March 1, 2024 • 35 mins
The Hollywood Ripper story begins in Glenview, Illinois - an unincorporated suburb of Cook County, where 18-year old Tricia Pacaccio was just finishing high school. Tricia attended a road rally with her friends, one of the last times they would get to see each other before leaving for college. When she returned home, she was attacked at her side doorstep and stabbed over a dozen times. Her father found her body the next day, and the Cook County Sheriff's Office began to investigate. After years of finding no leads, a new investigative team began to zero in on one of Tricia's neighbors - Michael Gargiulo - who grew up with Tricia's brother Doug. Even after finding himself in trouble with the law, police couldn't convince Gargiulo to provide any information about Tricia's murder, or what he may have known about it. Eventually, he moves to Hollywood, California, where another woman was murdered just blocks away from his house.
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Episode Transcript
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(00:16):
Four beautiful women, all victims ofbrutal attacks with a knife, one survivor
who managed to fight for her life. Over the span of twenty five years,
three of the women wound up dead, including one just eighteen years old.
(00:40):
At the center of it all oneman who managed to evade the police
for nearly three decades. Welcome tothe Once Upon a Crime in Hollywood podcast.
We go deep into the case inhow detectives pieced it all together,
speak with key experts who investigated eachof the gruesome attacks, and a comprehensive
(01:04):
recap of a three month trial thatthreatened to sentence the suspect to death.
Plus will break down how an Illinoisstate attorney's office may have dropped the ball
by not locking up the killer beforehe attacked two more women, The twist
and the turns of this case thathas star power, controversial evidence, three
(01:29):
families whose lives will never be thesame, and what's next with yet another
trial looming over the years to come. I'm Kelly Hymen and this is Once
Upon a Crime in Hollywood, theHollywood Ripper. The Hollywood Ripper case didn't
(02:00):
begin in Hollywood. It started inChicago in a cook County, Illinois suburb
called glen View. A bright eighteenyear old named Tricia Paccaccio was days away
from leaving glen View to attend PurdueUniversity on an engineering scholarship. She was
smart and popular. She took calculus, was a dedicated athlete. She was
(02:24):
on the debate team and hung outwith her friends often at the Lake Avenue
TGI Fridays in glen View. That'swhere she was the night of August thirteenth,
nineteen ninety three. As she oftendid, Tricia was out with friends
taking part in a Roade scavenger hunt, one of the last times she would
(02:49):
be able to see her friends beforeleaving for college. Around forty people attended
the rally, and after dinner,Tricia and her friends hung out in the
parking lot of Glenbrook South High School. Then she dropped two of them off
at their cars before heading home.Happy times. Those are times when you
(03:10):
think about when you're in high schooland you realize that part of your life
is going to change. You aregoing to have different experiences because you are
graduating from high school and you areessentially closing one chapter in your life and
(03:38):
beginning a new chapter. New chapterof excitement, moving as Trisha was,
to a new place to meet newfriends and to have new experiences. And
those are happy times, times ofjoy to enjoy with your friends and be
with your friends and excited for thenew adventures that you're going to experience.
(04:05):
I remember being in high school andabout everyone was graduating and going there their
separate ways, and those were memorable, exciting times of graduation day and getting
ready for graduation and the new journeyin your life. That's exciting times.
(04:26):
That's what Tricia was going through thenext chapter in her life and getting ready
to start that exciting new chapter.Let's bring in Doug Longhini, investigative reporter
and former producer for CBS News fortyeight Hours. He also worked for The
Chicago Reporter, ABC seven and NBCfive. Doug tell us a little bit
(04:54):
about glen View, Illinois. Glennview, Illinois is a suburb north of Chicago.
It's about nineteen ninety three, itwas about thirty seven thousand people.
It's on the train track that headsdown to downtown in Chicago, so a
(05:14):
lot of commuters, largely certainly innineteen ninety three, white city, middle
class, very very low crime Lordknows, there probably was. The have
been very few murders in the historyof glen View, A very nice place
(05:34):
to live, a suburb full oftrees and at that time modest homes.
Today not much more high end,but at that time, in nineteen ninety
three, the town of fairly modesthomes. Doug, what do you know
about Tricia? Tricia Piccaccio lived inGlenview, Illinois. Her parents were Rick
(06:01):
Pocotto and Diane Piccott Show in nineteenninety three. Rick worked for Bell Telephone,
he was a technician for them,and Diane worked at a veterinary animal
clinic in a suburb nearby. Triciahad two siblings, both younger Doug,
(06:25):
I think about a year younger thanher, and Tommy probably about five years
younger than her. They lived inglen View. They lived in a modest
sized home on a good sized cornerlot, and Tricia went to high school
in glen View. She was astraight A student, at least that's what
(06:50):
I've read. Was on the debateteam. I think loved the debate team.
Social friends. Had a boyfriend maybeyou know, during high school,
maybe more than one boyfriend. Idon't know, but she had a boyfriend
and she was heading off to college. She was going to go to Purdue
(07:14):
University in Lafayette, Indiana. Purdueis known for its engineering program and that's
the major that Tricia was going totake up. So in August of nineteen
ninety three, she was going tohead off to Purdue for her college experience.
So tris Paccaccio had been out withher friends, a lot of her
(07:40):
high school friends in the night ofAugust thirteenth, nineteen ninety three, Friday
the thirteenth, and oh later inthe evening, probably around between midnight and
one am, she took a coupleof her friends home and then she went
(08:01):
home in Glen View, and theirhome the way it's situated, it's on
a large corner lot. The frontof the house has a circular driveway and
then pretty far down on the sideof the house is the driveway into the
(08:22):
garage. And that evening, Prisiadrove a blue Mercury Cougar and she parked
her car in front of the houseon the circular driveway, and that's all
we know at that point. Sometimein the night, her mom, Diane
(08:46):
wakes up just wants to check onif Tricia got home. She looks out
the front window and sees that theTricia's cougar is parked out in front,
feels that line she's at home,goes back to bed. That morning,
about six am, Diane gets upand leaves her work early for the animal
(09:09):
clinic, the veterinary clinic, andbacks out of the garage, backs out
the driveway down the street, andheads over to the animal clinic. Later
he gets her father, Rick guessesaround eight thirty he is going, he's
(09:31):
up and he's going to put sometools in his van, and I get
that the van was sitting out inthe driveway and he walks out and he
looks over to his left, ashe says, he sees two little tennis
shoes pointing up on the side porchand it's his daughter, Tricia. And
(09:56):
he goes over and Tricia is lyingthere and there's blood everywhere, and she's
been stabbed. And as Rick toldus when we interviewed him for CBS News,
he died at that moment. Now, Rick Pocaccio is a tough guy,
you can kind of tell that,and he had been in the military
(10:20):
during Vietnam. I don't know whataction he saw or didn't see, but
he had been in Vietnam, butnothing prepared him for what he saw that
morning, Andatricia was lying face up. She'd been stabbed in multiple parts for
body where car keys were over onthe pavement. And I don't know what
(10:48):
Rick did next, but I doknow that Doug Picaccio, Ricia's younger brother,
ran upstairs, got Tricia's phone inher room and called for help.
Tricia's younger brother, Tommy, hadbeen in his bedroom. He heard Doug.
(11:15):
Then he sees Doug yelling, andthen Doug rips I don't know what
room, but rips the blinds offthe wall. Two boys come downstairs.
They get to the family room.They look out the bay window, which
also has a door, which wouldthen the door Tricia would have come in,
(11:35):
and they see their sister lying undera white sheet with one of her
arms sticking out from the sheet.At the sight of Trisha's body on the
doorstep, Rick dropped his coffee andran over to her. He attempted to
revive her, but her body feltcold, and she still had her keys
(11:58):
in her hand like she was tryingto get in the side door. Neighbors
heard him scream, and several cameover Diane. Tricia's mom had already left
for work and got a call fromher husband Rick. He had called her
just before that to tell her Triciawasn't home. They assumed she had slept
(12:20):
over her friend's house, who livedacross the street and had a party the
night before. When Rick called Dianeback to tell her he had found Tricia's
body, Diane grabbed her keys andran out the door. A technician she
worked with offered to give her aride home, but Diane said no.
(12:41):
She got in her car and drovehome. When she arrived, police cars
were already at the house. Policeprevented her from getting close to her daughter.
Can you only imagine the horrific newsthat a mother must have that she's
lost her child. Children are supposedto outlive their parents, not the other
(13:11):
way around. Words can't express whatDiane was going through as she heard about
her daughter and was driving there onlyto show up with the police being there
and not able to see her daughter. The emotions that she must experience.
(13:33):
A mother should never have to havethe loss of their own daughter, with
a daughter that had so many beautifuldreams and had such a bright future.
To have that bright future taken fromher is just horrible. There's not words
(13:54):
that can express what a horrific experiencethat is what Diane as a mother went
through and continues to go through bylosing her daughter and dealing with her other
children, and it happening at herhome. Can you imagine a place where
(14:15):
you live and it's supposed to besafe and sacred, but to know your
daughter died right in front of yourown home, Doug, what was this
scene like around the house? So, glen View, Illinois, not at
(14:37):
that time of thirty seven thousand people, had its own police department, but
the part of glen View that thePocacios lived in was not covered by the
town police. Like many of thesecities around Chicago. They are on Cook
County and it was the Cook CountySheriff's office that was going to handle this
(15:00):
case. But initially the Glendieth Policedepartment arrived. You can see from TV
coverage at the time the yellow tapeout and this was later described as a
blitz attack of blitz meaning sudden,and it was out in the open.
(15:20):
This was not behind the house orshrubbery or inside a building. This was
out on a side lawn that ispretty sizable and faces a number of homes,
one of which had had a partylate that night. So this was
a brazen attack, no effort tocover it up, no effort, no
(15:45):
effort to move Tricia's body. Hewas stabbed multiple times, I think more
than a dozen in different parts ofher body. Of course, Fish's left
arm also suffered a spiral fracture,which means it was twisted. And then
(16:07):
she was found prone laying face upon their side porch, and she had
a car key because she just lefther car in the parking area in front
of their home, and that carkey had a blood on it, which
was later tested for DNA, andnear the body was a bloody footprint,
(16:32):
and again her her body was leftout there to bleed out, no attempt
to cover it up, no attemptto move it done in literally the wide
open nighttime, but still houses nearby, people had a party nearby. It
(16:52):
was a pretty brazen attack, andthe neighbors came by, some of them
and one of the neighbors a guyfrom the next block over, a classmate
of Doug Poccaccio's, and this neighbor'sname was Michael Guardiulo, and Michael Guardulo
came over to see what was happeningalso, and he was at the end
(17:17):
of the of the driveway by wordmeets the street, and he was watching,
and according to testimony, Rick Boccaccioyelled at Michael Guardiulo, you know,
to find out who did this.He needed to find out who did
this Patricia. And at that pointRick Boccaccio, through this whole time immediately
(17:42):
after finding her body and with thepolice arriving, was very emotional and at
times had to be restrained by peopleholding on to his belt loop. But
at some point he yells over tothis neighbor kid, Michael Guardiulo, you
got to find out who killed Tricia. Tricia's family home was located on Huber
(18:07):
Lane, less than three miles fromthe TGI Fridays, where she was last
seen alive. The night of hermurder, her neighbors had been having a
pool party across the street, whichmeant there was plenty of possible witnesses who
might have seen or heard something,But when the police questioned people who were
at the party, no one seemedto recall having noticed anything. Doug tell
(18:34):
us about the beginning of the investigation, did the police have any leads or
suspects. This Piccaccio is killed ina brutal fashion, left to be found
by your parents. The police immediatelyresponded with the Glendia Police Department, but
(18:56):
the Pocaccio has lived in Cook County, and so the Cook County Sheriff's Department
took over. Ultimately, that wasnot the best of news for the Pricaccios
at that time. Not so muchtoday, but at that time the Cook
County Sheriff's Department was a political dumpingground, and there had been just the
(19:18):
year before a scandal where four hundredand fifty officers had been put on the
force, either as correction officers ordeputies, and had been given the entry
level test before or cheated in someway, and so the standards were not
the highest. And Ntricia was murdered, it was still at least three hundred
(19:41):
and fifty people on this force.So the Cook County Sheriff's Department takes over
many As pointed out later, manyof the officers, the higher officers at
the time, who were handling thisinvestigation, they too got kicked out for
a variety of corruption reasons or Lordknows what. So in the first years
(20:02):
of this investigation, I don't thinkanybody really knows where it went. The
Pocatos, particularly Diane Pocatco. Imean, she claims, and I believe
her, that she would go essentiallyevery week to the local office of the
Cook County Sheriffs Police and ask what'sgoing on and ruly get no answers.
(20:29):
Can you imagine as Diane claims thatshe would go every week to the local
office of the police station, tryingto get answers, trying to figure out
what happened to her daughter, whokilled her daughter? Why did they kill
her? And supposedly not get anyanswers to these questions. Here she loses
(20:55):
her daughter, who had such abright and promising future while to go off
to college, but now that's nevergoing to happen. In those dreams that
our daughter had will never become areality. And the mother is still trying
to find answers, still trying tofigure out who did this, Why did
(21:17):
they do this? Why did thishappen to a girl that had such a
bright future and had so many friendsand was popular. It was so bright,
and still the mother didn't get theanswers, but you kept persisting and
(21:38):
kept trying to figure out what happened. Doug, You've spoken with Trisha's family
on several occasions. What was lifelike for them after Tricia's was murdered folloween
Srisa Pertatche's murder, her family,that family's life or has turned upside down
(22:07):
even today. I mean, ifyou speaks with the parents, it's pretty
close to being like Tricia was killedyesterday. The emotional toll on that family
is profound and remain so. Itwas so profound at the time immediately following
(22:33):
the murder that the family moved outof the house and moved in with Diane
Pacaccio's mother. In fact, asI understand it, they stayed out of
the home for four years. DadRick would come over and cut the lawn
and keep the outside maintained or sixthings that might break in the home.
(22:55):
But nobody lived in that house forfour years. That was the impact.
The investigation stalled until nineteen ninety sevenwhen a new investigation team was assigned to
the case. Doug, What werethe new detectives investigating able to uncover that
the previous investigators had not. Eventually, a very good detective gets on the
(23:21):
case and he started focusing on aprime suspect, let's call him Suspect A.
And suspect had been a friend ofDoug Pococcio's, didn't go to the
same high school, but on aroundand at some point suspect one of his
(23:45):
relatives, close relatives had told thepolice that they suspected that Suspect A had
killed Christia Poccotcio. So all ofthe focus, all of it went on
Suspect A for a long time.And for example, when they were at
(24:06):
the crime scene, there was abloody footprint. Now it turned out to
belong to it Pacasio, but nobodyknew that for a while. And SUSPECTA
around the time that was revealed,got rid of some shoes, video owned,
he did a variety of suspicious saints, and that remained an important part
(24:26):
of the investigation for a long time. And for a long time from letters
that the Pacaccios wrote, they toowere highly suspicious of suspect A. However,
in nineteen ninety eight, remember Imentioned the neighbor boy, Michael Garjuo.
(24:48):
By this point Michael's graduated high school. The brother who was friends with
Michael Doug had graduated high school andso does no long a home. He's
at college at university. And butMichael god Dulo, who over the years
bring the murder, and what I'mjust in nineteen ninety three and what I'm
(25:11):
describing is I'm about to describe thishome visit by him. Michael Godjulo would
give Rick Pocaccio gifts all what kind, but he was from time to time
bring hidden gifts, which was abit odd, but only odd at that
time. I mean, nothing wasreally inferred, but it was odd.
(25:37):
So one night, late afternoon,Michael Godjulo comes over comes under the house.
Only Diane Pocaccio's there, and hewants to talk to Rick Pocaccio.
He won't tell Diane why. Hewon't talk to Diane about anything. He
(25:57):
said, he'll only talk to Rick. Well, Rick comes home, and
you know, I don't remember ifRick gets home or Michael's father gets there
first, but I'm going to justput it this way. Ultimately, Michael
(26:18):
Guardulo never gets to speak for RickBocaccio that evening because Michael Gardiulo's father comes
over to the house and pulls Michaelout of the house, and that meeting
with Rick never takes place. Fromwhat the Bocaccio's told us in our later
interviews with CBS News is that theybegan at that moment to suspect that Michael
(26:45):
Guardjulo had something to do, knewsomething more likely had something to do with
the murder of their daughter. Whatdo you think Michael would have said?
What if Michael had told him thathe did it? And why was Michael
(27:10):
giving him the gifts? Did hegive the gifts because he potentially felt guilty
about something and that made him feelbetter? When I hear that Michael's father
stopped him, What did Michael's fatherpotentially know and why did he stop him?
What was he going to say tothem? Was he going to say
(27:32):
that it was an accident that hedid it. We don't know that.
We don't know the answers to thatbecause it never occurred. We can all
guess or think what he might havesaid or would have said, or why
he gave the gifts, but ultimatelywe really don't know. And what exactly
(27:56):
was he going to tell the fatherand why did he only want to talk
to the father and not the wife. Those are questions that we just don't
know, Doug, what can youtell us about Michael Guardulo? Was he
close to the Pacachio family, sothe scene of the crime was a short
(28:19):
walk from where Michael Gardulo lived.He lived on Widell Lane, which was,
as the crow flies, about fivehundred feet away from the Pacaccio house.
It was to the next block tothe east, a modest size house.
Michael Guardiulo had a fair number ofbrothers and sisters and they lived in
(28:45):
the neighborhood for a very long time. Michael Guardiulo was one year younger than
Tricia Piccaccio, and that made himabout the same age as Chris Pocaccio's brother,
Doug. So Michael Gargiulo and DougPacaccio knew each other as little kids,
(29:07):
and I think they did things togethercloser friends when they were little.
Still knew each other in high school, and in fact, Doug played football
and Michael Guardiulo played football at leasthis sophomore and junior year, and I
(29:29):
believe they often went to school togetherin you know, family cars shuttling back
and forth. But Michael Guardiulo hadsome behavioral problems. He was a bit
of a hothead, now you know, he's a teenager, and that's we
(29:53):
probably could have described a lot ofpeople in their teenage cheers with some of
those qualities. But he did getin trouble with the police his I think
his senior year, he got intoa fight in the parking lot of the
high school and he did get abattery charge. Notably, he was not
(30:18):
in the yearbook his senior year ofhigh school, which I don't know the
answer to that, why not,but he was not in the yearbook.
I mean he still went to thehigh school, but he was not in
the yearbook. And over the years, Ian Dougcotzio were not as close as
they were when they were little kids, but they were still friends and did
(30:41):
see each other. In May ofnineteen ninety seven, Michael Cardulo walked into
Glen View Police station to complain thathe had been followed repeatedly by what he
believed were very police agencies. Accordingto documents obtained by The Journal and Tropics
(31:06):
News, when a police officer recognizedMichael as a suspect wanted by Libertyville Police
for vehicle burglary dating back to Februarysecond, nineteen ninety six, he was
arrested and held for pickup. OnMay thirty one, nineteen ninety seven,
(31:27):
Michael Guardulo confessed to going through unlockedcars in glen View and taking a cell
phone as well as a bag outof a van with another individual. Michael
posted bond for the burglary in nineteenninety seven, but the arrest gave Cook
(31:48):
County detectives an opening to dig deeperinto Michael's connection to Tricia doug What happened
when they spoke with him about theburglary charge as part of his criminal process.
He was offered a plea deal ifhe would since he was a neighbor
(32:10):
of Pacacio, and he'd been ahigh school friend of Dougs and knew a
bunch of the people in the highschool who knew Tricia. The police wanted
to talk to Guardzulo about what heknew, if anything, about Tricia's murder,
(32:32):
and they were offering him a pleadeal on the burglary charge, which
was a felony, if he wouldtalk to them about Tricia's murther, and
he refused to do that. Herefused to take the plea deal. He
took whatever the punishment was, andthat definitely made him a suspect. At
(32:55):
that point. He may have beena bit before, and he certainly was
a lot afterwards, but that wasthe kind of behavior that made no sense
to detectives at the time. Andwhy wouldn't he take the deal if he
you know? And what was itthat he didn't want to say about the
about Tricia's murder. So Guardulo doesn'ttalk to police and accepts a felony burglary
(33:17):
charge, but for the time being, he's able to walk free while awaiting
trial. He eventually moves to Hollywood, California, to live with his older
brother Kenny. Shortly after arriving inLos Angeles, Cook County detectives managed to
convince Guardulo to fly back to Chicagoto testify before a grand jury. According
(33:44):
to Chicago Magazine, Guardulo interviewed withdetective Jack Reid and Mark Baldwin prior to
giving his testimony. That's where hemade a shocking claim to detectives. Guardulo
said his friend suspect A, hadadmitted to killing Tricia. At that time,
the detectives were sure suspect A wasresponsible for the murder, but when
(34:07):
Garzulo was brought before the grand jury, he changed his story, making it
seem as if his friend was joking. Garzulo's friend moved out of the state
and was never charged. Detectives eventuallytracked him down and spent six hours trying
to persuade him to speak with them, but he demanded immunity, which Cook
(34:28):
County refused. Garzulo stopped talking tothe police and would eventually plead guilty to
the burglary. He was released oneighteen month probation and given a two hundred
dollars fine, according to a courtdisposition obtained by the journal Entropics. Free
again, he returned to the brightlights of Los Angeles, where he would
(34:51):
pursue a career in acting. Inour next episode, will follow Garzulo to
Los Angeles, where he would meetat twenty two year old named Ashley Ellern
and the Hollywood Ripper story begins tounfold.
Four beautiful women, all victims ofbrutal attacks with a knife, one survivor
who managed to fight for her life. Over the span of twenty five years,
three of the women wound up dead, including one just eighteen years old.
(00:40):
At the center of it all oneman who managed to evade the police
for nearly three decades. Welcome tothe Once Upon a Crime in Hollywood podcast.
We go deep into the case inhow detectives pieced it all together,
speak with key experts who investigated eachof the gruesome attacks, and a comprehensive
(01:04):
recap of a three month trial thatthreatened to sentence the suspect to death.
Plus will break down how an Illinoisstate attorney's office may have dropped the ball
by not locking up the killer beforehe attacked two more women, The twist
and the turns of this case thathas star power, controversial evidence, three
(01:29):
families whose lives will never be thesame, and what's next with yet another
trial looming over the years to come. I'm Kelly Hymen and this is Once
Upon a Crime in Hollywood, theHollywood Ripper. The Hollywood Ripper case didn't
(02:00):
begin in Hollywood. It started inChicago in a cook County, Illinois suburb
called glen View. A bright eighteenyear old named Tricia Paccaccio was days away
from leaving glen View to attend PurdueUniversity on an engineering scholarship. She was
smart and popular. She took calculus, was a dedicated athlete. She was
(02:24):
on the debate team and hung outwith her friends often at the Lake Avenue
TGI Fridays in glen View. That'swhere she was the night of August thirteenth,
nineteen ninety three. As she oftendid, Tricia was out with friends
taking part in a Roade scavenger hunt, one of the last times she would
(02:49):
be able to see her friends beforeleaving for college. Around forty people attended
the rally, and after dinner,Tricia and her friends hung out in the
parking lot of Glenbrook South High School. Then she dropped two of them off
at their cars before heading home.Happy times. Those are times when you
(03:10):
think about when you're in high schooland you realize that part of your life
is going to change. You aregoing to have different experiences because you are
graduating from high school and you areessentially closing one chapter in your life and
(03:38):
beginning a new chapter. New chapterof excitement, moving as Trisha was,
to a new place to meet newfriends and to have new experiences. And
those are happy times, times ofjoy to enjoy with your friends and be
with your friends and excited for thenew adventures that you're going to experience.
(04:05):
I remember being in high school andabout everyone was graduating and going there their
separate ways, and those were memorable, exciting times of graduation day and getting
ready for graduation and the new journeyin your life. That's exciting times.
(04:26):
That's what Tricia was going through thenext chapter in her life and getting ready
to start that exciting new chapter.Let's bring in Doug Longhini, investigative reporter
and former producer for CBS News fortyeight Hours. He also worked for The
Chicago Reporter, ABC seven and NBCfive. Doug tell us a little bit
(04:54):
about glen View, Illinois. Glennview, Illinois is a suburb north of Chicago.
It's about nineteen ninety three, itwas about thirty seven thousand people.
It's on the train track that headsdown to downtown in Chicago, so a
(05:14):
lot of commuters, largely certainly innineteen ninety three, white city, middle
class, very very low crime Lordknows, there probably was. The have
been very few murders in the historyof glen View, A very nice place
(05:34):
to live, a suburb full oftrees and at that time modest homes.
Today not much more high end,but at that time, in nineteen ninety
three, the town of fairly modesthomes. Doug, what do you know
about Tricia? Tricia Piccaccio lived inGlenview, Illinois. Her parents were Rick
(06:01):
Pocotto and Diane Piccott Show in nineteenninety three. Rick worked for Bell Telephone,
he was a technician for them,and Diane worked at a veterinary animal
clinic in a suburb nearby. Triciahad two siblings, both younger Doug,
(06:25):
I think about a year younger thanher, and Tommy probably about five years
younger than her. They lived inglen View. They lived in a modest
sized home on a good sized cornerlot, and Tricia went to high school
in glen View. She was astraight A student, at least that's what
(06:50):
I've read. Was on the debateteam. I think loved the debate team.
Social friends. Had a boyfriend maybeyou know, during high school,
maybe more than one boyfriend. Idon't know, but she had a boyfriend
and she was heading off to college. She was going to go to Purdue
(07:14):
University in Lafayette, Indiana. Purdueis known for its engineering program and that's
the major that Tricia was going totake up. So in August of nineteen
ninety three, she was going tohead off to Purdue for her college experience.
So tris Paccaccio had been out withher friends, a lot of her
(07:40):
high school friends in the night ofAugust thirteenth, nineteen ninety three, Friday
the thirteenth, and oh later inthe evening, probably around between midnight and
one am, she took a coupleof her friends home and then she went
(08:01):
home in Glen View, and theirhome the way it's situated, it's on
a large corner lot. The frontof the house has a circular driveway and
then pretty far down on the sideof the house is the driveway into the
(08:22):
garage. And that evening, Prisiadrove a blue Mercury Cougar and she parked
her car in front of the houseon the circular driveway, and that's all
we know at that point. Sometimein the night, her mom, Diane
(08:46):
wakes up just wants to check onif Tricia got home. She looks out
the front window and sees that theTricia's cougar is parked out in front,
feels that line she's at home,goes back to bed. That morning,
about six am, Diane gets upand leaves her work early for the animal
(09:09):
clinic, the veterinary clinic, andbacks out of the garage, backs out
the driveway down the street, andheads over to the animal clinic. Later
he gets her father, Rick guessesaround eight thirty he is going, he's
(09:31):
up and he's going to put sometools in his van, and I get
that the van was sitting out inthe driveway and he walks out and he
looks over to his left, ashe says, he sees two little tennis
shoes pointing up on the side porchand it's his daughter, Tricia. And
(09:56):
he goes over and Tricia is lyingthere and there's blood everywhere, and she's
been stabbed. And as Rick toldus when we interviewed him for CBS News,
he died at that moment. Now, Rick Pocaccio is a tough guy,
you can kind of tell that,and he had been in the military
(10:20):
during Vietnam. I don't know whataction he saw or didn't see, but
he had been in Vietnam, butnothing prepared him for what he saw that
morning, Andatricia was lying face up. She'd been stabbed in multiple parts for
body where car keys were over onthe pavement. And I don't know what
(10:48):
Rick did next, but I doknow that Doug Picaccio, Ricia's younger brother,
ran upstairs, got Tricia's phone inher room and called for help.
Tricia's younger brother, Tommy, hadbeen in his bedroom. He heard Doug.
(11:15):
Then he sees Doug yelling, andthen Doug rips I don't know what
room, but rips the blinds offthe wall. Two boys come downstairs.
They get to the family room.They look out the bay window, which
also has a door, which wouldthen the door Tricia would have come in,
(11:35):
and they see their sister lying undera white sheet with one of her
arms sticking out from the sheet.At the sight of Trisha's body on the
doorstep, Rick dropped his coffee andran over to her. He attempted to
revive her, but her body feltcold, and she still had her keys
(11:58):
in her hand like she was tryingto get in the side door. Neighbors
heard him scream, and several cameover Diane. Tricia's mom had already left
for work and got a call fromher husband Rick. He had called her
just before that to tell her Triciawasn't home. They assumed she had slept
(12:20):
over her friend's house, who livedacross the street and had a party the
night before. When Rick called Dianeback to tell her he had found Tricia's
body, Diane grabbed her keys andran out the door. A technician she
worked with offered to give her aride home, but Diane said no.
(12:41):
She got in her car and drovehome. When she arrived, police cars
were already at the house. Policeprevented her from getting close to her daughter.
Can you only imagine the horrific newsthat a mother must have that she's
lost her child. Children are supposedto outlive their parents, not the other
(13:11):
way around. Words can't express whatDiane was going through as she heard about
her daughter and was driving there onlyto show up with the police being there
and not able to see her daughter. The emotions that she must experience.
(13:33):
A mother should never have to havethe loss of their own daughter, with
a daughter that had so many beautifuldreams and had such a bright future.
To have that bright future taken fromher is just horrible. There's not words
(13:54):
that can express what a horrific experiencethat is what Diane as a mother went
through and continues to go through bylosing her daughter and dealing with her other
children, and it happening at herhome. Can you imagine a place where
(14:15):
you live and it's supposed to besafe and sacred, but to know your
daughter died right in front of yourown home, Doug, what was this
scene like around the house? So, glen View, Illinois, not at
(14:37):
that time of thirty seven thousand people, had its own police department, but
the part of glen View that thePocacios lived in was not covered by the
town police. Like many of thesecities around Chicago. They are on Cook
County and it was the Cook CountySheriff's office that was going to handle this
(15:00):
case. But initially the Glendieth Policedepartment arrived. You can see from TV
coverage at the time the yellow tapeout and this was later described as a
blitz attack of blitz meaning sudden,and it was out in the open.
(15:20):
This was not behind the house orshrubbery or inside a building. This was
out on a side lawn that ispretty sizable and faces a number of homes,
one of which had had a partylate that night. So this was
a brazen attack, no effort tocover it up, no effort, no
(15:45):
effort to move Tricia's body. Hewas stabbed multiple times, I think more
than a dozen in different parts ofher body. Of course, Fish's left
arm also suffered a spiral fracture,which means it was twisted. And then
(16:07):
she was found prone laying face upon their side porch, and she had
a car key because she just lefther car in the parking area in front
of their home, and that carkey had a blood on it, which
was later tested for DNA, andnear the body was a bloody footprint,
(16:32):
and again her her body was leftout there to bleed out, no attempt
to cover it up, no attemptto move it done in literally the wide
open nighttime, but still houses nearby, people had a party nearby. It
(16:52):
was a pretty brazen attack, andthe neighbors came by, some of them
and one of the neighbors a guyfrom the next block over, a classmate
of Doug Poccaccio's, and this neighbor'sname was Michael Guardiulo, and Michael Guardulo
came over to see what was happeningalso, and he was at the end
(17:17):
of the of the driveway by wordmeets the street, and he was watching,
and according to testimony, Rick Boccaccioyelled at Michael Guardiulo, you know,
to find out who did this.He needed to find out who did
this Patricia. And at that pointRick Boccaccio, through this whole time immediately
(17:42):
after finding her body and with thepolice arriving, was very emotional and at
times had to be restrained by peopleholding on to his belt loop. But
at some point he yells over tothis neighbor kid, Michael Guardiulo, you
got to find out who killed Tricia. Tricia's family home was located on Huber
(18:07):
Lane, less than three miles fromthe TGI Fridays, where she was last
seen alive. The night of hermurder, her neighbors had been having a
pool party across the street, whichmeant there was plenty of possible witnesses who
might have seen or heard something,But when the police questioned people who were
at the party, no one seemedto recall having noticed anything. Doug tell
(18:34):
us about the beginning of the investigation, did the police have any leads or
suspects. This Piccaccio is killed ina brutal fashion, left to be found
by your parents. The police immediatelyresponded with the Glendia Police Department, but
(18:56):
the Pocaccio has lived in Cook County, and so the Cook County Sheriff's Department
took over. Ultimately, that wasnot the best of news for the Pricaccios
at that time. Not so muchtoday, but at that time the Cook
County Sheriff's Department was a political dumpingground, and there had been just the
(19:18):
year before a scandal where four hundredand fifty officers had been put on the
force, either as correction officers ordeputies, and had been given the entry
level test before or cheated in someway, and so the standards were not
the highest. And Ntricia was murdered, it was still at least three hundred
(19:41):
and fifty people on this force.So the Cook County Sheriff's Department takes over
many As pointed out later, manyof the officers, the higher officers at
the time, who were handling thisinvestigation, they too got kicked out for
a variety of corruption reasons or Lordknows what. So in the first years
(20:02):
of this investigation, I don't thinkanybody really knows where it went. The
Pocatos, particularly Diane Pocatco. Imean, she claims, and I believe
her, that she would go essentiallyevery week to the local office of the
Cook County Sheriffs Police and ask what'sgoing on and ruly get no answers.
(20:29):
Can you imagine as Diane claims thatshe would go every week to the local
office of the police station, tryingto get answers, trying to figure out
what happened to her daughter, whokilled her daughter? Why did they kill
her? And supposedly not get anyanswers to these questions. Here she loses
(20:55):
her daughter, who had such abright and promising future while to go off
to college, but now that's nevergoing to happen. In those dreams that
our daughter had will never become areality. And the mother is still trying
to find answers, still trying tofigure out who did this, Why did
(21:17):
they do this? Why did thishappen to a girl that had such a
bright future and had so many friendsand was popular. It was so bright,
and still the mother didn't get theanswers, but you kept persisting and
(21:38):
kept trying to figure out what happened. Doug, You've spoken with Trisha's family
on several occasions. What was lifelike for them after Tricia's was murdered folloween
Srisa Pertatche's murder, her family,that family's life or has turned upside down
(22:07):
even today. I mean, ifyou speaks with the parents, it's pretty
close to being like Tricia was killedyesterday. The emotional toll on that family
is profound and remain so. Itwas so profound at the time immediately following
(22:33):
the murder that the family moved outof the house and moved in with Diane
Pacaccio's mother. In fact, asI understand it, they stayed out of
the home for four years. DadRick would come over and cut the lawn
and keep the outside maintained or sixthings that might break in the home.
(22:55):
But nobody lived in that house forfour years. That was the impact.
The investigation stalled until nineteen ninety sevenwhen a new investigation team was assigned to
the case. Doug, What werethe new detectives investigating able to uncover that
the previous investigators had not. Eventually, a very good detective gets on the
(23:21):
case and he started focusing on aprime suspect, let's call him Suspect A.
And suspect had been a friend ofDoug Pococcio's, didn't go to the
same high school, but on aroundand at some point suspect one of his
(23:45):
relatives, close relatives had told thepolice that they suspected that Suspect A had
killed Christia Poccotcio. So all ofthe focus, all of it went on
Suspect A for a long time.And for example, when they were at
(24:06):
the crime scene, there was abloody footprint. Now it turned out to
belong to it Pacasio, but nobodyknew that for a while. And SUSPECTA
around the time that was revealed,got rid of some shoes, video owned,
he did a variety of suspicious saints, and that remained an important part
(24:26):
of the investigation for a long time. And for a long time from letters
that the Pacaccios wrote, they toowere highly suspicious of suspect A. However,
in nineteen ninety eight, remember Imentioned the neighbor boy, Michael Garjuo.
(24:48):
By this point Michael's graduated high school. The brother who was friends with
Michael Doug had graduated high school andso does no long a home. He's
at college at university. And butMichael god Dulo, who over the years
bring the murder, and what I'mjust in nineteen ninety three and what I'm
(25:11):
describing is I'm about to describe thishome visit by him. Michael Godjulo would
give Rick Pocaccio gifts all what kind, but he was from time to time
bring hidden gifts, which was abit odd, but only odd at that
time. I mean, nothing wasreally inferred, but it was odd.
(25:37):
So one night, late afternoon,Michael Godjulo comes over comes under the house.
Only Diane Pocaccio's there, and hewants to talk to Rick Pocaccio.
He won't tell Diane why. Hewon't talk to Diane about anything. He
(25:57):
said, he'll only talk to Rick. Well, Rick comes home, and
you know, I don't remember ifRick gets home or Michael's father gets there
first, but I'm going to justput it this way. Ultimately, Michael
(26:18):
Guardulo never gets to speak for RickBocaccio that evening because Michael Gardiulo's father comes
over to the house and pulls Michaelout of the house, and that meeting
with Rick never takes place. Fromwhat the Bocaccio's told us in our later
interviews with CBS News is that theybegan at that moment to suspect that Michael
(26:45):
Guardjulo had something to do, knewsomething more likely had something to do with
the murder of their daughter. Whatdo you think Michael would have said?
What if Michael had told him thathe did it? And why was Michael
(27:10):
giving him the gifts? Did hegive the gifts because he potentially felt guilty
about something and that made him feelbetter? When I hear that Michael's father
stopped him, What did Michael's fatherpotentially know and why did he stop him?
What was he going to say tothem? Was he going to say
(27:32):
that it was an accident that hedid it. We don't know that.
We don't know the answers to thatbecause it never occurred. We can all
guess or think what he might havesaid or would have said, or why
he gave the gifts, but ultimatelywe really don't know. And what exactly
(27:56):
was he going to tell the fatherand why did he only want to talk
to the father and not the wife. Those are questions that we just don't
know, Doug, what can youtell us about Michael Guardulo? Was he
close to the Pacachio family, sothe scene of the crime was a short
(28:19):
walk from where Michael Gardulo lived.He lived on Widell Lane, which was,
as the crow flies, about fivehundred feet away from the Pacaccio house.
It was to the next block tothe east, a modest size house.
Michael Guardiulo had a fair number ofbrothers and sisters and they lived in
(28:45):
the neighborhood for a very long time. Michael Guardiulo was one year younger than
Tricia Piccaccio, and that made himabout the same age as Chris Pocaccio's brother,
Doug. So Michael Gargiulo and DougPacaccio knew each other as little kids,
(29:07):
and I think they did things togethercloser friends when they were little.
Still knew each other in high school, and in fact, Doug played football
and Michael Guardiulo played football at leasthis sophomore and junior year, and I
(29:29):
believe they often went to school togetherin you know, family cars shuttling back
and forth. But Michael Guardiulo hadsome behavioral problems. He was a bit
of a hothead, now you know, he's a teenager, and that's we
(29:53):
probably could have described a lot ofpeople in their teenage cheers with some of
those qualities. But he did getin trouble with the police his I think
his senior year, he got intoa fight in the parking lot of the
high school and he did get abattery charge. Notably, he was not
(30:18):
in the yearbook his senior year ofhigh school, which I don't know the
answer to that, why not,but he was not in the yearbook.
I mean he still went to thehigh school, but he was not in
the yearbook. And over the years, Ian Dougcotzio were not as close as
they were when they were little kids, but they were still friends and did
(30:41):
see each other. In May ofnineteen ninety seven, Michael Cardulo walked into
Glen View Police station to complain thathe had been followed repeatedly by what he
believed were very police agencies. Accordingto documents obtained by The Journal and Tropics
(31:06):
News, when a police officer recognizedMichael as a suspect wanted by Libertyville Police
for vehicle burglary dating back to Februarysecond, nineteen ninety six, he was
arrested and held for pickup. OnMay thirty one, nineteen ninety seven,
(31:27):
Michael Guardulo confessed to going through unlockedcars in glen View and taking a cell
phone as well as a bag outof a van with another individual. Michael
posted bond for the burglary in nineteenninety seven, but the arrest gave Cook
(31:48):
County detectives an opening to dig deeperinto Michael's connection to Tricia doug What happened
when they spoke with him about theburglary charge as part of his criminal process.
He was offered a plea deal ifhe would since he was a neighbor
(32:10):
of Pacacio, and he'd been ahigh school friend of Dougs and knew a
bunch of the people in the highschool who knew Tricia. The police wanted
to talk to Guardzulo about what heknew, if anything, about Tricia's murder,
(32:32):
and they were offering him a pleadeal on the burglary charge, which
was a felony, if he wouldtalk to them about Tricia's murther, and
he refused to do that. Herefused to take the plea deal. He
took whatever the punishment was, andthat definitely made him a suspect. At
(32:55):
that point. He may have beena bit before, and he certainly was
a lot afterwards, but that wasthe kind of behavior that made no sense
to detectives at the time. Andwhy wouldn't he take the deal if he
you know? And what was itthat he didn't want to say about the
about Tricia's murder. So Guardulo doesn'ttalk to police and accepts a felony burglary
(33:17):
charge, but for the time being, he's able to walk free while awaiting
trial. He eventually moves to Hollywood, California, to live with his older
brother Kenny. Shortly after arriving inLos Angeles, Cook County detectives managed to
convince Guardulo to fly back to Chicagoto testify before a grand jury. According
(33:44):
to Chicago Magazine, Guardulo interviewed withdetective Jack Reid and Mark Baldwin prior to
giving his testimony. That's where hemade a shocking claim to detectives. Guardulo
said his friend suspect A, hadadmitted to killing Tricia. At that time,
the detectives were sure suspect A wasresponsible for the murder, but when
(34:07):
Garzulo was brought before the grand jury, he changed his story, making it
seem as if his friend was joking. Garzulo's friend moved out of the state
and was never charged. Detectives eventuallytracked him down and spent six hours trying
to persuade him to speak with them, but he demanded immunity, which Cook
(34:28):
County refused. Garzulo stopped talking tothe police and would eventually plead guilty to
the burglary. He was released oneighteen month probation and given a two hundred
dollars fine, according to a courtdisposition obtained by the journal Entropics. Free
again, he returned to the brightlights of Los Angeles, where he would
(34:51):
pursue a career in acting. Inour next episode, will follow Garzulo to
Los Angeles, where he would meetat twenty two year old named Ashley Ellern
and the Hollywood Ripper story begins tounfold.
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