if we're going to be able to
match it exactly. I'm Richard would say, stapled onto the order,
I'll do it. They would be perfect.
Speaker 2 (06:51):
Most people were surprised that these gorgeous wedding cakes came
from a guy who liked to blast heavy metal and
classic rock at the bakery.
Speaker 10 (06:58):
My outgoing, bubbly nature he definitely got from me. His
love of sports and music he definitely got from his father.
He made him listen to music from when he was
in the crib.
Speaker 2 (07:10):
Richard's best friend Frank, he.
Speaker 11 (07:13):
Can go from being like in a mosh pit to
then going to work to the dance floor in the
same night. Like he can go listen to Metallica to
listen to Madonna. You know, that's how wide his music
range was.
Speaker 2 (07:24):
Going to concerts was Richard's thing, and he loved sharing
that with his family. His youngest sister, Elisa, said Richard
drove her to see her first concert, no doubt.
Speaker 12 (07:36):
He took me to my second concert also.
Speaker 10 (07:38):
I think it was a lotus more set.
Speaker 12 (07:40):
It was the nineties.
Speaker 2 (07:43):
Richard's cousin Stacy Richard had every rock album under the
song on cassette.
Speaker 12 (07:49):
Metallica, Iron Maiden, and Bruce Springsteen.
Speaker 2 (07:55):
Bruce Springsteen was always a favorite of Richard and his father's.
Stacy said, whenever Richard and his father were working together
at the bakery, they always had on Bruce. That was
their thing. And no matter what mood Richard was in,
she said, whenever a song from Springsteen came on, there
was Richard covered in flower dancing like no one was watching.
Speaker 12 (08:15):
There was always laughter and noise and music from his
bench where he worked.
Speaker 2 (08:22):
Stacy also worked at Viking Pastries.
Speaker 12 (08:25):
I'd come around the bend and lo and behold, there'd
be a cupcake in my face. That was Richard.
Speaker 2 (08:32):
He was a practical joker. I had heard about Richard's
love of hockey, and according to Stacy, he was always
trying to get a group together to play.
Speaker 12 (08:41):
If it was a sports related activity, Richard drove in
and generally it was some kind of hockey, just wondering
whether or not it was going to be a punk
and how scared you.
Speaker 1 (08:53):
Had to be.
Speaker 12 (08:54):
You were hoping for the ball, not the puck. And
I'll just never forget. We were out in the driveway
and he just was drilling me with slap shot through
slap shot, trying to defend them. But I couldn't and.
Speaker 2 (09:10):
All he could do is just live, but just in
the most fun way. But it wasn't all jokes and pranks.
Richard had a soft and sensitive side to him, and
that was on full display with his daughter. Richard became
a dad young in life. He was only twenty years
(09:31):
old when he had a daughter named Angela or Anne
Jessie Calder.
Speaker 12 (09:35):
He stepped right into the role of raising that.
Speaker 2 (09:38):
Child by himself.
Speaker 12 (09:40):
I can remember teaching him different hair styles.
Speaker 2 (09:47):
He did Angela's hair in the morning, and he made
sure that.
Speaker 12 (09:50):
She was fed and that she was fooled, and that
she was loved, and that she had everything that she
could possibly need.
Speaker 2 (09:59):
He was a good He was a very good father.
He took very good care of her. That's Richard's former
girlfriend Julie, who's also Ange's mother. After Julie got pregnant,
she moved in with Richard, but she said it was
a struggle for both of them. They were just too young.
Julie admits she wasn't ready to settle down and become
a wife, much less a mother.
Speaker 13 (10:21):
I had Angela and then I was partying all the time,
you know, drinking with the friends and going to bars
and stuff like that. So, you know, we had a
child young, so we weren't ready to settle down.
Speaker 2 (10:33):
But Richard stepped up and became the primary caregiver.
Speaker 13 (10:36):
That that was kind of a wild child and I
couldn't really give Angela what she needed. So she went
and moved in with Richard and it was carved when
both of us.
Speaker 2 (10:48):
Julie said she credits Richard for being the parent to
Ange that she wasn't ready to be.
Speaker 13 (10:53):
I know he could have used somehow by which I was,
you know, available a little more, but he was very.
Speaker 2 (10:58):
Good, managed to get a lot of help from his family,
especially March.
Speaker 3 (11:04):
They talked every day.
Speaker 13 (11:06):
I think it's pretty much in the Italian culture that
you know, the boys are more like mommy boys.
Speaker 2 (11:12):
And he was very very close with his mother.
Speaker 13 (11:15):
You know, they were a tight Italian family.
Speaker 3 (11:19):
My dad raised me up until I was about thirteen
fourteen years old.
Speaker 2 (11:26):
That's Richard and Julie's daughter. Ang.
Speaker 3 (11:28):
We lived on top of the bakery that my family owned.
He was basically a girl dad.
Speaker 2 (11:36):
Today Ange has a child of her own and said
she's constantly amazed at how much her dad was able
to juggle back in the day.
Speaker 3 (11:43):
He would literally be rushing to finish wedding cakes, like
whipping up maybe five wedding cakes in a matter of
two hours or so, rushing to get me out the
bakery door to make it to soccer games. And I'll
never forget that. He would just be covered in cake,
standing out there watching me play soccer. And back then
I would be like, oh my goodness, my dad looks crazy.
(12:06):
But I mean, now, when I think about it, how
hard it is to juggle everything in life. He did
a remarkable job.
Speaker 2 (12:15):
As Ange developed into a teenager, she decided the time
was right to move in with her mom. And this
was around two thousand and four.
Speaker 3 (12:23):
I was going through certain girl things. It was hard
for him to grasp or understand, and at the time,
I just felt like, you know, I needed my mom
a little closer, and so I decided to move in
with her.
Speaker 2 (12:37):
From age twenty to about thirty four, Anne said Richard's
life revolved around her and the bakery. So when she left,
she said, Richard really struggled with being an empty nester.
Speaker 3 (12:48):
It was really hard for him. It was hard for
me too. It was an adjustment.
Speaker 2 (12:53):
Richard decided to get a tattoo on his left arm
that said Angela, but it didn't fill the void.
Speaker 3 (12:59):
Not long after he said, you know what, you're too
far away. He packed up and moved maybe five minutes
up the street.
Speaker 2 (13:09):
Richard moved out of the apartment above his parents' bakery
and into South Philly. Ange lived right down the street,
but he found himself with a lot more independence. For
the first time since Richard's ten years, he suddenly had
free time. More specifically, he was able to start dating again.
(13:34):
Danielle Imbo's brother, John A. Toobray, has been a reluctant
spokesperson for his family ever since Danielle vanished back in
two thousand and five. I sat down to speak with
John a few times over the course of a year,
but I have to say that initial interview wasn't easy
to get.
Speaker 1 (13:51):
I told Veto, I don't do these anymore. He called
me three or four times and he said, Johnny, I
need you to do it. Said if you need me
to do it, I'll do it.
Speaker 2 (14:02):
As my team set up our equipment around the Tobrays
dining room table, I told John, I try to keep
this whole experience as painless as possible. But who was
I kidding? How could this not be painful?
Speaker 1 (14:14):
I was speaking to one of my mentors, telling him
about it, and he's like, John, when's enough going to
be enough? When are you going to stop torturing yourself? Right?
And I said, you know what, It'll never be enough
because I owe it to her to do this every
day for the rest of my life, because I owe
that to her to never give up, because she would
(14:37):
never give up if it were me.
Speaker 2 (14:39):
John was not just Danielle's little brother. They were incredibly close.
Speaker 1 (14:45):
I actually considered her one of my best friends. You know,
I could tell her anything. She told me everything.
Speaker 2 (14:51):
In their early days, Danielle was John's protector.
Speaker 1 (14:55):
I do remember being a freshman and walking down the
hallway and this kid is calling to beat me up.
I'm getting ready to get into a fight with a
kid that I don't even know, and here comes Danielle
to the rescue. Danielle directs guys to chase him, and
here I am, like, you want to mess with me?
You got to talk to Danielle. It was cool. And
(15:17):
then she came home and then she told my parents.
She goes, oh, yeah, Johnny almost got beat up by
a junior today, I had to get involved, like I
didn't almost get beat up it. I was fine, I
had had all under control.
Speaker 2 (15:27):
In fact, their four person family unit was incredibly tight.
John more like his mom, Danielle much like her dad.
Speaker 1 (15:36):
They were each other's fan club. They just were so
identical in so many ways, from the singing career to
their personality to the way each one of them can
just take over the room. Everybody just wants to be
around them all the time.
Speaker 2 (15:54):
John said their father used to be a famous do
wop singer. He went by the name Johnny October. Danielle
inherited her dad's voice in stage presence. John has a
handful of old VHS tapes of Danielle singing in a
local cover band called the Schoolboys. Even through the grainy footage,
(16:21):
Danielle stood out commanded the stage. She had shoulder length,
jet black hair and fair skin. She also had a
smile much like Madonna, you know, with that ever so
slight gap between her two front teeth. And I don't
hesitate to say this, she was beautiful.
Speaker 1 (16:38):
I always envied that I didn't have the confidence and
self esteem as Danielle and my father. I didn't have
the voice of Danielle and my father.
Speaker 2 (16:48):
At twenty one, Danielle met an older guy. In a
matter of months, they got engaged and then married.
Speaker 1 (16:55):
The marriage it didn't last. I think Danielle was just
a little too young to commit and he was very possessive.
Speaker 2 (17:03):
She wanted to live her life. She moved to New
York City and had that experience for a few years.
She even worked as a blackjack dealer at an Atlantic
City casino. Then she followed in her dad's footsteps in
the car business, and that's when she met her second husband,
Joe Imbo.
Speaker 1 (17:21):
Joe was from New York had lived in San Diego
for the life of me. I have no idea what
he was doing in Burlington, New Jersey, but he was
driving up the highway where the dealership was, and as
luck would have it, as car broke down right in
front of the dealership.
Speaker 2 (17:41):
Joe and Danielle quickly hit it off. And John understands why.
Speaker 1 (17:47):
He reminded me a lot of my father. He was short,
he was stocky, Italian, real dark skin, dark hair, dark ice.
And I'm saying to myself and I wonder why Danielle
fell for him.
Speaker 2 (17:57):
There is a saying that women married guys to remind
them of their father, and that's what happened with Danielle.
In two thousand and one, she and Joe tied the knot,
and unlike Danielle's first husband, Joe fit right in with
Danielle's family.
Speaker 1 (18:13):
I got him a job. We started working together. I
started teaching and training and mentoring him in the card business.
We bought jet skis together. We would go jet skiing.
We got along, you know, as.
Speaker 2 (18:24):
You can imagine to grow up and have your sibling
close to your partner and go through life together, it's
a dream for most. Here's Jody, John's wife.
Speaker 14 (18:33):
I have a younger brother, so I never had a sister.
And it was just the fun and excitement. Like she
liked fashion, I liked fashion. She liked sports like I did.
It was an instant connection.
Speaker 2 (18:46):
Danielle and Jody were inseparable, and we're more like sisters
than sisters in law.
Speaker 14 (18:52):
She had a convertible, so we would go pick up
her paycheck on a Friday and just put the top
down and drive all the way down the shore, pick
her pay check up and then watch Friends on TV.
You know, things like.
Speaker 2 (19:04):
That, and it wasn't just Jody and Danielle who hung out.
The two couple spent most weekends together.
Speaker 14 (19:11):
We always had a great time when we went out
with them, you know, when she would sing, Joe would
pick me up and me and Joe would drive into
the city watch her sing there.
Speaker 2 (19:23):
Late nights. Smokey bars eventually went away when Jody got
pregnant with twins. And then came another surprise.
Speaker 14 (19:32):
John and I were watching Sopranos. It was a Sunday
night and everyone knew do not call the house when
Sopranos is on Sunday night, Like, we are watching our show,
and the phone rings and it's Danielle and you know,
back then there was no pause or rewind on your TV.
And John saying, tell her we'll call her back, tell
(19:53):
her will call her. And I said, is everything okay?
And she said it is, but in her voice she
sounded sad. So I said, are you all right? And
she said I'm pregnant and I screamed that you could
probably have heard me in Florida. I was like, oh
my goodness, we're going to be pregnant together. This is amazing.
Speaker 2 (20:14):
And she starts crying and she's like you're not mad?
Speaker 14 (20:17):
And I said mad.
Speaker 7 (20:18):
Why would I be mad?
Speaker 14 (20:20):
And she said, because I don't want it to be
like I'm stealing your thunder.
Speaker 2 (20:24):
You're pregnant.
Speaker 14 (20:25):
I'm like, this is amazing. I said, no, I am
not mad. I am so happy for you guys.
Speaker 2 (20:34):
They were going to have each other and their kids
were going to grow up together. Three boys all around
the same age. The life Theotobrays wanted to build one
that prioritized family was coming together.
Speaker 14 (20:49):
Every night after work, Her and I would go and
get ice cream because at this point we were like Mattie.
Speaker 2 (20:55):
You know, with the big belly.
Speaker 14 (20:56):
I mean we would both sit there and just rest
our hands on our her stomach and like eat the
ice cream as it was dripping down our chins and
not even knowing it.
Speaker 2 (21:06):
The twins were born in March of two thousand and two,
and Danielle gave birth to her son, Joe Junior, two
months later.
Speaker 14 (21:13):
In Nay.
Speaker 2 (21:15):
John remembers how happy his sister was.
Speaker 1 (21:19):
She would just look at him and she huge, stark crisch.
Isn't he the most beautiful thing you'd ever say? We're like, yeah,
Danielle's beautiful. We got it. Yes, She was a great mom.
I think her exact words were, now I know what
it's truly like to be in love with someone, like
instant in love. The three of the kids would just
(21:39):
be crawling all over each other, like just barely like
walking right, and Danielle and Jody would be Indian style
on either side, and they would just play all day
with the kids all day. She loved those kids. I
have so many pictures of Danielle with them as babies.
Speaker 2 (21:56):
Life was good for the Atobreys and the Inmbos, any
family memories, but that would all be short lived.
Speaker 1 (22:05):
That football trip happened and it just it ruined everything.
Speaker 2 (22:18):
By two thousand and four, Danielle and Joe Imbo were
still newlyweds. They'd only been married a couple of years
and life was just getting started for the two thirty sethings.
They owned a condo in New Jersey and just had
a baby boy, also named Joe. There was even talk
of Danielle and Joe moving into a house across the
street from Danielle's brother John, but things never got to
(22:41):
that point because of what happened at a football game.
Speaker 1 (22:45):
Joe, you know, he was in the football of course,
he was in the gambling, so Sunday he fit right
in with the family watching the games.
Speaker 2 (22:53):
Football was a Sunday ritual at John's house. John said
he and Joe even started a tradition where the two
of them and a few of their friends would fly
down to the Super Bowl every year.
Speaker 1 (23:03):
So we went to one super Bowl, then we went
to the next super Bowl together. We talked about it
being a tradition and as the boys get older, we'll
take the boys with us.
Speaker 2 (23:13):
Their kids were all less than a year old in
two thousand and four, so John and Joe made plans
to fly to Houston with some friends to go to
the game.
Speaker 1 (23:22):
We're getting ready to go to the Super Bowl and
we get this massive blizzard. There's like two feet of
snow on the ground.
Speaker 2 (23:29):
First it was mother Nature, then the flu bug tour
through John's house. His wife and twin boys got sick,
and so did Danielle.
Speaker 1 (23:37):
Both the girls are sick, my wife, my sister definitely ill.
The kids are babies, they're infants. They're sick, and I
bail out. I said Joe, I'm not going to go.
This is crazy. I want to go, but I can't leave.
Jody and the kids home sick like that, and he said, well,
I'm still going, and he goes with my friends.
Speaker 2 (23:56):
John's wife, Jody, said, Danielle wasn't happy with Joe's decision.
Speaker 14 (24:01):
I think she was expecting the same from Joe, and
then when she didn't get it, I think it was
more of at first angry, but then more her. You
know that the super Bowl would be more important than
your son being really sick with a high fever and
your wife not feeling great and still having to take
care of him because it's baby.
Speaker 2 (24:24):
You might remember the two thousand and four Super Bowl
for Tom Brady and the Patriots holding on to beat
the Panthers. That was the game with the halftime show
that featured the infamous wardrobe malfunction between Janet Jackson and
Justin Timberlake. That was a memorable game, and Joe Imbo
got to see it all, at least he was supposed to.
Speaker 1 (24:47):
He meets this girl on the plane and has an affair.
Speaker 2 (24:52):
John said. As soon as word got back to him,
he immediately called up every one of his friends who
went on that trip to find out what the hell happened.
Speaker 1 (25:00):
And they're like, dude, I don't know all I know
is he met this girl. He was sat next to
her on the plane. He was talking to her the
whole time, and we didn't see him the whole trip.
Speaker 2 (25:08):
John learned that while all of his guys were at
the game, Joe was busy fumbling away his marriage. But
things were about to go from bad to worse.
Speaker 1 (25:18):
Joe comes home. Then y'all still sick, the baby's still sick.
Then y'all said, hey, Han, Howard's your trip. And he's like,
I don't love you. I was never in love with you,
and I'm leaving. He moved out and filed for divorce.
That's how the bomb was dropped. Next thing you know,
(25:40):
he's talking about moving to Atlanta to go live with
this girl and her kid.
Speaker 14 (25:45):
It's like a movie, you know, like one day you
wake up and you're angry that your husband left you
and your child while you were sick, needs to grow
on a plane, and then just leaves you.
Speaker 2 (25:55):
Jody told me she was shopping with her twin boys
at Target when she got a phone call from Danielle.
Speaker 14 (26:01):
I was pushing the kids in a stroller in the
parking lot and I stopped in and I was like,
excuse me, and she said, yeah, he just packed up
all of his stuff. Where are you can I come over?
I just waited for in the parking lot and she
got there, put little Joe in the stroller, and you know,
she was hysterical. I don't know what to do do
I just keep calling them and telling them that try
(26:22):
to work this out. I don't want this. We literally
walked through Target for three hours, just talking about different
things of what she wanted to do.
Speaker 2 (26:35):
Just to put this into perspective, all of this happened
just about a year before Danielle and Richard disappeared, and
John said, once Danielle and Joe's marriage started falling apart,
it sent Danielle's spiraling.
Speaker 1 (26:49):
It just got dark. She didn't eat, she didn't sleep
this whole time, she's asking him, why are you doing this?
I don't understand what happened. Everything was fine, and you left,
you came back, and now you never loved me, like
you don't love me anymore.
Speaker 2 (27:07):
Joe packed up and moved down to Atlanta to be
with the woman he had an affair with at the
super Bowl. By that spring of two thousand and four,
Danielle and Joe's son celebrated his first birthday. There was,
of course, cake and ice cream and plenty of presents,
and Danielle was doing it all by herself.
Speaker 14 (27:25):
He was living his new life with this girl. And
each day she would call him and you wouldn't answer,
or if he did, he just didn't want to be bothered.
Some days she would call me sad and crying, saying
I miss him. I do want him back, I do
want him to come home. I don't want little Joe
to grow up without a father. I just want everything
(27:47):
to be the way it was.
Speaker 2 (27:49):
But according to John, the damage was already done.
Speaker 1 (27:52):
She was not the same person after that. She was
self conscious, pride all the time, Chaine smoked, lost a
ton of ways. She would call herself a two time loser.
Here I am a two time loser with two failed marriages.
Speaker 2 (28:13):
Most surprising, Jody said, Danielle was still open to reconciling
with Joe.
Speaker 14 (28:19):
I don't know if it was necessarily that she loved
him so much that she wanted to get back with him.
She just did not want little Joe growing up in
a broken home if it meant him coming home after
what he did. But little Joe had a father, at
home and always grew up with a family. She would
have done that for him.
Speaker 2 (28:41):
But Jody had some advice for Danielle.
Speaker 14 (28:44):
My answer to her was, if you two are only
going to be fighting in front of him, it's not
good for him. So if you want to just walk
away from this, no one will think any less of
you that you are a single mom raising a child
on your.
Speaker 2 (28:56):
Own, John said. Danielle was also afraid she couldn't make
it financially.
Speaker 1 (29:02):
She didn't know if she could afford the condo on
her own, and I told her, pack up your stuff
and move in with us. We'll sell your house, it's
in your name, pay off the condo, pay off your bills,
and you stay with us until you get back on
your feet again.
Speaker 2 (29:23):
Danielle wasn't ready to do that yet, but she became
a picture at their house. Sometimes she was crying, other
times she seemed to be moving forward with her life.
Speaker 1 (29:34):
Even through all those dark times that she was going
through with her husband. The fact that the three of
us could be together it was great.
Speaker 14 (29:43):
It was probably about five or six months at that point.
It was kind of like, I think I'm done with him.
Speaker 2 (29:50):
Danielle and Joe went to a mediator to start the
divorce process.
Speaker 14 (29:55):
And they had gone two times, basically to discuss who
gets the who gets that, will sell the place, will
split it down the middle, all that kind of stuff.
Speaker 2 (30:05):
Eventually, Jody started to see less and less of Danielle.
Speaker 14 (30:09):
When things started happening with her and Joe. Obviously she
was here a lot. And then when she had met
up with Christine, I had started to see her a
little bit less and she was spending a little more
time with Christine Chris. Christine was going through a divorce
at the time.
Speaker 2 (30:26):
Too, Christine as in Christine Patrone, Richard's sister. Christine and
Danielle had been friends since high school and seemed to
bond over both of their impending divorces, and all of
that time with Christine led Danielle to Richard.
Speaker 1 (30:43):
She's known Richard her whole life. Richard was a single parent,
and it was just good company. The two of them
would go to a movie together, go to dinner.
Speaker 2 (30:52):
As two thousand and four were on, Danielle finally seemed
to be turning the page on everything that happened with Joe.
And that's when John said it all came to a
screeching halt. Something flipped in Joe and all of a sudden,
Joe did a one eighty.
Speaker 1 (31:11):
That's when he started pressing her to get back together
and it row wined her. It real wind her.
Speaker 2 (31:26):
That's next time on There and Gone. If you have
any information about the disappearance of Danielle Imbo and Richard Patron,
please call the Citizens Crime Commission tip line at two
on five five four six eight four seven seven, or
you can reach out to the show in our team
by email at varngonpod at gmail dot com. That's There
(31:49):
and Gone pod at gmail dot com. Thank you so
much for listening. One way for you to show support
is by subscribing to our show on Apple Podcasts. Don't
forget to rate and review because five star reviews go
a long way. A big thank you to all of
our listeners. Therein gonn is a production of Glass Podcasts,
(32:10):
a division of Glass Entertainment Group in partnership with iHeart Podcasts.
The show is executive produced by Nancy Glass, Ben Fetterman,
and me Andrea Gunning. It's hosted and written by me
Andrea Gunning, with additional reporting and writing by Ben Fetterman.
The series is also written and produced by Todd gans.
Our associate producer is Kristin Melcurrie. Research by Mason Klinder,
(32:33):
Anna Hamilton, and Bella riki Our iHeart team is Ali
Perry and Jessica Krincheck. Audio editing and mixing by Matt
del Vecchio, Additional editing support by Nico Ruka. Therein. Gonn's
theme and original compositions were composed by Oliver Bains and
Darry mcaulay of Neuser Music Library provided by my Music
(32:54):
Special thanks to both the Patrone and and toe Ray families.
For more podcasts from iHeart, visit iHeartRadio, app, Apple Podcasts,
or wherever you get your podcasts
Popular Podcasts
1. Stuff You Missed in History Class
Join Holly and Tracy as they bring you the greatest and strangest Stuff You Missed In History Class in this podcast by iHeartRadio.
2. Dateline NBC
Current and classic episodes, featuring compelling true-crime mysteries, powerful documentaries and in-depth investigations.
3. Crime Junkie
If you can never get enough true crime... Congratulations, you’ve found your people.