March 15, 2024 • 43 mins
After Cook County's State's Attorney chose not to prosecute, Michael Gargiulo is once again a free man. He moves into an apartment in El Monte, California with his girlfriend, where a 32-year-old woman named Maria Bruno moves in across the complex. Less than two weeks after she moves in, Maria Bruno is killed. Her estranged husband, Irving, finds her stabbed, mutilated, and left for dead in her own bed, just hours after the two had been out the night prior. In a chilling 911 call, Irving describes the scene to police. Mark Lillienfeld, a detective with Los Angeles County Sheriff's Department, is assigned to the case. We speak to Det. Lillienfeld about the crime scene, witness statements from people who lived in the apartment, and a crucial piece of evidence left at the crime scene: a blue medical bootie with drops of blood on it.
Mark as Played
Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
(00:10):
Michael Garzulo was once again a freeman, able to escape charges in Cook County,
Illinois due to issues with the DNAevidence in Tricia Paccaccio's murder. In
two thousand and five, Gardiulo meta woman named Grace Quack, and the
two began a relationship. In Septemberof two thousand and five, Garzulo and
(00:34):
Quack, who was pregnant with Gardulo'ssecond child, had moved into a second
floor apartment in the forty six hundredblock of Arden Way in Elmonte. Two
months later, on November twenty three, two thousand and five, a woman
named Maria Bruno moved in across theapartment complex. A thirty two year old
(00:58):
aspiring model, she was originally fromAl Salvador and had four children. She
had just separated from her husband Irvinga few weeks prior to moving in.
Despite only living in the apartment forten days, Bruno had already complained to
friends about a weird guy who hadbeen watching her. Robert Rasmussen, one
(01:25):
of Bruno's neighbors, remembers seeing anunknown man wearing a hoodie and a baseball
hat who was jiggling Bruno's doorknob andpeering through her window. On another occasion,
he saw the same man following heras she carried groceries. Rasmussen said,
(01:45):
Bruno went into the apartment and theman followed her in, but the
minute he went inside, he backedout and the door was shut in his
face. Then, on the nightof November thirtieth, two thousand and five,
Maria went out with her strange husbandIrving. After a night of drinking,
(02:06):
Maria was too intoxicated to drive home, so Irving took her back to
her apartment. The two had sex, then Irving got dressed and left around
three am. He returned the followingmorning to drive Maria to work, but
when Maria didn't answer the door,he noticed her kitchen window screen was missing.
(02:30):
Irving crawled through the window and foundMaria's body laying in a pool of
blood. He called nine to oneone in a chilling call as he describes
the brutality of the scene. Becauseyou boys partly to where does she live?
(03:07):
I go, Okay, I cancall me from are you there at
her house? Do you have torecycle and call you to reciffle? Okay?
What you mean? I'm I mean? Ye know how what's your recular?
We be all you know? Okay, just come back to me.
Let you step on the race.Were you know that play? Oh that's
(03:31):
fun. That's what younger your exwife to your ex wife? Now?
Oh yeah that really? What's yourseparated? Okay? We have we have
a legally. Where are you rightnow? Or you can you come down
as other boys? Oh well Igot this thou too? Six? I
(04:00):
did away? Are six two sick? I'm gonna way okay. If I
was foty six twenty six did onthe servis? Yeah? That boy?
Okay, no very you know,tell me what exactly? Now? Would
you think that lid? You see? I was stocking on the door now,
uh huh. And I'm just knockingon the door. Okay, d
(04:25):
you think you're h is dead?I was looking on the door and then
I went in to the The windwas the window because it was a long
okay. And when I lived andwhen a given five, it was the
pool of blood. Okay, thepo when did they give me to a
(04:46):
living window? Kicking the trip inthe window is there's a there was a
four nine on the floor, uhhuh, in one of the mountain missing.
Then I went to go to mymy explosive. She's done expr So
if she did you do that,you're I'm put together right now. If
(05:09):
you're good, don't catch anything ofme. You up so the pus and
gut the house and you know Imove. We moved to so west the
westen a week ago. Okay,do you have many cats? Doesn't?
Yeah, that's point two. Areto get him? Nor why my house?
(05:31):
Your house? You brother hall houseon the only one house. When
it happened, you would see whatwe live here? It's okay. And
then the last said you talked toher of me my funny like ann time
we'll stay. That's human dr wrongat that time. So what's a bit
(05:54):
about boo ooh yeah, just seventhe fish door there, No that it
was later and went at midnight.Oh my, hold on, let me
think, let me say, okay, and the apartment, are you in
(06:25):
that number twenty number twenty? Yeah, okay, I'm knocking hard on the
door. Nobody somebody's answer. Okay, you haven't touched any dan in the
house, right, I do,like you made it that I didn't.
I when did you touch? Iwas the something that was food over her
(06:48):
mouth? Now, let's shut upfrom mouse. You know that they they
cut her her this and none ofthe nippers was placed over her belt.
It was tight when one up thenipples which based over her mouse? What
(07:08):
about her? Now? You knowthey took her whist Okay, they want
book? Okay, they took theknippers or it was based over her mouse.
Okay, And that was come,what's t well? What about?
And he talked to her like billy, I dropped her off here? What
(07:32):
tight? Oh my god? Shewants to do about? Let me think?
So you about two a m.Well what do you have doing?
(07:54):
Also to the end? Huh?Well, what are you doing? Also
to the end? You know?Yeah, we have talked to to probably
it's like a like a lot.You have fun there? I gave my
doctor off. Okay, have youbeen separating? Very sure? Very very
(08:20):
week? We about how many?Maybe like two three weeks? Are you
living at the location now? No, you just moved. Good, that's
perfect. Do you do you havecross and popery? Man? No?
No, she should have palping atour house. But we just moved.
We just moved in here. Doyou know if you're arguing with anybody?
(08:46):
Cool? Are you inside of theparts? Yeah? Whatever, you do
now, I mean, what areyou talking to? I know, I
(09:13):
don't know. With me, Iwent for the you don't know anything.
(09:35):
Let's bring in Detective Mark Lillianfeld.He's with the l A County Sheriff's Department
and was one of the first onthe scene. Mark, what do you
remember about the crime scene? Youknow, I have I have a relatively
even though it's been a long time, over a decade and a half,
I have a pretty clear memory ofit. You know, it was a
(09:58):
it was a big apartment complex,and there were three identical two story,
rectangular shaped apartment buildings that made upthis complex, and they were all lined
up. They were on the eastside of a north south street, and
each of the buildings kind of wasan energy of their own, and they
were connected by a common driveway andstuff. And each building had about eighty
(10:20):
apartment units in each of them,so there were, you know, two
hundred plus apartments one bedroom, twobedroom apartments in the buildings. And Maria's
building, where the murder occurred,was actually the southernmost apartment in the line
of them, and it had along driveway going up the side of the
(10:41):
building to the rear parking area,and it was pretty secure. And the
city where this occurred, the cityof Almonte, as a kind of a
working class, mostly Hispanic community.It's about twenty miles east of downtown Los
Angeles. It is an incorporated cityunder itself its own city government, including
(11:01):
its police department and things along thoselines. And the reason that I was
called out there, I was aLos Angeles County sheriff, and the Almonte
Police Department simply is under resourced andunderfunded to investigate murders that occur within their
jurisdiction, so they quite often askedfor assistance from the county sheriff. So
(11:26):
I remember specifically that the building wherethis occurred was a two story rectangular building
had a swimming pool in the centerof it. It was like a million
other apartment buildings in southern California,very they're like cookie cutters, are all
the same. And the crime sceneitself, where the victim lived, was
(11:48):
a ground floor apartment. It wason the north side of the building.
It was very close to the pool, and it was a typical typical one
bedroom, one bath, you know, kind of a studio, small,
you know, bachelorette type apartment.It couldn't have been you know, maybe
four hundred square feet Clive hundred squarefeet. And one of the things that
(12:11):
I remember very clearly, and thatdrew my attention right away when I got
there, was just outside of theapartment door, by about ten feet on
the on the you know, thepatio or the pavement of the courtyard was
a blue cotton medical like booty,like a shoe protector, and it was
pretty obviously it was just you know, going to be a piece of evidence.
(12:31):
And the Almanni police officers had gotthere on scene and had the fire
department roll and pronounce the victim dead. They knew right away this is going
to be a piece of evidence,so they had you know, kind of
like chalked it off and they hadpreserved it so it wouldn't be disturbed.
And like I said, I Imean I remember pretty vividly. I remember
(12:52):
the layout of the apartment because Ispent many many hours there that day and
in subsequent days too. And whenyou open front door, you were immediately
in like a very small kind ofan entryway, and then you were really
standing in the living room and toyour left of the front door was a
bar and by a bar. Idon't mean a drinking bar, you know
(13:13):
that kind of bar, but justa countertop and that divided the kitchen from
the living room. And on theother side of this countertop was the kitchen,
and it was a small, kindof a galley type kitchen. You
know. It had an oven andyou know, a microwave and the typical
kitchen sink. And at the atthe end of the kitchen was a window
that looked out onto the courtyard.So the window was just adjacent to the
(13:37):
front door. And then just beyondthe kitchen was kind of a very small
doorway and it led to there wasa bathroom on the left, you know,
typical with a tub and a showerand a toilet and a sink,
and a very short hallway with kindof like a linen closet in the hallway.
And then just beyond that at theend of that hallway, opposite the
(13:58):
bathroom was a doorway that led tothe single bedroom in the apartment, and
it was you know, your typicalyou know, like a ten foot by
twelve foot bedroom. It was theonly bedroom in the apartment that had a
king sized bed, I believe ana dresser and the victim of lying in
the bed and pull blood. Therewere sheets and blankets and covers on the
(14:20):
bed, if I recall, andpillows, and there was quite a bit
of clothing strewn about. And itturned out ultimately, ultimately we determined the
victim. It just moved into thisapartment like ten days earlier, and so
there were still a couple of boxescontaining shoes and clothing and purses and the
typical stuff you know that a youngwoman would have one she's moving from one
(14:43):
place to another. So a lotof stuff was packed, a lot of
stuff was unpacked, and there wasyou know, quite a bit of you
know, blouses and pants and shortsand jeans and things like that that were
hung up in the closet, andthen a lot of stuff was just piled
kind of in piles on the floorand on the dresser. Uh there was
(15:03):
nightstands on either side of the bed, and I recall all the furniture was
brand new. The apartment smelled ofnew paint, The carpeting was fresh,
freshly cleaned, and it was reallya pretty pristine apartment. It was it
was almost like a like a modelapartment, you know, It's like like
something you would show perspective tenants toUH to view to you know, hey,
(15:26):
you know you can live you canlive in this fabulous lifestyle kind of
deal. And it was. Itwas a secure building the UH. The
only way to enter the interior ofthe building was either threw a pass code
punched into a keypad or if youhad like a magnetic key card. Those
are the only two ways to getinto that building. It was a relatively
secure building. If you wanted todrive to the back driveway parking area that
(15:50):
was unsecured the same thing. Youhad to have either a you know,
kind of a pass key magnetic creditcard thing that would open a vehicle gate
and allow you to drive through,or you had to have a like a
four digit code to punch you intoa keypad that would allow the gate to
open. It was actually one ofthe attractions for the building that the victim,
(16:11):
Maria Bruno, It's one of thereasons she picked that building is because
she was just recently separated from herhusband. She was looking for a secure
place, and that that building caughther eyes, being especially for that part
of town, in that city inparticular, extraordinarily secure. Did you notice
(16:32):
anything about the victim's body that stoodout. I did, both my partner
and I and of course the crimelab people and even the officers that were
there from Elmanti Police Department. AndI mean it was a pretty I had
already been a homicide cop for along time. I had been to hundreds
of homicide scenes, hundreds of otherdeath scenes and all that. So I
(16:53):
was a pretty older, mature,experienced guy. I'd kind of been around.
You know, if you're a murdercop in La, you you it's
it's kind of like being a murdercop on steroids. You know, it
ain't. It ain't Waco, Texasor Madison, Illinois. It's it's kind
of it's busy to say the leave. So I was told, you know,
(17:14):
what to expect, and when Iwalked in, I was, you
know, it was an accurate depiction. Uh uh. Miss Bruno was lying
on the bed, She was lyingon her side, She was nude,
she was somewhat wrapped up a littlebit in the bedding, in the cover
and the sheet or the blanket,and it like like on first appearance,
(17:37):
it appeared to me as if thebody had been posed, which it turns
out that it was. And therewas a lot of blood, a lot
of blood all over the bedding,all over her and it almost looked like
at first as if she had beendecapitated. She had not, but she
had suffered really severe lacerations to herneck and chest area. Uh, both
(18:00):
breaths had been removed. One breathwas actually placed in her mouth and one
was actually placed on the pillow nextto her head. And that right away
was you know, it's like crapyou see in the movie. It's it's
not real life. I have beento other murders, you know that were
gory and bloody and all that stuff, but I'd never really been to one
(18:21):
quite like that. And certainly youknow, where the body was posed and
where there was you know, sexualmutilation. So it was it was pretty
remarkable. You know, it's prettyunusual and stuff, to say the least.
So there wasn't a lot of mysteryas to the cause of death.
Was obviously from a you know,from a sharp force object like a knife,
(18:42):
and that was in fact the causeof death. What do hard to
figure that out? And there wasn'tThere wasn't like a lot of blood like
sprayed on the walls around the furniture. There was some blood on the nightstand
if I recalled next to her nextto the bed, great deal of blood
on the bed or since betting,But it wasn't, you know, it
(19:03):
wasn't again. You know, evencops aren't immune from what we think we're
going to see on TV or inthe movies. So that's uh, that
was that was my first impression ofit. There was no weapon in the
immediate uh, bedroom, or inthe immediate area when I had entered the
apartment. In the kitchen, whichlike the rest of the apartment was very
(19:23):
clean, lying on the floor ofthe kitchen, and it had been pointed
out to me previously by the uniformpatrol cops, but lying on the floor
of the kitchen was a package.It was a knife package like you would
buy it, you know, bed, bathroom, beyond, and had four
spots on it on the cellophane wrappingor the plastic wrapping for for different sized
(19:45):
knives like a pairing knife and acutlery knife, and a you know,
a steak knife, and and kindof like a like a you know,
a big butcher kind of knife.And one of those four knife was missing.
The other three were still in thepackage from the manufacturer to handle were
kind of sticking out from the plasticthat was protecting the blade part of it.
But the missing knife was a longyou know, there was an outline
(20:07):
manufactured on the package of the sizeof the knife, and it looked like
a big knife. You know,it looked like a big almost like a
flame knife, like a single edgedknife with a wooden handle, if I
recall correctly, And it must havehad like a six or seven inch blade.
And so again, you know thatmystery wasn't I'm not the brightest tool
(20:27):
in the shed here. If Ican figure that stuff out, you know,
it's not a lot, not alot of mystery to it. That
putting two and two together from thescene in the bedroom and the injuries on
the victim and then the knife packagingbeing in the kitchen, you can anybody
can draw that conclusion that most likelyyour weapon is from the home there.
It's from that that knife package.Detective, did you have any indication or
(20:52):
suspect or possible motives? You know, we relatively quickly. You know,
we had to focus because of theamount of violence and the fact that it
was the estranged husband who found her. We certainly had to question him and
(21:15):
and by questioning him. I don'tmean to sit down and ask questions,
you know, across a table.I mean, you know, he he
kind of you know, if you'relooking for people their potential suspects on a
strange husband who's going through a divorcewould be, you know, right at
the top of the list. Andagain, I'd love to do the Sherlock
Holmes thing, but Ray Charles andHelen Keller both would tell you that it's
pretty pretty simple, pretty basic stuff. Though we met him after we did
(21:41):
the crime scene investigation, he actuallywaited for us for hours in the lobby
of the police department. He wasn'tunder rest, he was free to go,
and he simply was you know,he made arrangements to care for his
four children, and he didn't hedidn't move a muscle out of the lobby,
and he waited for us for likelike seven or eight nine hours in
the lobby of this apartment. Wedidn't get to him until late in the
(22:02):
afternoon. And this murder, youknow, occurred like in the early morning
hours, and we discovered it Ithink around seven or eight in the morning,
and then by the time we processedthe crime scene it was three four
or five in the afternoon, andwhen we we meaning my partner and I
got back to the Elmanti Police Department, the husband, Irving, was waiting
for us in the lobby, sowe wound up interviewing him at great length.
(22:26):
We talked him for I think wetalked him for four or five hours,
and he was totally cooperative, andI did not get like a bad
feel about the guy. Like Jesus, guy's lying. He wasn't contradictory,
wasn't. He just didn't display anyof the any of the indicators of being
responsible for this at all. Hewas obviously upset. He was very frank
(22:48):
with us about the details of theirmarriage, why they were separated, why
Maria had just recently moved into thisbuilding, why that apartment, you know,
So there wasn't It wasn't that hewas uncooperative at all, quite the
opposite it. So we we ultimatelyafter kind of getting that preliminary elimination of
him, thinking potentially he's really notour guy at least it's not jumping out,
(23:12):
you know, biting us in thenose that he's our guy. From
there, you know, just justkind of spitballing. She who would do
such a horrible thing. You knowwhat, what's the motive? Is it
a robbery? At rio money?Was she a third woman in a you
know, a triangular love triangle?I mean, you know she's not a
dope. A dope being that youcan eliminate a lot of simple things.
(23:34):
And the fact that she was nude, the fact that she was sexually mutilated,
the fact that her body was posed, the fact she was a very
attractive woman living alone. And itdid not appear the apartment was ransacked.
It didn't appear that any property wastaking. So you draw conclusions by eliminating
other other avenues. So by excluding, by excluding other potential motivations, you
(24:00):
draw a conclusion. Cops do itall the time. Uh, scientists do
it. People people do it allthe time. They draw conclusions by eliminating
other things. So we were ableto do that relatively quickly. And and
you know this was it had allthe all the earmarks of being Geesus is
(24:21):
potentially sexually motivated. This woman issexually uh mutilated, and she's new,
she's very attractive, she lives alone, and the body is posed and both
breasts are cut off. Uh notto to you know, beat that into
the ground for the salaciousness of it. But it's it's it's a clue.
(24:42):
I mean, it's an indicator ofwhat's motivating behind this murder. You know,
it wasn't her, you know,her ten thousand dollars rolex wasn't missing,
missing her, you know, moneywasn't missing. Nothing was missing hardly
at all except on the murder weapon. Ultimately, we determined that actually her
where keys were missing, and Ibelieve that was the only thing that was
(25:03):
that we never recovered from that apartmentor from the murder scene, was her
keys, and that in itself,didn't you know that could be a very
There were a number of what couldbe innocent explanations behind that, as well
as potentially that the suspect who didthe murder took her keys when he left,
so and to this day that's neverbeen answered. Actually, I'm going
(25:26):
to go with the suspect actually tookthe keys and that they weren't misplaced or
lost, but that that remains apossibility. Have you ever seen a blue
medical booty at a crime scene before? I have seen at crime scenes in
the past efforts made by suspects tonot leave forensic evidence, like like a
(25:48):
burglar that wears gloves, or youknow, somebody that enters a building or
a home to do some kind ofa crime, and they'll they'll take prophylactic
measures of one type or another toavoid leaving you know, evidence, whether
it be a fingerprints or DNA oror something like that. Sexual predators,
(26:11):
those that are you know, reallykind of premeditated and have a have a
game plan. Quite often they willmake their victims take a shower, or
they'll actually wear a conom or dosomething to avoid, you know, leaving
evidence at a crime scene. Soseeing the blue booty there was not it
just wasn't a huge leap that Jesusunusual. Maybe a maybe a brain surgeon,
(26:33):
you know, lives in this apartmentbuilding and they drop their booty on
the way from surgery. It's like, you know, there's not a lot
of not a lot of mystery tothat you can draw that draw that assumption,
you know, and be somewhat suspiciousand raised an eyebrow, but most
likely the suspect and it turned outto be correct, wore this this booty,
this prophylactic device to avoid leaving ashoeprints or bootprints or footprints and ultimately
(27:00):
in the investigation that was born outthat that was the fact. What were
the next steps of the investigation.We were hoping to get fingerprint, we
were hoping to get DNA, andwe really didn't get either very quickly at
all. It took months and monthsto develop DNA off of the Blue booty,
and even then we did not havea have a match for that DNA
(27:22):
right away. So it was itwas, you know, nineteen fifty five.
It was your old fashioned murder.We did not have video that were
in fact a couple of security videocameras, but they were not working,
and they were not the type thatrecorded images. They were there like close
circuits so they could watch images,and even some of those didn't work properly.
So you know what cops have beendoing for one hundred plus years.
(27:47):
We started knocking on doors. Andagain, you know, earlier I described
this is three apartment buildings that arethat are right next to each other.
They're all part of the same youknow complex, and there are eighty apartments
in each complex, so we're talkingtwo hundred and thirty two hundred and forty
individual apartments. So my partner andI, you know, got our tape
(28:08):
recorders charged up, and we workedwith some other cops and start knocking on
doors and knocked on doors and knockedon doors and knocked on doors, and
it took us, you know,quite quite a few days to canvass the
entire building. Of course, somepeople work for to midnight, some people
work midnight to eight, so noteverybody's home. You wind up leaving business
cards, you wind up getting phonecalls later. Like every other homicide cop
(28:30):
in America in the beginning, youwind up working very very long, hard
hours. And that's what we did. We wound up eventually knocking on every
one of those apartment doors and contactingthe bulk of those and I want to
say it's around two hundred and thirty, two hundred and forty residents, and
we wound up talking almost everybody.Did you see anything, did you hear
(28:51):
anything, do you know anything?Has there been any kind of suspicious activity
going on? So on and soforth, So that that's a big chunk
of that investigation. From there,we kind of drew a circle outside of
the apartment building, started knocking ondoors on people that lived in houses across
the street and people that lived downthe block, and you know, has
(29:11):
there been anything unusual, you know, any suspicious people. And you know,
again, this is Los Angeles.You know, it's the second it's
the second largest city in the nation. You know, I've got ten million
people in Los Angeles County. It'sit's a big damn place. So you
know, there's a lot going onall the time. It's truly, you
know, a vibrant place. Eventhough El Monty is a suburb of Los
(29:33):
Angeles and a city undo itself,it's a it's a big community. You
know, I'm not I don't recallexactly, but there's I believe El Monte
itself must have maybe fifty or onehundred thousand people a population that live there.
It's a major hub in many waysof manufacturing and and you know,
commerce, and it's a it's abedroom community also, but it's also got
(29:56):
you know, quite a bit ofof other things going for it. So
that's a big city. So youknow, we're we're doing the best we
can under the circumstances to uh toyou know, try to try to narrow
down, you know, talking topeople. That's that's what cops do,
is communicating, try to see ifanybody heard anything or signing or you know.
(30:18):
Uh, it turned out one ofthe one of the better leads we
got relatively quickly was from a womanthat lived in a building unrelated to the
apartment complex where the murder happened,but she lived a couple of buildings south
and she was awakened by a burglarand uh, when he startled her sleeping
(30:41):
on the couch, he ran away. So we thought, gee, that's
pretty good, you know, whenthe guy got into her apartment through a
window, and we that could beour guy. You know, let's let's
work that burglary. And so westarted working that pretty hard, putting a
lot of effort into that. Wedidn't get any fingerprints, but in talking
to other witnesses, knocking on doorsand on so forth, we developed enough
(31:02):
evidence to focus on one guy.We did a search warrant at this one
guy's home. He lived in theneighborhood, and he was good for the
burglary, and he alibied out forour our murder, and we were able
to eliminate him as being the suspectin our murder. We ultimately charge him
with the burglary of this unrelated woman'splace. But you know, that's that's
(31:23):
essentially you know, it's what copsdo. I mean, you go where
the clue, wherever the evidence takesyou, and that's where that's where that
particular evidence took us. So itwasn't you know, again, I want
to be sure like Holmes here andyou know'll tell you what a great job
we did, but it was kindof just going through the numbers. You
know, started A and go toZ, and it's not It's pretty routine
(31:44):
in that respect. The work thatwe we meaning detectives or homicide detectives,
what we do is kind of,you know, not all that different than
piloting airplane and you go down achecklist. You don't truly have a checklist
like a pilot would, but youyou know, there are certain things you
do and the physical evidence that thecrime scene is one of the first things.
And the next thing is to lookfor you know, even back then
(32:06):
in two thousand and five, tolook for video evidence or evidence of suspicious
activity. And you get that byknocking on doors and talking to people.
So that's what we did. Thatwas a big part of the investigation,
was meeting people, talking to people. We looked at old police reports for
activity or calls to service there.And it's a big building, two hundred
(32:29):
and forty residents, so there areno people call the cops. Hey there's
a car block in my parking space. Hey there's a suspicious guy in the
laundery room. Hey my my workvan got broken into, my tools got
stolen. So you know, crimedoesn't crime doesn't stop necessarily, you know,
where a major crime occurs. II've got to not laugh about it.
(32:52):
It's actually tragic. But like whennine to eleven happened in the Twin
Towers went down, I mean,there were still there were thousands of automotive
accidents that took you know, thelives of thousands of Americans that day,
and thousands of people got arrested fordrunk driving, and sadly, hundreds of
people got murdered all across America unrelatedto nine to eleven. I mean,
you know, life keeps going ondespite tragedy, and this tragedy was no
(33:15):
different. You know, people keptyou know, looting and stealing and robbing
and pillaging and doing the bad crapthat people do. And and you know
it happened after this murder. Ithappened before this murder, and you know,
our job is to kind of identifythat and see if there's a correlation,
and so that that kind of tookus in that direction. That's kind
(33:36):
of where we went. What canyou tell us about Maria Bruno? She
was about thirty two years old.She was an immigrant to this country,
I believe from Central America, andI want to say from El Salvador.
She came in this country. Ibelieve was a young teenager. She got
married very young to a young manthat she had fallen in love with and
met or met and fall in lovewith, hopefully in that order. And
(33:59):
they'd been married about ten years.They had twins. The twins I think
were like like four years old,and then she had like a five year
old and a six year old.Her husband, Irving, was a middle
class, nice guy, bright guy, at a degree in psychology. I
believe they owned and operated a videorental store, which kind of dates this
(34:22):
murder, I guess, because wedon't have those kinds of stores anymore,
like a Blockbuster, but you know, a family owned thing. And it
was also a currency exchange where peoplecould go there and transfer money by wire,
you know, from this exchange totheir loved ones or to anybody they
wanted anywhere in the world. Sothat was how these people lived and supported
(34:45):
themselves. They lived in a verynice home and a very nice residential area.
Maria was somewhat I think both ofthem the marriage had kind of run
its course, and they had bothkind of just decided mutually that the marriage
was over and they were going totake a break and most likely get a
(35:05):
divorce. So they were. Itwas very civil between them. It wasn't,
you know, like a you know, screaming Peyton place kind of I
hate your guts, I never wantto see you again type deal at all.
And Maria actually moved out of thehome, was a little bit unusual,
and together they found her a nice, clean, secure apartment to move
into ultimately, which wasn't so secure. So that was her background. She
(35:30):
really didn't have a lot of relativeshere in this country. She had a
cousin I remember that was a malecousin that was in the United States Navy
in San Diego, and she hadsome other distant relatives I believe in uncle,
but she really didn't didn't have anybodyanybody else here other than the immediate
family, and so her husband,her husband's parents. You know, we
(35:51):
were those closest to her. Detective, What did Maria's friends and neighbors tell
you when you spoke to them?You know, I mean, the more
you know about the victim, themore you're going to potentially know about suspects.
So we did a you know,you know, a background as much
as we possibly could about Maria,and you know, she she seemed like
(36:13):
a really nice woman. She wasvery, very pretty. She was kind
of trying to break into modeling.She'd had some photos of her taken professionally
and had kind of hit that thatcircuit a little bit, but never found
a whole lot of success in it. She worked when her and her husband
decided to dissolve the marriage and separate, she got a job at a furniture
(36:37):
store there in Almonti and she workedin the credit department, very briefly.
She'd only been to work for avery short period of time before her death,
and prior to that, she'd workedwith her husband at the at the
video store. But she was,you know, like like no enemies,
and she didn't have you know,this kind of crazy life where she was
a high risk victim. She wasn'tat all, you know, you know,
(36:58):
somebody that that took chances. Youknow, just a mom with four
little kids, trying to do thebest she could raising little kids in a
hectic, you know, hectic lifethat we all live and everything, and
so there wasn't anything that stuck outthat she was a big risk taker.
She since her separation had dated alittle bit, she had gone out with
a few different men. We woundup meeting them. A couple of them
(37:20):
were One of them, at leastthat comes to mind, was a young
man that lived there in the apartmentbuilding, you know, and he was
he was totally co op and wewere able again to kind of eliminate him
as being a suspect pretty easily throughthe timeline that we had developed. And
then she had dated another guy alittle bit more seriously, who was a
(37:44):
restaurant manager in the city of Pasadena, and Pasadena is about about ten miles
from Almonte, and so he wasable to provide us with with some background
about Mariad what kind of girl shewas, and you know, what they
liked and you know, did togetherand they'd go out to movies and the
usual you know stuff that people dowhen you're getting to know each other and
dating each other and stuff. Heprovided us a story that turned out to
(38:08):
be very valuable later on, andbasically he said that when Maria had moved
into the building, she had hada very brief confrontation with another occupant in
the building, and the guy thathad confronted her had actually followed her into
her apartment. When her hands werefull, she was carrying a box from
(38:30):
the parking lot through the courtyard andinto her apartment, and when she turned
around after setting the box down,this this guy, this young man,
was standing there and he kind ofstartled her, and it pissed her off,
and she kind of yelled at theguy and told him, you know,
get the hell out of my apartment, and the guy did, and
it kind of creeped her out.And ultimately she learned that the guy actually
(38:53):
lived in her building and that helived across the way and across the way
or three words that she used indescribing where this guy lived. So she
told her her friend Brian, whois the manager of a restaurant that she
had kind of started dating. Shetold him that story. So that was
kind of it creeped her out,and she told that story to Brian and
(39:17):
then a couple of days later shewent out with Brian again and she told
him, you know, that creepyguy had told me about it across the
way. He's not what I thoughthe was. He's okay. Like she
wasn't in she wasn't not in harm'sway, but she wasn't as alert or
have that stranger danger Spidey sense thinggoing where this guy's at creep He bothers
(39:40):
me, I've got to be actuallycareful around him, that she kind of
had let her guard down around himin some manner based on her statement to
Brian, her buddy. So ultimatelywe wound up actually finding an actual eyewitness,
an older gentleman that lived in abuilding across the courtyard from Maria,
who saw the confrontation that she haddescribed to buy it, where the guy
(40:05):
had followed her into her apartment.He was in there for probably less than
ten or twenty seconds before he backedout when she, you know, did
the the aggressive thing of you know, who the hell are you and get
out of my freaking home. Sothat was that was, you know,
something that you know, quite oftenin murder investigations, the littlest things that
(40:27):
don't seem to have a great importanceturn out to be, you know,
amongst the most important things. Backto the evidence from the crime scene,
drops of blood from the medical bootywould find Maria Bruno's DNA as well as
another unidentified man. One thing wasfor sure, the DNA did not match
(40:52):
her husband, Irving, and italso didn't match anyone in the database.
So we have three women, TriciaBoccaccio, Ashley Elren and now Maria Bruno,
all brutally murdered with a knife,and all three living in close proximity
(41:14):
to Michael Gargiulo. None of themurders had evidence of the woman being sexually
assaulted, and no items or belongingswere taken by the killer. Garjulo,
who was living right across from Maria, was never interviewed by the police.
(41:34):
His girlfriend, Grace Quack, hadmoved out by that time. In two
thousand and six, Garzulo started workingfor Gus the Plumber, with a man
named Gustavo Bone. He started anew relationship with a woman named Anna Louise
Gonzalez. According to La Weekly,the two met at a showroom for plumbing
(41:55):
and bathroom remodeling. They would eventuallyget married and in two thousand and seven,
Gardulo moved into Gonzalez's apartment with hermother in Santa Monica, California.
In two thousand and eight, yetanother woman who lived close to Garzulo would
be brutally attacked by a knife,but this time the victim lived to tell
(42:21):
her story. In our next episode, we'll hear that story, the big
break police had been waiting for,and how it tied together the murders of
Tricia Boccaccio, Ashley Ellern, andMaria Bruno. I'm Kelly Hyman, and
this is once upon a crime inHollywood, the Hollywood Ripper.
Michael Garzulo was once again a freeman, able to escape charges in Cook County,
Illinois due to issues with the DNAevidence in Tricia Paccaccio's murder. In
two thousand and five, Gardiulo meta woman named Grace Quack, and the
two began a relationship. In Septemberof two thousand and five, Garzulo and
(00:34):
Quack, who was pregnant with Gardulo'ssecond child, had moved into a second
floor apartment in the forty six hundredblock of Arden Way in Elmonte. Two
months later, on November twenty three, two thousand and five, a woman
named Maria Bruno moved in across theapartment complex. A thirty two year old
(00:58):
aspiring model, she was originally fromAl Salvador and had four children. She
had just separated from her husband Irvinga few weeks prior to moving in.
Despite only living in the apartment forten days, Bruno had already complained to
friends about a weird guy who hadbeen watching her. Robert Rasmussen, one
(01:25):
of Bruno's neighbors, remembers seeing anunknown man wearing a hoodie and a baseball
hat who was jiggling Bruno's doorknob andpeering through her window. On another occasion,
he saw the same man following heras she carried groceries. Rasmussen said,
(01:45):
Bruno went into the apartment and theman followed her in, but the
minute he went inside, he backedout and the door was shut in his
face. Then, on the nightof November thirtieth, two thousand and five,
Maria went out with her strange husbandIrving. After a night of drinking,
(02:06):
Maria was too intoxicated to drive home, so Irving took her back to
her apartment. The two had sex, then Irving got dressed and left around
three am. He returned the followingmorning to drive Maria to work, but
when Maria didn't answer the door,he noticed her kitchen window screen was missing.
(02:30):
Irving crawled through the window and foundMaria's body laying in a pool of
blood. He called nine to oneone in a chilling call as he describes
the brutality of the scene. Becauseyou boys partly to where does she live?
(03:07):
I go, Okay, I cancall me from are you there at
her house? Do you have torecycle and call you to reciffle? Okay?
What you mean? I'm I mean? Ye know how what's your recular?
We be all you know? Okay, just come back to me.
Let you step on the race.Were you know that play? Oh that's
(03:31):
fun. That's what younger your exwife to your ex wife? Now?
Oh yeah that really? What's yourseparated? Okay? We have we have
a legally. Where are you rightnow? Or you can you come down
as other boys? Oh well Igot this thou too? Six? I
(04:00):
did away? Are six two sick? I'm gonna way okay. If I
was foty six twenty six did onthe servis? Yeah? That boy?
Okay, no very you know,tell me what exactly? Now? Would
you think that lid? You see? I was stocking on the door now,
uh huh. And I'm just knockingon the door. Okay, d
(04:25):
you think you're h is dead?I was looking on the door and then
I went in to the The windwas the window because it was a long
okay. And when I lived andwhen a given five, it was the
pool of blood. Okay, thepo when did they give me to a
(04:46):
living window? Kicking the trip inthe window is there's a there was a
four nine on the floor, uhhuh, in one of the mountain missing.
Then I went to go to mymy explosive. She's done expr So
if she did you do that,you're I'm put together right now. If
(05:09):
you're good, don't catch anything ofme. You up so the pus and
gut the house and you know Imove. We moved to so west the
westen a week ago. Okay,do you have many cats? Doesn't?
Yeah, that's point two. Areto get him? Nor why my house?
(05:31):
Your house? You brother hall houseon the only one house. When
it happened, you would see whatwe live here? It's okay. And
then the last said you talked toher of me my funny like ann time
we'll stay. That's human dr wrongat that time. So what's a bit
(05:54):
about boo ooh yeah, just seventhe fish door there, No that it
was later and went at midnight.Oh my, hold on, let me
think, let me say, okay, and the apartment, are you in
(06:25):
that number twenty number twenty? Yeah, okay, I'm knocking hard on the
door. Nobody somebody's answer. Okay, you haven't touched any dan in the
house, right, I do,like you made it that I didn't.
I when did you touch? Iwas the something that was food over her
(06:48):
mouth? Now, let's shut upfrom mouse. You know that they they
cut her her this and none ofthe nippers was placed over her belt.
It was tight when one up thenipples which based over her mouse? What
(07:08):
about her? Now? You knowthey took her whist Okay, they want
book? Okay, they took theknippers or it was based over her mouse.
Okay, And that was come,what's t well? What about?
And he talked to her like billy, I dropped her off here? What
(07:32):
tight? Oh my god? Shewants to do about? Let me think?
So you about two a m.Well what do you have doing?
(07:54):
Also to the end? Huh?Well, what are you doing? Also
to the end? You know?Yeah, we have talked to to probably
it's like a like a lot.You have fun there? I gave my
doctor off. Okay, have youbeen separating? Very sure? Very very
(08:20):
week? We about how many?Maybe like two three weeks? Are you
living at the location now? No, you just moved. Good, that's
perfect. Do you do you havecross and popery? Man? No?
No, she should have palping atour house. But we just moved.
We just moved in here. Doyou know if you're arguing with anybody?
(08:46):
Cool? Are you inside of theparts? Yeah? Whatever, you do
now, I mean, what areyou talking to? I know, I
(09:13):
don't know. With me, Iwent for the you don't know anything.
(09:35):
Let's bring in Detective Mark Lillianfeld.He's with the l A County Sheriff's Department
and was one of the first onthe scene. Mark, what do you
remember about the crime scene? Youknow, I have I have a relatively
even though it's been a long time, over a decade and a half,
I have a pretty clear memory ofit. You know, it was a
(09:58):
it was a big apartment complex,and there were three identical two story,
rectangular shaped apartment buildings that made upthis complex, and they were all lined
up. They were on the eastside of a north south street, and
each of the buildings kind of wasan energy of their own, and they
were connected by a common driveway andstuff. And each building had about eighty
(10:20):
apartment units in each of them,so there were, you know, two
hundred plus apartments one bedroom, twobedroom apartments in the buildings. And Maria's
building, where the murder occurred,was actually the southernmost apartment in the line
of them, and it had along driveway going up the side of the
(10:41):
building to the rear parking area,and it was pretty secure. And the
city where this occurred, the cityof Almonte, as a kind of a
working class, mostly Hispanic community.It's about twenty miles east of downtown Los
Angeles. It is an incorporated cityunder itself its own city government, including
(11:01):
its police department and things along thoselines. And the reason that I was
called out there, I was aLos Angeles County sheriff, and the Almonte
Police Department simply is under resourced andunderfunded to investigate murders that occur within their
jurisdiction, so they quite often askedfor assistance from the county sheriff. So
(11:26):
I remember specifically that the building wherethis occurred was a two story rectangular building
had a swimming pool in the centerof it. It was like a million
other apartment buildings in southern California,very they're like cookie cutters, are all
the same. And the crime sceneitself, where the victim lived, was
(11:48):
a ground floor apartment. It wason the north side of the building.
It was very close to the pool, and it was a typical typical one
bedroom, one bath, you know, kind of a studio, small,
you know, bachelorette type apartment.It couldn't have been you know, maybe
four hundred square feet Clive hundred squarefeet. And one of the things that
(12:11):
I remember very clearly, and thatdrew my attention right away when I got
there, was just outside of theapartment door, by about ten feet on
the on the you know, thepatio or the pavement of the courtyard was
a blue cotton medical like booty,like a shoe protector, and it was
pretty obviously it was just you know, going to be a piece of evidence.
(12:31):
And the Almanni police officers had gotthere on scene and had the fire
department roll and pronounce the victim dead. They knew right away this is going
to be a piece of evidence,so they had you know, kind of
like chalked it off and they hadpreserved it so it wouldn't be disturbed.
And like I said, I Imean I remember pretty vividly. I remember
(12:52):
the layout of the apartment because Ispent many many hours there that day and
in subsequent days too. And whenyou open front door, you were immediately
in like a very small kind ofan entryway, and then you were really
standing in the living room and toyour left of the front door was a
bar and by a bar. Idon't mean a drinking bar, you know
(13:13):
that kind of bar, but justa countertop and that divided the kitchen from
the living room. And on theother side of this countertop was the kitchen,
and it was a small, kindof a galley type kitchen. You
know. It had an oven andyou know, a microwave and the typical
kitchen sink. And at the atthe end of the kitchen was a window
that looked out onto the courtyard.So the window was just adjacent to the
(13:37):
front door. And then just beyondthe kitchen was kind of a very small
doorway and it led to there wasa bathroom on the left, you know,
typical with a tub and a showerand a toilet and a sink,
and a very short hallway with kindof like a linen closet in the hallway.
And then just beyond that at theend of that hallway, opposite the
(13:58):
bathroom was a doorway that led tothe single bedroom in the apartment, and
it was you know, your typicalyou know, like a ten foot by
twelve foot bedroom. It was theonly bedroom in the apartment that had a
king sized bed, I believe ana dresser and the victim of lying in
the bed and pull blood. Therewere sheets and blankets and covers on the
(14:20):
bed, if I recall, andpillows, and there was quite a bit
of clothing strewn about. And itturned out ultimately, ultimately we determined the
victim. It just moved into thisapartment like ten days earlier, and so
there were still a couple of boxescontaining shoes and clothing and purses and the
typical stuff you know that a youngwoman would have one she's moving from one
(14:43):
place to another. So a lotof stuff was packed, a lot of
stuff was unpacked, and there wasyou know, quite a bit of you
know, blouses and pants and shortsand jeans and things like that that were
hung up in the closet, andthen a lot of stuff was just piled
kind of in piles on the floorand on the dresser. Uh there was
(15:03):
nightstands on either side of the bed, and I recall all the furniture was
brand new. The apartment smelled ofnew paint, The carpeting was fresh,
freshly cleaned, and it was reallya pretty pristine apartment. It was it
was almost like a like a modelapartment, you know, It's like like
something you would show perspective tenants toUH to view to you know, hey,
(15:26):
you know you can live you canlive in this fabulous lifestyle kind of
deal. And it was. Itwas a secure building the UH. The
only way to enter the interior ofthe building was either threw a pass code
punched into a keypad or if youhad like a magnetic key card. Those
are the only two ways to getinto that building. It was a relatively
secure building. If you wanted todrive to the back driveway parking area that
(15:50):
was unsecured the same thing. Youhad to have either a you know,
kind of a pass key magnetic creditcard thing that would open a vehicle gate
and allow you to drive through,or you had to have a like a
four digit code to punch you intoa keypad that would allow the gate to
open. It was actually one ofthe attractions for the building that the victim,
(16:11):
Maria Bruno, It's one of thereasons she picked that building is because
she was just recently separated from herhusband. She was looking for a secure
place, and that that building caughther eyes, being especially for that part
of town, in that city inparticular, extraordinarily secure. Did you notice
(16:32):
anything about the victim's body that stoodout. I did, both my partner
and I and of course the crimelab people and even the officers that were
there from Elmanti Police Department. AndI mean it was a pretty I had
already been a homicide cop for along time. I had been to hundreds
of homicide scenes, hundreds of otherdeath scenes and all that. So I
(16:53):
was a pretty older, mature,experienced guy. I'd kind of been around.
You know, if you're a murdercop in La, you you it's
it's kind of like being a murdercop on steroids. You know, it
ain't. It ain't Waco, Texasor Madison, Illinois. It's it's kind
of it's busy to say the leave. So I was told, you know,
(17:14):
what to expect, and when Iwalked in, I was, you
know, it was an accurate depiction. Uh uh. Miss Bruno was lying
on the bed, She was lyingon her side, She was nude,
she was somewhat wrapped up a littlebit in the bedding, in the cover
and the sheet or the blanket,and it like like on first appearance,
(17:37):
it appeared to me as if thebody had been posed, which it turns
out that it was. And therewas a lot of blood, a lot
of blood all over the bedding,all over her and it almost looked like
at first as if she had beendecapitated. She had not, but she
had suffered really severe lacerations to herneck and chest area. Uh, both
(18:00):
breaths had been removed. One breathwas actually placed in her mouth and one
was actually placed on the pillow nextto her head. And that right away
was you know, it's like crapyou see in the movie. It's it's
not real life. I have beento other murders, you know that were
gory and bloody and all that stuff, but I'd never really been to one
(18:21):
quite like that. And certainly youknow, where the body was posed and
where there was you know, sexualmutilation. So it was it was pretty
remarkable. You know, it's prettyunusual and stuff, to say the least.
So there wasn't a lot of mysteryas to the cause of death.
Was obviously from a you know,from a sharp force object like a knife,
(18:42):
and that was in fact the causeof death. What do hard to
figure that out? And there wasn'tThere wasn't like a lot of blood like
sprayed on the walls around the furniture. There was some blood on the nightstand
if I recalled next to her nextto the bed, great deal of blood
on the bed or since betting,But it wasn't, you know, it
(19:03):
wasn't again. You know, evencops aren't immune from what we think we're
going to see on TV or inthe movies. So that's uh, that
was that was my first impression ofit. There was no weapon in the
immediate uh, bedroom, or inthe immediate area when I had entered the
apartment. In the kitchen, whichlike the rest of the apartment was very
(19:23):
clean, lying on the floor ofthe kitchen, and it had been pointed
out to me previously by the uniformpatrol cops, but lying on the floor
of the kitchen was a package.It was a knife package like you would
buy it, you know, bed, bathroom, beyond, and had four
spots on it on the cellophane wrappingor the plastic wrapping for for different sized
(19:45):
knives like a pairing knife and acutlery knife, and a you know,
a steak knife, and and kindof like a like a you know,
a big butcher kind of knife.And one of those four knife was missing.
The other three were still in thepackage from the manufacturer to handle were
kind of sticking out from the plasticthat was protecting the blade part of it.
But the missing knife was a longyou know, there was an outline
(20:07):
manufactured on the package of the sizeof the knife, and it looked like
a big knife. You know,it looked like a big almost like a
flame knife, like a single edgedknife with a wooden handle, if I
recall correctly, And it must havehad like a six or seven inch blade.
And so again, you know thatmystery wasn't I'm not the brightest tool
(20:27):
in the shed here. If Ican figure that stuff out, you know,
it's not a lot, not alot of mystery to it. That
putting two and two together from thescene in the bedroom and the injuries on
the victim and then the knife packagingbeing in the kitchen, you can anybody
can draw that conclusion that most likelyyour weapon is from the home there.
It's from that that knife package.Detective, did you have any indication or
(20:52):
suspect or possible motives? You know, we relatively quickly. You know,
we had to focus because of theamount of violence and the fact that it
was the estranged husband who found her. We certainly had to question him and
(21:15):
and by questioning him. I don'tmean to sit down and ask questions,
you know, across a table.I mean, you know, he he
kind of you know, if you'relooking for people their potential suspects on a
strange husband who's going through a divorcewould be, you know, right at
the top of the list. Andagain, I'd love to do the Sherlock
Holmes thing, but Ray Charles andHelen Keller both would tell you that it's
pretty pretty simple, pretty basic stuff. Though we met him after we did
(21:41):
the crime scene investigation, he actuallywaited for us for hours in the lobby
of the police department. He wasn'tunder rest, he was free to go,
and he simply was you know,he made arrangements to care for his
four children, and he didn't hedidn't move a muscle out of the lobby,
and he waited for us for likelike seven or eight nine hours in
the lobby of this apartment. Wedidn't get to him until late in the
(22:02):
afternoon. And this murder, youknow, occurred like in the early morning
hours, and we discovered it Ithink around seven or eight in the morning,
and then by the time we processedthe crime scene it was three four
or five in the afternoon, andwhen we we meaning my partner and I
got back to the Elmanti Police Department, the husband, Irving, was waiting
for us in the lobby, sowe wound up interviewing him at great length.
(22:26):
We talked him for I think wetalked him for four or five hours,
and he was totally cooperative, andI did not get like a bad
feel about the guy. Like Jesus, guy's lying. He wasn't contradictory,
wasn't. He just didn't display anyof the any of the indicators of being
responsible for this at all. Hewas obviously upset. He was very frank
(22:48):
with us about the details of theirmarriage, why they were separated, why
Maria had just recently moved into thisbuilding, why that apartment, you know,
So there wasn't It wasn't that hewas uncooperative at all, quite the
opposite it. So we we ultimatelyafter kind of getting that preliminary elimination of
him, thinking potentially he's really notour guy at least it's not jumping out,
(23:12):
you know, biting us in thenose that he's our guy. From
there, you know, just justkind of spitballing. She who would do
such a horrible thing. You knowwhat, what's the motive? Is it
a robbery? At rio money?Was she a third woman in a you
know, a triangular love triangle?I mean, you know she's not a
dope. A dope being that youcan eliminate a lot of simple things.
(23:34):
And the fact that she was nude, the fact that she was sexually mutilated,
the fact that her body was posed, the fact she was a very
attractive woman living alone. And itdid not appear the apartment was ransacked.
It didn't appear that any property wastaking. So you draw conclusions by eliminating
other other avenues. So by excluding, by excluding other potential motivations, you
(24:00):
draw a conclusion. Cops do itall the time. Uh, scientists do
it. People people do it allthe time. They draw conclusions by eliminating
other things. So we were ableto do that relatively quickly. And and
you know this was it had allthe all the earmarks of being Geesus is
(24:21):
potentially sexually motivated. This woman issexually uh mutilated, and she's new,
she's very attractive, she lives alone, and the body is posed and both
breasts are cut off. Uh notto to you know, beat that into
the ground for the salaciousness of it. But it's it's it's a clue.
(24:42):
I mean, it's an indicator ofwhat's motivating behind this murder. You know,
it wasn't her, you know,her ten thousand dollars rolex wasn't missing,
missing her, you know, moneywasn't missing. Nothing was missing hardly
at all except on the murder weapon. Ultimately, we determined that actually her
where keys were missing, and Ibelieve that was the only thing that was
(25:03):
that we never recovered from that apartmentor from the murder scene, was her
keys, and that in itself,didn't you know that could be a very
There were a number of what couldbe innocent explanations behind that, as well
as potentially that the suspect who didthe murder took her keys when he left,
so and to this day that's neverbeen answered. Actually, I'm going
(25:26):
to go with the suspect actually tookthe keys and that they weren't misplaced or
lost, but that that remains apossibility. Have you ever seen a blue
medical booty at a crime scene before? I have seen at crime scenes in
the past efforts made by suspects tonot leave forensic evidence, like like a
(25:48):
burglar that wears gloves, or youknow, somebody that enters a building or
a home to do some kind ofa crime, and they'll they'll take prophylactic
measures of one type or another toavoid leaving you know, evidence, whether
it be a fingerprints or DNA oror something like that. Sexual predators,
(26:11):
those that are you know, reallykind of premeditated and have a have a
game plan. Quite often they willmake their victims take a shower, or
they'll actually wear a conom or dosomething to avoid, you know, leaving
evidence at a crime scene. Soseeing the blue booty there was not it
just wasn't a huge leap that Jesusunusual. Maybe a maybe a brain surgeon,
(26:33):
you know, lives in this apartmentbuilding and they drop their booty on
the way from surgery. It's like, you know, there's not a lot
of not a lot of mystery tothat you can draw that draw that assumption,
you know, and be somewhat suspiciousand raised an eyebrow, but most
likely the suspect and it turned outto be correct, wore this this booty,
this prophylactic device to avoid leaving ashoeprints or bootprints or footprints and ultimately
(27:00):
in the investigation that was born outthat that was the fact. What were
the next steps of the investigation.We were hoping to get fingerprint, we
were hoping to get DNA, andwe really didn't get either very quickly at
all. It took months and monthsto develop DNA off of the Blue booty,
and even then we did not havea have a match for that DNA
(27:22):
right away. So it was itwas, you know, nineteen fifty five.
It was your old fashioned murder.We did not have video that were
in fact a couple of security videocameras, but they were not working,
and they were not the type thatrecorded images. They were there like close
circuits so they could watch images,and even some of those didn't work properly.
So you know what cops have beendoing for one hundred plus years.
(27:47):
We started knocking on doors. Andagain, you know, earlier I described
this is three apartment buildings that arethat are right next to each other.
They're all part of the same youknow complex, and there are eighty apartments
in each complex, so we're talkingtwo hundred and thirty two hundred and forty
individual apartments. So my partner andI, you know, got our tape
(28:08):
recorders charged up, and we workedwith some other cops and start knocking on
doors and knocked on doors and knockedon doors and knocked on doors, and
it took us, you know,quite quite a few days to canvass the
entire building. Of course, somepeople work for to midnight, some people
work midnight to eight, so noteverybody's home. You wind up leaving business
cards, you wind up getting phonecalls later. Like every other homicide cop
(28:30):
in America in the beginning, youwind up working very very long, hard
hours. And that's what we did. We wound up eventually knocking on every
one of those apartment doors and contactingthe bulk of those and I want to
say it's around two hundred and thirty, two hundred and forty residents, and
we wound up talking almost everybody.Did you see anything, did you hear
(28:51):
anything, do you know anything?Has there been any kind of suspicious activity
going on? So on and soforth, So that that's a big chunk
of that investigation. From there,we kind of drew a circle outside of
the apartment building, started knocking ondoors on people that lived in houses across
the street and people that lived downthe block, and you know, has
(29:11):
there been anything unusual, you know, any suspicious people. And you know,
again, this is Los Angeles.You know, it's the second it's
the second largest city in the nation. You know, I've got ten million
people in Los Angeles County. It'sit's a big damn place. So you
know, there's a lot going onall the time. It's truly, you
know, a vibrant place. Eventhough El Monty is a suburb of Los
(29:33):
Angeles and a city undo itself,it's a it's a big community. You
know, I'm not I don't recallexactly, but there's I believe El Monte
itself must have maybe fifty or onehundred thousand people a population that live there.
It's a major hub in many waysof manufacturing and and you know,
commerce, and it's a it's abedroom community also, but it's also got
(29:56):
you know, quite a bit ofof other things going for it. So
that's a big city. So youknow, we're we're doing the best we
can under the circumstances to uh toyou know, try to try to narrow
down, you know, talking topeople. That's that's what cops do,
is communicating, try to see ifanybody heard anything or signing or you know.
(30:18):
Uh, it turned out one ofthe one of the better leads we
got relatively quickly was from a womanthat lived in a building unrelated to the
apartment complex where the murder happened,but she lived a couple of buildings south
and she was awakened by a burglarand uh, when he startled her sleeping
(30:41):
on the couch, he ran away. So we thought, gee, that's
pretty good, you know, whenthe guy got into her apartment through a
window, and we that could beour guy. You know, let's let's
work that burglary. And so westarted working that pretty hard, putting a
lot of effort into that. Wedidn't get any fingerprints, but in talking
to other witnesses, knocking on doorsand on so forth, we developed enough
(31:02):
evidence to focus on one guy.We did a search warrant at this one
guy's home. He lived in theneighborhood, and he was good for the
burglary, and he alibied out forour our murder, and we were able
to eliminate him as being the suspectin our murder. We ultimately charge him
with the burglary of this unrelated woman'splace. But you know, that's that's
(31:23):
essentially you know, it's what copsdo. I mean, you go where
the clue, wherever the evidence takesyou, and that's where that's where that
particular evidence took us. So itwasn't you know, again, I want
to be sure like Holmes here andyou know'll tell you what a great job
we did, but it was kindof just going through the numbers. You
know, started A and go toZ, and it's not It's pretty routine
(31:44):
in that respect. The work thatwe we meaning detectives or homicide detectives,
what we do is kind of,you know, not all that different than
piloting airplane and you go down achecklist. You don't truly have a checklist
like a pilot would, but youyou know, there are certain things you
do and the physical evidence that thecrime scene is one of the first things.
And the next thing is to lookfor you know, even back then
(32:06):
in two thousand and five, tolook for video evidence or evidence of suspicious
activity. And you get that byknocking on doors and talking to people.
So that's what we did. Thatwas a big part of the investigation,
was meeting people, talking to people. We looked at old police reports for
activity or calls to service there.And it's a big building, two hundred
(32:29):
and forty residents, so there areno people call the cops. Hey there's
a car block in my parking space. Hey there's a suspicious guy in the
laundery room. Hey my my workvan got broken into, my tools got
stolen. So you know, crimedoesn't crime doesn't stop necessarily, you know,
where a major crime occurs. II've got to not laugh about it.
(32:52):
It's actually tragic. But like whennine to eleven happened in the Twin
Towers went down, I mean,there were still there were thousands of automotive
accidents that took you know, thelives of thousands of Americans that day,
and thousands of people got arrested fordrunk driving, and sadly, hundreds of
people got murdered all across America unrelatedto nine to eleven. I mean,
you know, life keeps going ondespite tragedy, and this tragedy was no
(33:15):
different. You know, people keptyou know, looting and stealing and robbing
and pillaging and doing the bad crapthat people do. And and you know
it happened after this murder. Ithappened before this murder, and you know,
our job is to kind of identifythat and see if there's a correlation,
and so that that kind of tookus in that direction. That's kind
(33:36):
of where we went. What canyou tell us about Maria Bruno? She
was about thirty two years old.She was an immigrant to this country,
I believe from Central America, andI want to say from El Salvador.
She came in this country. Ibelieve was a young teenager. She got
married very young to a young manthat she had fallen in love with and
met or met and fall in lovewith, hopefully in that order. And
(33:59):
they'd been married about ten years.They had twins. The twins I think
were like like four years old,and then she had like a five year
old and a six year old.Her husband, Irving, was a middle
class, nice guy, bright guy, at a degree in psychology. I
believe they owned and operated a videorental store, which kind of dates this
(34:22):
murder, I guess, because wedon't have those kinds of stores anymore,
like a Blockbuster, but you know, a family owned thing. And it
was also a currency exchange where peoplecould go there and transfer money by wire,
you know, from this exchange totheir loved ones or to anybody they
wanted anywhere in the world. Sothat was how these people lived and supported
(34:45):
themselves. They lived in a verynice home and a very nice residential area.
Maria was somewhat I think both ofthem the marriage had kind of run
its course, and they had bothkind of just decided mutually that the marriage
was over and they were going totake a break and most likely get a
(35:05):
divorce. So they were. Itwas very civil between them. It wasn't,
you know, like a you know, screaming Peyton place kind of I
hate your guts, I never wantto see you again type deal at all.
And Maria actually moved out of thehome, was a little bit unusual,
and together they found her a nice, clean, secure apartment to move
into ultimately, which wasn't so secure. So that was her background. She
(35:30):
really didn't have a lot of relativeshere in this country. She had a
cousin I remember that was a malecousin that was in the United States Navy
in San Diego, and she hadsome other distant relatives I believe in uncle,
but she really didn't didn't have anybodyanybody else here other than the immediate
family, and so her husband,her husband's parents. You know, we
(35:51):
were those closest to her. Detective, What did Maria's friends and neighbors tell
you when you spoke to them?You know, I mean, the more
you know about the victim, themore you're going to potentially know about suspects.
So we did a you know,you know, a background as much
as we possibly could about Maria,and you know, she she seemed like
(36:13):
a really nice woman. She wasvery, very pretty. She was kind
of trying to break into modeling.She'd had some photos of her taken professionally
and had kind of hit that thatcircuit a little bit, but never found
a whole lot of success in it. She worked when her and her husband
decided to dissolve the marriage and separate, she got a job at a furniture
(36:37):
store there in Almonti and she workedin the credit department, very briefly.
She'd only been to work for avery short period of time before her death,
and prior to that, she'd workedwith her husband at the at the
video store. But she was,you know, like like no enemies,
and she didn't have you know,this kind of crazy life where she was
a high risk victim. She wasn'tat all, you know, you know,
(36:58):
somebody that that took chances. Youknow, just a mom with four
little kids, trying to do thebest she could raising little kids in a
hectic, you know, hectic lifethat we all live and everything, and
so there wasn't anything that stuck outthat she was a big risk taker.
She since her separation had dated alittle bit, she had gone out with
a few different men. We woundup meeting them. A couple of them
(37:20):
were One of them, at leastthat comes to mind, was a young
man that lived there in the apartmentbuilding, you know, and he was
he was totally co op and wewere able again to kind of eliminate him
as being a suspect pretty easily throughthe timeline that we had developed. And
then she had dated another guy alittle bit more seriously, who was a
(37:44):
restaurant manager in the city of Pasadena, and Pasadena is about about ten miles
from Almonte, and so he wasable to provide us with with some background
about Mariad what kind of girl shewas, and you know, what they
liked and you know, did togetherand they'd go out to movies and the
usual you know stuff that people dowhen you're getting to know each other and
dating each other and stuff. Heprovided us a story that turned out to
(38:08):
be very valuable later on, andbasically he said that when Maria had moved
into the building, she had hada very brief confrontation with another occupant in
the building, and the guy thathad confronted her had actually followed her into
her apartment. When her hands werefull, she was carrying a box from
(38:30):
the parking lot through the courtyard andinto her apartment, and when she turned
around after setting the box down,this this guy, this young man,
was standing there and he kind ofstartled her, and it pissed her off,
and she kind of yelled at theguy and told him, you know,
get the hell out of my apartment, and the guy did, and
it kind of creeped her out.And ultimately she learned that the guy actually
(38:53):
lived in her building and that helived across the way and across the way
or three words that she used indescribing where this guy lived. So she
told her her friend Brian, whois the manager of a restaurant that she
had kind of started dating. Shetold him that story. So that was
kind of it creeped her out,and she told that story to Brian and
(39:17):
then a couple of days later shewent out with Brian again and she told
him, you know, that creepyguy had told me about it across the
way. He's not what I thoughthe was. He's okay. Like she
wasn't in she wasn't not in harm'sway, but she wasn't as alert or
have that stranger danger Spidey sense thinggoing where this guy's at creep He bothers
(39:40):
me, I've got to be actuallycareful around him, that she kind of
had let her guard down around himin some manner based on her statement to
Brian, her buddy. So ultimatelywe wound up actually finding an actual eyewitness,
an older gentleman that lived in abuilding across the courtyard from Maria,
who saw the confrontation that she haddescribed to buy it, where the guy
(40:05):
had followed her into her apartment.He was in there for probably less than
ten or twenty seconds before he backedout when she, you know, did
the the aggressive thing of you know, who the hell are you and get
out of my freaking home. Sothat was that was, you know,
something that you know, quite oftenin murder investigations, the littlest things that
(40:27):
don't seem to have a great importanceturn out to be, you know,
amongst the most important things. Backto the evidence from the crime scene,
drops of blood from the medical bootywould find Maria Bruno's DNA as well as
another unidentified man. One thing wasfor sure, the DNA did not match
(40:52):
her husband, Irving, and italso didn't match anyone in the database.
So we have three women, TriciaBoccaccio, Ashley Elren and now Maria Bruno,
all brutally murdered with a knife,and all three living in close proximity
(41:14):
to Michael Gargiulo. None of themurders had evidence of the woman being sexually
assaulted, and no items or belongingswere taken by the killer. Garjulo,
who was living right across from Maria, was never interviewed by the police.
(41:34):
His girlfriend, Grace Quack, hadmoved out by that time. In two
thousand and six, Garzulo started workingfor Gus the Plumber, with a man
named Gustavo Bone. He started anew relationship with a woman named Anna Louise
Gonzalez. According to La Weekly,the two met at a showroom for plumbing
(41:55):
and bathroom remodeling. They would eventuallyget married and in two thousand and seven,
Gardulo moved into Gonzalez's apartment with hermother in Santa Monica, California.
In two thousand and eight, yetanother woman who lived close to Garzulo would
be brutally attacked by a knife,but this time the victim lived to tell
(42:21):
her story. In our next episode, we'll hear that story, the big
break police had been waiting for,and how it tied together the murders of
Tricia Boccaccio, Ashley Ellern, andMaria Bruno. I'm Kelly Hyman, and
this is once upon a crime inHollywood, the Hollywood Ripper.
Popular Podcasts
On Purpose with Jay Shetty
I’m Jay Shetty host of On Purpose the worlds #1 Mental Health podcast and I’m so grateful you found us. I started this podcast 5 years ago to invite you into conversations and workshops that are designed to help make you happier, healthier and more healed. I believe that when you (yes you) feel seen, heard and understood you’re able to deal with relationship struggles, work challenges and life’s ups and downs with more ease and grace. I interview experts, celebrities, thought leaders and athletes so that we can grow our mindset, build better habits and uncover a side of them we’ve never seen before. New episodes every Monday and Friday. Your support means the world to me and I don’t take it for granted — click the follow button and leave a review to help us spread the love with On Purpose. I can’t wait for you to listen to your first or 500th episode!
Stuff You Should Know
If you've ever wanted to know about champagne, satanism, the Stonewall Uprising, chaos theory, LSD, El Nino, true crime and Rosa Parks, then look no further. Josh and Chuck have you covered.
Dateline NBC
Current and classic episodes, featuring compelling true-crime mysteries, powerful documentaries and in-depth investigations. Follow now to get the latest episodes of Dateline NBC completely free, or subscribe to Dateline Premium for ad-free listening and exclusive bonus content: DatelinePremium.com