59: The Joseph Gatto Story - A Son's Journey into the Dark - Shades of Murder: A True Crime Podcast

Episode Transcript
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(00:04):
On November 13th, 2013, officersarrived at the residence of an
elderly man in the prestigious and hip Silver Lake neighborhood
of Los Angeles, CA. His home was ransacked and on
the surface it appeared to be a fatal home invasion.
Who was this innocent victim andwas it a stranger who committed

(00:25):
this crime? Or was it perhaps a monster the
victim knew who would stage the scene to look like a burglary.

(01:10):
Hello and welcome to Shades of Murder.
I am your host Alita Caldwell. In this podcast, I discuss cases
of murder from around the world and throughout history,
attempting to unravel the layersof darkness that help make
humans and to monsters. Please be forewarned that each

(01:30):
episode contains specific and attimes very graphic and
disturbing details of the case. This show is not intended for
all audiences and listener discretion is strongly advised.
In this episode, instead of analyzing the case through the
various lenses of criminology inthe justice system, as I

(01:51):
frequently do, I sit down with the victim's son, Mike Goddo.
Please listen to the episode in its entirety so you don't miss a
moment of this emotional and deeply personal interview.
Silver Lake, CA on the East Sideis one of the most expensive and
trendiest neighborhoods in all of Los Angeles, neighboring

(02:14):
Hollywood to the West and slightly north of downtown.
It's well known for its unique hit and very artistic appeal.
Several celebrities have called the area their home, including
actress Chris Pine and Ryan Gosling and the musician Beck.
The neighborhood is considered to be relatively safe and
certainly is in comparison to many other sections of Los
Angeles. It's crime rate is 35% lower

(02:36):
than the state average and 28% lower than the national average,
with more property crime than violent crimes occurring there.
It was on the night of November 12th, 2013, within this
beautiful and quiet community that her shocking murder would
take place, ripping away one with beloved older citizens.
When Mike got her received a call from his youngest sister on

(02:59):
the evening of November 13th, 2013, her words just didn't make
any sense to him. She said that she found her
father slumped over at his desk and he appeared to have a wound.
He told her to call emergency services right away.
At some point within the next few hours, he received
confirmation that his father wasdead and he was believed that he

(03:19):
had been murdered. It seemed impossible that he
could be gone. 78 year old Joseph Gatto was in many
respects larger than life. He was extremely healthy and
fit, especially for his age, andit was expected that he would
live several more decades. Joseph Gatto, the father of Mike
Gatto, one of the prominent and powerful figures in California

(03:40):
politics of the time, was legendary in his own right.
Born to a father who worked for the coal mines and later steel
mines in Pennsylvania during theGreat Depression, Joseph Gatto
had made it his mission in life that once he grew up, he and his
family would never be without. He was the first person in his
family to graduate from college and he earned multiple master's

(04:02):
degree. Joseph Gado was passionate about
higher education and the arts. He helped establish the Los
Angeles County High School for the Arts and was the founding
Dean and chairman of its visual arts department.
While growing up, Mike Gado didn't see his father very much
as he worked three jobs. Joseph Gado would work his nine
to five teaching art classes andwould briefly go home before

(04:23):
heading to Dodger Stadium every single night where he ran a food
stand. Then every Saturday he taught
classes at a College of design on Sunday.
That was his one day of rest andthe family respected that, so
they gave him his space and timeto breathe.
Not too long before his death, he was happily spending his
retirement days in the lively, youthful trend setting

(04:46):
neighborhood of Silver Lake where the family had grown up.
At last, Joseph Gatto had the time to breathe, relax and
pursue his own passion for the arts and create jewelry.
Since he had been staying at their Sacramento house at the
time of his father's murder, Mike and his wife Danielle
packed their bags and drove to Los Angeles the next morning
once he arrived at his father's Silver Lake residence.

(05:07):
My God, I was accompanied by local law enforcement to the
crime scene. This is by the way an extremely
abnormal procedure, not to mention beyond traumatizing for
a victims loved ones. Unfortunately, it was deemed a
horrible necessity to help locate any of his father's
electronic devices. Mike took in a deep breath and
walked inside the room where hisfather had been brutally

(05:29):
murdered. Several things stood out right
away as he entered the third floor where his father had been
killed. Inside his bedroom on the
counter top lay his large gold ring, an item of great value
that wasn't taken but was in plain sight.
Many electronics were still there, as well as art hanging on
the wall, some of which would have garnered a high price, and
yet his father's small wooden file cabinet had been pried

(05:51):
open. Even more compelling, on the
floor by his desk were handwritten notes indicating a
change of will. Mike had been previously aware
of his father discussing this inmonths past, but he hadn't given
it much thought until that exactmoment.
A neighbor initially spread speculation that he was killed
because of his valuable collection of icons.
Icons are a type of painting on wood with origins in Greek

(06:14):
Orthodox culture. They were first painted during
the Byzantine Empire and later in the Russian Empire, which had
given them the name frequently referred to as Russian icons.
The art depicts religious scenesof the Christian faith, commonly
a St. or the Virgin Mary, and they are often overlaid with
silver or gold. Genuine pieces that are several

(06:34):
centuries old are highly valuable.
Joseph Goddard had a rare and vast collection of icons, and he
was set to present his private pieces at an antiquity show only
days before he was killed. This neighbor believed he must
have been murdered by art thieves specifically sent by the
Russian mob who saw this advertisement for his lecture,

(06:55):
and yet not one of his precious icons had been stolen from his
home. In December 2013, the police
issued A bulletin to newspapers and made direct appeals to pawn
shops to keep a lookout for any jewelry brought in.
It was discovered that a few pieces of jewelry have been
taken from his home. Joseph Gotta was an incredible

(07:15):
jeweler known for his unique, globally inspired pieces,
predominantly crafted from silver and sometimes gold.
He incorporated elements of art into each piece.
They were not of exceptionally high value though, more in the
hundreds, not thousands. Joseph Goddard's pieces were
more valuable than anything because he signed each one of
them and they were beautiful andone-of-a-kind, but not one piece

(07:40):
of his jewelry had ever surfaced.
The only real suspect to emerge at this time was that of a young
car thief. The following sequence of events
were portrayed by the LAPD and the media as having happened.
A young man was reported to havebeen in the vicinity of Mr.
Gado's house, approximately 1/4 mile away, sometime after 6:00
PM on the night of his murder. The young man was described as

(08:01):
wearing clean but edgy clothes and spotted by two neighbors
trying to break into a car. He allegedly had a gun and was
behaving in a threatening manner.
The neighbors got into one of their vehicles and chased after
him as he ran down the staircasecarved out in the neighborhood,
which would only be known by someone who lived there or who
was very familiar with the area.He watched as a helicopter flew

(08:25):
overhead. He thought it was the LEPD,
although in fact it was a tourist helicopter taking
visitors to view the famous Hollywood sign.
At that exact moment, Joseph gota went back to his vehicle to
get his printer out of the trunkhe had just bought, which he
could only do if the garage doorwas open.

(08:46):
As he walked up the stairs with this heavy, awkward item, the
young man snuck into the garage to hide.
After about an hour had passed, the guy began to itch for a fix
and went inside the home. He confronted Joseph Gotto there
with the purpose of stealing from him and in the chaos shot
him, most likely by accident, ashe watched the elderly man

(09:08):
slouch over at his desk bleedingto death.
The drug addict ransacked the place, attempting unsuccessfully
to break into his safes with large garden shears and a fire
poker. But instead he opted to tear
into his files, grabbed a few pieces of jewellery, maybe some
cash but not the credit cards from his wallet, and ran off
into the night. Mind you, the thief would have

(09:30):
had to run past the 2 1/2 mile track that surrounded the lake
where literally thousands of joggers in Los Angeles run.
None of this fit, but the policedid their best to convince Mike
Gatto and the entire public at large to swallow this story as
the truth. There were unidentified prints
inside the house, but they didn't match those found on the

(09:51):
vehicle. The gun cartridge was also left
behind. As aforementioned, Joseph Gatto
was known for being very fit andstrong for a man of 78 years
old. It was identified years earlier
that his family's heritage in Italy how the Centurion gene,
which was evidenced by one of his aunts who lived until she

(10:12):
was 110 years old. The factor of this character and
physical strength is interestingin the scope of how such an
alert and healthy older man was attacked almost effortlessly in
his own home, not to mention howhis body was found in his
bedroom on the third level of the residence.
These elements are bizarre when you think of an intruder that is

(10:33):
a stranger being his assailant. It's not very logical to think
that a person seemingly snuck into a man's home without a
sound being made. Then he was caught in the act of
burglary and he shot Joseph Gatto in the stomach, who
slouched over on his desk and died slowly from the wound.
Under these circumstances, one would believe there were signs

(10:56):
of a struggle, even possibly defensive wounds that occurred
during the attack. From everything I have read,
Joseph Gatto was not someone whowould have been intimidated to
the point of not even attemptingto survive.
Then you add in the strange crime scene where it appears
someone was rummaging through files in search of something,
and yet art and jewelry and other items clearly of value

(11:19):
were not taken. There were endless questions.
My Gatto began to ponder. If there was a man breaking into
cars, why would he have a gun? That is not typical behavior for
a car thief. Because the penalty changes from
barely any time to serious jail time if armed.
Then there was the timing. That didn't make any sense.
Why would someone break into cars when people are arriving

(11:40):
home after work and even under desperate situations, why choose
to enter a house where there arethree cars?
It would have been dark by then,so there would have been
multiple lights on in the residence.
Not at all an ideal setting for a theft, drug addicted or not,
to sneak into a home to rob someone.

(12:01):
Everything also seemed to align the night of the murders.
That is, for the killer, any possible witnesses, AKA the
neighbors, were way at various places as they were expected to
be based on their usual schedules.
That seemed awfully convenient and highly suspicious, as if the
murderer knew exactly when the area would be most vacant.

(12:22):
In 2014, the Los Angeles City Council offered a $50,000 reward
for information leading to the killer's arrest, which is a
standard reward. There was definitely no
favoritism or any extra assistance being provided to the
important assemblyman and his family to solve this brutal
murder. During this time around 100

(12:42):
raids of the residences of individuals on probation, those
who had violated parole and known burglars in the area were
performed, but nothing came of them.
None of these people seemed to have any connection to the
crime. It was at the same time that it
was learned by Mike Goddard thatthe car thief, who allegedly had
been armed with a gun had only been witnessed by an 8 year old

(13:04):
boy. This made it much more likely
that the car thief was simply just that, a young man
attempting to rob vehicles in a well to do neighborhood, but not
a brutal, merciless killer of anelderly man.
In September 2014, my God had decided to talk directly to the
two people who saw the car thiefand chased him off.

(13:24):
The woman described the man as being of Eastern European
descent. Specifically, she described him
as being an Eastern European hitman.
He was casual in his demeanor and didn't appear at all rushed.
He didn't seem to be high or drugged out on anything.
The two times Mike spoke to her,she recalled him saying 2
distinctly different things eachtime.

(13:46):
She couldn't remember if he had said do you want to die tonight
or he said take another step andit's the end.
She also described him as dressing like a foreigner in a
very nice way, but that he didn't have an accent.
The woman also provided Mike with two slightly different time
frames as to when she saw him that night.
When she and the other neighbor drove off in their car to chase

(14:08):
the suspect, truck just so happened to block their way.
She believed it had been a decoy.
Then Mike spoke with the man whohelped out in the chase.
He described the man as being Armenian.
The suspect was also described by him as being calm, not in any
rush and he didn't appear to be high on any drugs and he never

(14:28):
shouted anything. There was also a woman who was
never identified who passed the suspect running down the stairs.
Despite Mike Goddess pleas, the woman never came forward.
The neighbor who helped chase the suspect, her eight-year old
son who also saw the suspect, said his description of the
thief didn't match the neighborsat all.

(14:49):
He told the police sketch artistthat he didn't see the man long
enough or well enough to providethem with the description.
And yet, the police decided to sketch what the neighbors saw
versus the neighbor's son. In November of that year, the
Gatto family held a press conference asking the public to
please come forward with any information regarding the
murder. No one ever did.
Familial DNA was also employed, but as of this recording, there

(15:13):
have been no hits in the database.
For those of you not clear aboutthis distinct kind of DNA, it is
based in California and looks for patterns of the Y chromosome
that are specific to males in order to find a match.
As an example, perhaps a cousin of the arbitrator is in the
database, but nothing ever surfaced.
In December 2014, the CaliforniaCourt of Appeals struck down

(15:36):
ADNA law that it existed for thepast 11 years.
This law mandated that anyone arrested for a serious felony
offense have their DNA taken andsubmitted into CODIS.
The challenge to this law was centered around its violation of
the search and seizure laws protected under the 4th
Amendment. This undoubtedly would severely
and adversely impact countless victims of murder and rape,

(16:00):
essentially eliminating hope that one day they received news
that a match was found. Such a drastic change in law
catapulted Mike Gatto in the arena of both victims rights and
the preservation of DNA testing.What may once have been an issue
of constitutional rights was nowsomething deeply personal and

(16:20):
profoundly impacting on his life.
This law has since been reinstated, but unless the
individual has been convicted ofa felony, there are existing
expungement laws that get rid ofthe DNA sample.
Two years passed since his father's murder and Mike, along
with his family and an extensivenumber of community members,
held a vigil in the Silver Lake neighborhood.

(16:41):
Holding candles, they walked thestraits singing one of his
father's favorite Catholic songs.
That fall, Mike Godda regularly spoke with one of the main
detectives on his father's case and learned some new things, one
which was particularly hopeful. Several sets of unknown prints
were collected from his father'shouse.
Most of them have been partial, but they were going to be
subjected to augmentation and advance reconstruction to

(17:04):
hopefully yield a match. But he was told that this meant
the person who murdered his father was not someone already
in the system, whether for an arrest, or someone who was
undocumented. Their prints had never been
found at another crime scene, nor was it someone who would
ever applied for a job with the government.
These were still hell bent on the theory that his killer was

(17:25):
the car thief and based on his familiarity of the surroundings
since he knew to take the carvedout staircase, it was likely a
neighborhood kid. The neighborhood was comprised
of $1,000,000 houses, so how many 20 somethings were living
amongst them? The police had constructed this
theory of how a young man in hisearly 20s who lived with his

(17:46):
grandmother at the time, completely lost it after
accidentally shooting and killing Joseph Garo.
After realizing her grandson wasinvolved, she then sent him away
to live with like an extended family member or something in
Alaska. When Mike Garo inquired as to if
they had looked into the census of the neighborhood to view

(18:06):
profiles that may narrow down a suspect within this theory of
theirs, they never did. When he asked if they had viewed
the high school yearbooks of theone school that existed in
Silver Lake to see who may fit the profile of the sketch, they
also rejected this idea. They insisted it would take far
too much time and wouldn't yieldany valid results.

(18:29):
In November of 2015, Mike Godda decided to pursue this idea on
his own. He was hesitant, even nervous,
to contact the principal regarding such a strange and
morbid request, but unlike the police, he was more than happy
to provide five years of yearbooks for Mike to scroll
through. Mike ended up taking notes on

(18:49):
who were the strongest possible candidates that the young man in
the sketch could fit, and even googled a few names to see if
they fit into a gangster or criminal type of mold.
The two eyewitnesses also gave their input for several weeks.
In addition to the many hats androles he wore, Mike Gado played
amateur sleuth and delivered a concise report on his findings

(19:13):
to the LAPD. Once again, they didn't invest
their time in gathering additional information.
It was highly unlikely that anyone even read, much less
followed up with his file. In February 2016, a local paper
called Los Feliz Leger reported that only a few hours before

(19:33):
Joseph Gatto was killed, Gatto'ssister Nicole and her boyfriend
got married. No family members have been in
attendance and no one had been aware of the event.
In mid 2016, 102 tips and leads had come in than nothing.
Mike Gada was informed how the back door was unlocked when his
father was discovered dead. This made sense that the

(19:55):
perpetrator had gone to the garden to grab garden shears in
an attempt to unsuccessfully pryopen the safe.
It was also learned that 30 different envelopes of jewelry
had been opened. Then in mid 2017, it was
reported that a young man was taken into custody for vehicle
burglary near his father's home.It wouldn't have been important

(20:19):
except for the fact that the man's photo strongly resembled
the sketch made of the auto thief.
Since he had only been charged with a misdemeanor, though, DNA
could not be collected. My God, I hoped that the police
would press him about any known auto theft ring or anything at
all. He had heard about the murder,

(20:41):
but once again the police were more caught up with not wanting
to do what someone else suggested.
Rather than ask the man questions that could have led to
answers or at least eliminate him as a potential suspect, the
police did at last admit that the sketch of the possible
murder suspect was not being given much credits.

(21:04):
No one was talking, no one had snitched, no one had re
offended. They were left with nothing,
similar to many other victims ofmissing and murdered loved ones
who get nowhere. With the police's help, Mike
Gatto decided to hire a private investigator.
Immediately, the climate began to change around the

(21:27):
investigation. It was then learned that the
police had not interviewed everyone in his neighborhood.
They had only focused on the immediate neighbors with an easy
access as it was revealed someone not directly across the
street heard something of significance.

(21:48):
It was discovered by the privateinvestigator that in the house
behind the residence directly across the street from his
father's home, was a woman who heard a loud sound like a
firecracker at 6:20 PM when his father would have returned from
Costco that night and prior to the neighbors interactions with

(22:08):
the auto thief. When it happened, the woman hit
her deck and crawled around for a few minutes thinking there
could be additional fire. Then she contacted one of her
neighbors and asked if their adolescent childhood set up a
firecracker or even fired a gun.All of this new information
seemed as if it should blow the investigation wide open into a

(22:29):
brand new direction. The police gave the excuse that
it didn't match up the known timeline as to when Joseph Gatto
was on his computer, but just because someone was online
doesn't mean it was the victim. Based on the evidence of what is
known, it seemed obvious that someone was trying to find

(22:50):
something amongst his father's belongings.
It wasn't likely a value in a traditional sense either,
because the perpetrator had dug through personal files and now
there was the possibility that someone else had been using his
father's computer. It would later be revealed by
the private investigator that the police had failed to check
off what many would consider to be obvious tactics and

(23:13):
strategies of a homicide investigation.
From I messages to who had copies of keys to his father's
house, to performing polygraphs on everyone from himself to the
key vendor. And so all of this information
was compiled and put together ina report and presented to the
LAPD. They suggested that Mike gotta
be the first to come in for a polygraph.

(23:37):
What followed can only be described as harassment, which
bordered on illegal behaviour bythe detectives.
He wasn't simply asked about hiswhereabouts or his relationship
with his father. Mike Gatto was yelled at,
berated and forced to sit there while these so-called
investigators skewered him for two hours.

(24:02):
He left disgusted and with little faith left in law
enforcement, yet unlike the LAPD, my God, I remained
respectful and tactful and neveronce did he badmouth the police
for their incompetent investigation, much less their
bullying behavior toward him. He also never once used his own

(24:27):
political power and influence tochange the direction of the
investigation. This conveys everything about
his character because most people, including myself, if
they had the resources and connections he had, would have
used them to affect the investigation.
A few months later, there was some semblance of justice when
the two detectives were removed from his case.

(24:49):
Finally, in 2019, after these incompetent detectives were
released from Mike Goto's father's case, he received 2 new
ones. Mike Goto received 2 new ones.
These homicide investigators were committed, compassionate,
and viewed the case through fresh and much broader vision.

(25:10):
They were finally doing what he had requested and hoped would be
done on his father's case years before the detectives actively
collaborated with him. A genetic genealogist who had
solved over 100 cases. And maybe most importantly,
we're looking at the crime from all angles.
The deputy District Attorney wasalso working on expanding DNA

(25:32):
testing. But then the investigation hit
yet another roadblock. Hope of finding a leak to the
perpetrator through DNA was not likely going to happen.
It was confirmed that the samplewas too fragmented and too small
to yield any voluble results. Then the great pandemic arrived
and pretty much shut down any advancements in the case for a

(25:55):
couple of years. In 2022, when Mike was finally
permitted to have face to face meetings with the detectives on
his case again, he learned of something very significant, a
fact that no one had ever revealed.
His father had gunshot residue on his hands and arms.

(26:16):
What does this indicate? Well, one of two things.
This means either indicates thatthe gun used in the homicide was
Joseph Gatos and his perpetratorstruggled with him successfully
getting possession of the weapon, or his father had fought
back. But this only led to more
possible theories and scenarios,none which neatly fit.

(26:39):
And this is where the investigation sits today.
Joseph Gato's case, to this day,remains unsolved.
It is one of over 100,000 cold cases in the United States, of
which only 1% are ever solved. However, thanks to major
evolutions in DNA and other areas of technology, cold cases

(27:03):
are being solved. The oldest case ever solved in
the United States was cold for over 50 years.
There are also breaks in cases from people confessing on their
deathbeds or others that just finally want to speak the truth.
The question remains, was JosephGoddard's death an unplanned

(27:24):
homicide that occurred during a home invasion, or was it
carefully staged by someone he knew to appear as one?
In lieu of a deep dive and analysis of very elements of
this case, I have a very specialguest with me today.

(27:45):
First of all, is it Mike Gatto or Gatto?
That's right. We we say Mike Gatto and I, as I
always said when I was in the legislature, as long as you're
not calling me a jerk, I'm OK with it.
OK, so it. Is Mike Gatto.
Mike Gatto, Joseph Gatto's son, is here to discuss the case and
how his father's murder has profoundly affected his life.

(28:06):
Welcome to Shades of Murder. Mike, I appreciate your reaching
out to me and wanting to be on my little show.
I was going to say you. Know I, we believe or I believe
that podcasts are the greatest form of democratized
entertainment and information. And in many cases they're doing
better work than the networks. And so for families of unsolved
murder victims, you know, we aredeeply into the true crime genre

(28:29):
and we know that the assistance that you provide in getting our
stories out is extremely valuable.
I appreciate. Hearing that so much, you know,
a lot of times true crime shows are perceived as only being
sensationalist. And with my show and as I you
have acknowledged, I really try to put a focus on the
educational elements, whether it's from a criminological point

(28:52):
of view or victim's point of view.
I try to enlighten in some smallway.
So that means a lot to hear. Thank you.
Of course, let. Me first extend my.
Sincerest condolences to you andyour family for the loss of your
father. For those listeners who may not
be familiar with you, you are a former California Assemblyman
who served the State of California between 2010 and

(29:14):
2016. In your own words, why were you
drawn into politics? I.
Was running into politics because I was tired of waking up
in the morning and reading the newspaper and saying, you know,
someone's got to do better. Someone's got to got to do
better than those folks in the capital.
And then at some point, I realized that maybe that someone

(29:36):
was me. You know, it's one thing to
criticize government from the outside, and then it's another
thing to give up your life and become part of government.
And at some point, I chose, I challenged myself to do the
latter. And I really liked having my
hands on the wheel. I really liked the feeling that
I could wake up any given day and make a difference in the
lives of 40 million Californians.
That's amazing. Will you make me proud to be a

(29:57):
natural Californian, so to speak?
Native Californian? Before your career in politics,
you practice law at Los Angeles,oldest and most distinguished
law firm. You also served as Congressional
Chief of staff and worked in theadministration under three
different mayors. Today, you're a managing partner
at business law firm Actium. I believe that's right.

(30:19):
So, Needless to say, you are impressive and a highly
accomplished individual. But today the focus is on your
father and your quest for truth and justice.
You wrote a book called Noir by Necessity, How My Father's
Unsolved Murder Took Me to Dark Places, which describes in raw,
captivating detail the many, many emotions, processes, and

(30:41):
experiences you have endured since finding out that your
father was killed. What inspired you to write this
about your experience losing your father more than a decade
after his death? Yeah, so.
It was, it was really two things.
The first one was that, as you noted, I am very fortunate to
have a platform. I have a big following on

(31:03):
Twitter now called X. I'm on TV, national TV 2-3 times
a week. And you know, I can, I can get
the attention of newspapers if Iwant.
But you know, in California, between 40 and 50% of murders go
unsolved. And most of the victims families
do not have a platform. Their stories go untold.

(31:26):
The families toil for justice insilence and nobody covers their
family's case. And I got to meet so many
families like that over the the time that my dad's case is
stretched that, you know, I justwanted to draw some attention to
the experience for people who we're not familiar with what
it's like, you know, and, and obviously, God forbid that

(31:48):
anybody out there ever goes through this, but I wanted to
give people just a little bit ofa window into what it's like for
all the murder victims and bringattention to their case.
And then the second thing is, you know, we live in a world
where a lot of these cases are being solved by, you know, sort
of amateur sleuths and, and people who are devotees to the
true crime genre. You know, I was hoping that, you

(32:11):
know, I could get the details out of my father's case again
and that maybe somebody would pick up the book and maybe
somebody would either really work hard to solve it or they
knew somebody or they knew something and they would step
forward. And while that hasn't happened
yet, you know, I still hope thatpeople will read the book.
And people in the Los Angeles area will, you know, keep their
ears to the ground and maybe this will jaw jog some memories

(32:34):
and maybe, you know, at some point someone will step forward.
Yeah. And you never know.
I. Mean cold cases are being solved
every day in so many different ways.
So there there is always hope. Yeah, other had go ahead.
No, I, I, I was. Just going to say we still have
hope now your father had. A very strong impact on many
people's lives. He was one of the founders of
the Los Angeles County School ofArts, a published author of

(32:55):
several textbooks, and a teacherto hundreds of students.
He will always be remembered forhis passion and encouragement of
the arts, but at the end of the day, he was your dad.
Can you share what he meant to you?
Yeah. So the thing to know about my
dad, I guess, first and foremostis that he was two things.

(33:15):
Number 1, he was a very hard worker when I was a kid.
He had three jobs. And he did that because, you
know, everybody sort of rebels against the previous generation.
And his father was a very hard worker, too, But his father
always struggled to put food on the table.
His dad was a was a coal miner and then a steel worker and, you

(33:36):
know, a general laborer. And, you know, the family grew
up very poor. So my dad was determined not to
do that for us. So he worked three jobs and just
just a tremendous hard worker. The second thing to know about
my dad is that, you know, he wasa Renaissance man.
He was the type of guy who could, you know, take apart an
engine and, you know, restore anold antiques chair and then

(34:03):
spend an hour, you know, pruninghis fruit trees.
Yeah. And then write a book.
I mean, you know, like, I'm not sure that they make guys like
that anymore. I mean, he, he knew so much.
His, his breadth of knowledge was so varied.
And. And I think that is a tremendous
value in a world like we live inright now.

(34:24):
Yeah, he sounds like he was sucha fascinating man and like you
said, really just kind of a Jackof all trades, so to speak.
He he had his hands kind of in everything and he could do
almost anything. Yeah, that is.
Absolutely right. Now, how did your father's
murder change the trajectory of your career?
Did it impact your priorities asa politician in any way?

(34:47):
Yeah, so. It changed my career a number of
ways. I mean, the, the first way was
that, you know, I think it derailed my political career for
a while there. And to some degree it still has,
you know, what this was like. You know, I mean, it it, it
obviously turned up and turned our lives upside down.
And I think for a while I was probably obsessed with the case,
you know, for the first six months after something like

(35:08):
that, you're not even really sleeping, you know, much less,
you know, working at full capacity.
Look, I still work my butt off to be the best legislator, the
best provider of constituent services, everything like that.
But but I recognize that, you know, this, this was something
that that's, you know, certainlyfilled a lot of my time.
And then the second thing is, you know, there's a part of me

(35:29):
that would like this case to be solved before I return to
politics. You know, it feels like just a
gaping hole or an open wound. It just feels like it's
unfinished business. And it would be very nice to, to
have some resolution there and have some closure before I
return to politics. I don't know if that's going to
happen. I mean, politics is a calling.
I might come back at some point sooner rather than later.

(35:51):
But, you know, it, it just the, you know, it's something like
this really. I, I guess the best way to
describe it is, of course, nobody ever plans for anything
like this. And it just makes your life go
down a path that you never expect.
Yeah, yeah. Exactly, just like as you
described in the novel. And it took you in so many
different directions, emotionally, psychologically,

(36:12):
everything. Now, if you're right with it, I
would like to return to the moment your sister called you
the night your father died. Now, when you first received the
phone call about your father, itwas your sister who said she
found him slouched over his deskand she couldn't tell exactly,
but she thought he might have a wound and he was cold to the
touch. Now you of course told her to

(36:33):
immediately call 911. We all know that people respond
in different ways to stressful situations, so this is not to
place any blame or suspicion upon her.
But it wasn't a typical response.
Or was it? Did you find that strange or was
that something that she would do, was kind of reach out to you
for advice? Yeah.

(36:54):
Hard to know, right? I'm, so I should, I should
stress, I have two sisters and there's the older one that,
that, you know, I, there's some detail in the book about, you
know, some of her, you know, biography, biography and things
like that. And then, then I have a younger
1 and it was the younger sister who discovered my dad's body and

(37:15):
called me the night of his murder.
I, I frankly don't know if she called someone else before.
It's totally possible that, you know, she, she called, you know,
somebody else, possibly the police.
I don't know. But but I think, you know, she
just freaked out. And I think that, you know, I, I

(37:35):
just remember when I, you know, I expressed disbelief because my
dad was in such good health. None of us credibly thought that
he would have just had a sudden heart attack or anything like
that because he was just in great health, right?
And so, so, you know, I just remember telling her, like, Are
you sure he's dead? And she's like, well, you know,
this body's cold, right? And and so I can kind of
understand why she wouldn't callan ambulance if that was, you

(37:58):
know, something that she could see and feel.
But you know, that that whole night was surreal.
I mean, it just the whole night was surreal because, you know,
we had so little information andit came in and bits and pieces
over the course of the evening. Yeah, it must have just.
Felt like, like you said, just so surreal, just kind of in a
dreamscape at that point. Now, as mentioned in the case,

(38:20):
the police walked you into an active crime scene, which I was
under the impression was completely against protocol for
multiple reasons. Not only is it unnecessarily
traumatic for a loved one, but it also jeopardizes evidence
through having no possible contamination.
Now you feel did did you feel pressured to go or did you want

(38:40):
to go? Oh, I.
Wanted to go so, so you know, the, the events unfolded this
way and I, I, I kind of, you know, the book is laid out at
where I'm learning things, wherethe audience learns things in
the order that I did so, but I'mgoing to, you know, kind of skip
around and give people the timeline.
So my father was killed on November 12, 2013, 11/12/13.

(39:01):
His body was discovered the nextday, November 13 of 2013.
And then I want to say N14, my family and I, my wife and our
then two daughters, we drove down from Sacramento.
We had gotten a call very late the night before.
There are no flights running. And then, you know, with two
young kids, we just decided to drive down.

(39:22):
And so we drove down on the 14th.
The police had already been at the crime scene for 36 hours by
the time we got there, and we showed up.
And so, you know, I think they had really processed everything
that they needed to, but they really wanted the family's help
at that point to try to, you know, kind of piece things
together. My father was a collector.

(39:44):
His house was very disorganized.And, you know, they just wanted
our input and, and things like that.
And I also was, you know, I really wanted to see what things
look like now. They had taken a lot of evidence
away, obviously. And so this, you know, again,
this was 36 hours later of roundthe Clockwork.
But the crime scene was, you know, it was still surreal to be
in my childhood home and it being a crime scene when it was.

(40:06):
Your childhood home? OK.
I wasn't sure about that. I wasn't sure if it was the home
you grew up in or if it was a a different residence he was
living in there. So based upon the scene that you
saw, did you initially believe that it was an unplanned
homicide that occurred during a home invasion or did it appear
to be staged as one we initially?

(40:29):
Had so many different leads and theories and they all they all
had major faults. So the first theory that was
circulated was that my dad was killed by the Russian mafia and
that was based on one neighbor who my dad had a collection.
Yeah, it, it was but. But I mean, you know, to in
fairness to to her, she, she hada basis for it.

(40:52):
So my dad had a collection of paintings called icons.
They are old paintings made on wood with like, gold leaf and
some paint. And they were made in Greece and
Russia and basically Eastern Orthodox lands.
Now, I should stress, these are not Van Gogh's.
These are not paintings that areworth $20 million.
They're worth maybe, you know, $5000, right?

(41:12):
But my dad had, you know, 20 of them, right?
And, but there had been an advertisement that had gone out
just a couple days before that said Joe Gatto is going to come
speak On this date, you know, it's like November 14th or
something. And he's going to bring some of
his collection of, you know, really rare Russian icons,
right? And so, you know, her theory

(41:33):
was, wow, the, you know, these paintings were in storage and my
dad probably went and got them and somebody was like possibly
tracking him and they knew he was going to speak and they
probably figured, well, the paintings are going to be with
him. And so, you know, let's go steal
on. Now.
We knew that that right when we went to the crime scene and
talked with the police, you know, and with our eyes, we knew

(41:54):
that that theory was not true because there were these
paintings were always at my dad's house.
They were hanging on the wall. Whoever killed my dad walked
right past several of them and they were not taken.
So we we quickly eliminated that.
Now, the next theory that we had, or that I had at least, was
that this was somehow political.You cannot be in public office
these days without breaking someeggs and making some enemies.
And, you know, I started to question, was some gosh, was

(42:16):
somebody trying to send me a message?
Was somebody trying to do something to threaten me or, or
was somebody pissed at my dad for some reason because of me?
And, you know, I mentioned that to the police and I mentioned
some of the groups that had beendoing some very weird things and
protesting me and everything like that.
And the police just laughed and they said, you look, you know,
you're, you're a very public guy.

(42:36):
You know, you give 7 speeches a day.
Your Sacramento house is listed,your Los Angeles residence is
close by and everybody knows where it is.
If they wanted to to mess with you, they would have killed you,
Mike. And that was hard to hear.
But but, you know, I couldn't argue with that logic.
And then came the theory that, you know, dominated the media

(42:57):
for about 6 years. And that was the theory of the
random Carver. Yeah.
And I I definitely. Would like to go into that, but
we are all familiar with the concept of tunnel vision in
which law enforcement focuses onone suspect and they use the
evidence they have to fit the narrative.
So considering the police seem to be sold on this theory of
this home invasion facilitated by the car thief in the

(43:19):
neighborhood that night, they didn't seem to take other
possible suspects very seriously.
Now I wanted to address, go, go ahead.
No, no, go ahead. Go ahead.
I was going to say I. Wanted to address some
interesting statistics on elderly victims of homicide and
home invasion because I found them to be quite interesting and
relevant to your father's case if you'd like to hear them.

(43:40):
Yeah, absolutely. So.
Victims of homicide who are 64 years and older are extremely
rare. On average, they comprise only
5.5% of all homicide victims. Now there are approximately 2 to
3,000,000 households every year that are broken into and the
majority of these crimes as you would expect happen when the

(44:01):
house is unoccupied. Violent events are reported to
have taken place in somewhere between 6:00 to 7% of home
invasions with simple assault and aggravated assault being the
most common type of offense. OK, so the data nevertheless
shows that it is extremely rare it homicide occurs in

(44:21):
approximately .0004% of home burglaries, so way, way under
half a percent. But when it does happen, the
elderly and the disabled are more prone to be victims.
In general, elderly victims of homicide are more likely to be
killed inside their home over any other victim demographic.

(44:43):
Of course, this makes sense because most of them are
housebound or vulnerable in someway.
Now, do you think this type of crime data may have influenced
law enforcement's perception of who the likely perpetrator was
and in turn contributed to this tunnel vision?
Well, I was contacted. By another stat guy at some
point, and I, I forget if I mentioned this in the book or

(45:05):
not, but you know, so he reviewed the, the stats like you
gave, which is, you know, it's very rare that home invasions
happen when someone's home, veryrare that the burglar kills
somebody. But the statistic that he told
me that that was different, rather than looking at it from
the perspective of home invasions or burglaries, he said
when an elderly person is murdered, the killer is somebody

(45:29):
the elderly person knew, 95%. Oh yeah, I have that.
I have those statistics on the different part, yeah.
And. And so that to me was chilling
because, you know, we, we started a minute ago to talk
about the, the dominant theory and the tunnel vision and, and
is one of the police officers said, you know, well, when
there's a horse running through the neighborhood, I don't go

(45:51):
looking for no Unicorn. And it's like, OK, well, great,
but we should talk about this theory that that came out next.
So there was a woman in the neighborhood coming home from
karate with her son right around6:00 on the 12th of November.
And she drove on her St. and shefound a young man who was

(46:16):
breaking into a car and kind of weird, right?
I mean, it's the time that everyone's at home at dinner,
coming home from school, coming home from work.
Very weird to have a guy breaking in the car.
Yeah. And so she said like, hey, hey,
what are you doing? And then she, like, called for a
male neighbor and he came out too.

(46:38):
And they kind of confronted thisguy and.
And, you know, he ran away now, allegedly when he ran away, he
said something like follow me and die or something like that.
Or, you know, do you want to dietonight?
Like just then keep messing withme.
But they did chase him. They, they, they did chase him.
He ran down a walk St. It's a little, you know,

(46:58):
pedestrian only St. that, that is in the Silver Lake
neighborhood where my dad lived.And they drove around sort of
like a hairpin to confront him at the bottom of the walk St.
And at that moment, her son, who's very young, I forget if he
was 6 or 7 or 8, but he told thepolice later that he saw the guy
brandish a gun. Could they make out his face?
Not really. They put out a sketch, but the

(47:19):
sketch could look like literallyanybody, any young man, right?
It's not a great sketch. Then, you know, my dad was
killed roughly an hour and a half later.
They think, you know, the this quickly became the dominant
theory. The mother put a put a sent an
e-mail to some friends and it got forward to the media and
everybody started focusing on this.

(47:40):
Now I'll tell you like, what would have had to happen for
this theory to come into play. So first of all, the the police,
you know, I said, well, give me a profile of this guy.
Give me a profile. They said, OK, well, you know,
he's a young guy high on drugs looking at his fix.
So he's breaking into cars. And I'm immediately thinking
with a gun, like if you have a gun, there's, there's a million

(48:02):
places you can go to in Los Angeles, including some of just
a couple blocks away where, you know, they're quiet and people
are walking with handbags and wallets.
And you can just, you know, say,stick them up and you can get
your fix very fast. Yeah, secondly, breaking into a
car with a gun turns, you know, a misdemeanor slap on the wrist,
a day in jail to to. A felony, yeah.
So it's kind of weird. Thirdly, the, and I'm jumping

(48:24):
ahead a little bit, but when I interviewed the people who, you
know, the neighbors who saw thisguy, they said he was dressed
very nicely. He did not appear to be on
drugs. And they said he looked like an
Eastern European hitman. That's what they said.
And but anyway, to continue withthe theory that when the cops, I
said give me a profile, they said, well, you know, he's

(48:44):
fleeing down these people. You know, right-handed people
tend to turn right. So let's assume he's
right-handed. Then he ran towards your dad's
street and he assumed that it was an alley.
My dad's street was very small. He goes down your dad's street
thinking he can get some shelterfrom the people chasing him.
And right at that moment, there was a tour helicopter dispatched
to go to the Hollywood sign. My dad lived fairly close to the

(49:04):
Hollywood sign, and he thought it was a police helicopter.
So he said, my gosh, I got to get inside somewhere.
And right at that exact moment, your dad had bought a printer at
Costco. That night when, you know, we
saw him on security video, we found the receipts.
So, you know, he came down to get the printer.
And, you know, to your dad's badluck, he could not get the

(49:25):
printer out from the side of his, you know, from his car,
from the side, from the doors. He had to get it out from the
hatchback in the back. So he had to open the garage
door again. And right at that moment, you
know, as your dad's walking the printer in, this guy happened to
be right there by your dad's garage door.
And without your dad noticing, he ducked in the garage.

(49:46):
That explains why there's no forced entry, no signs of forced
entry at your dad's home. And then your dad went upstairs
and set up the printer. This is the police again telling
me the stuff. And we know that, you know, we
know he's trying to set up the printer 'cause it was on the
floor. And you know, we think he was on
his website tweaking a few things 'cause there's activity
at 7:37 PM. And while this is happening, the

(50:07):
young man is sitting in his garage and he doesn't take
anything. He doesn't, he doesn't take any
of the tools, the valuable tools.
He doesn't take anything from your dad's cars.
As a matter of fact, he sits in an occupied garage where he
knows somebody is and there are three cars present.
And he doesn't know if your dad lives with the Ukrainian

(50:27):
wrestling team. He doesn't know if your dad is
in a multi generational household.
He just sits in the garage and at roughly 740 he walks upstairs
and kills your dad. And I'm thinking like this makes
no sense. Like oh and by the way.
And and for this theory to work,this young man would have had to
shoot my dad and sit there and watch him die and then ransack

(50:48):
his room. Yeah, ransack his.
Room and and you know just all these things right.
It just never sat well with me because, you know, you fire a
gun in an occupied dwelling and your adrenaline's already at
because, you know, people saw you with a gun and they were
chasing you. You don't stick around.
I mean, you just don't the the perspective of someone like
that. You know, gunfire is loud and

(51:10):
you know you, you. I think most people assume that
everybody heard it and the cops are on the way.
I just, you know, it, it just never stuck well with me.
And then to sit there and watch my dad die and and then, like,
rummage through the room and it just didn't make sense.
Yeah, It didn't make. Sense to me at all, either by
everything you discussed in the book, it appeared to me as if
the perpetrator was looking for something specific.

(51:32):
They ignored all kinds of items in the house that would have
held great financial return for them, like as you mentioned, the
icons and they focus their attention on Prime through a lot
of his personal files. Yeah, that.
That part was also kind of difficult because, you know,
the, the, the, the crime scene again, like, you know, and I've

(51:54):
had this conversation with the police so many times.
It's either it doesn't make sense for a million reasons
because, you know, again, this was a junkie high on drugs, or
it was something vastly more complicated and it was staged or
it was something more right? Because you really, there's,
there's no middle ground. Whoever killed my dad didn't
take a variety of electronics, you know, things like iPads and

(52:17):
things like that, that you couldsell pretty quickly.
I remember seeing like some of my dad's personal jewelry, like,
you know, there in the room and I just walked by it and, you
know, didn't take it. At the same time, there was a
file cabinet that was broken into, a wooden file cabinet that
was broken into, which was kind of strange.

(52:37):
And then the the burglar made a big show of trying or tried to
get into my dad's safes. And that part was very strange
because whoever did this tried to get into safes with a pair of
garden chairs. And again, you know, like these
were like those Old West Wells Fargo safes that are about half
the size of a human and half walls, you know, 6 inches thick.

(52:59):
You don't need to be a brain surgeon to realize you're not
going to get into him with a glorified pair of scissors,
Right. And so it either struck me like,
Gee, this person was putting on a show, or this person was
really stupid. And again, that's there's a lot
of themes like that in my dad's case.
Yeah, just like you said. Just none of the evidence added
up. Now I did want to return to what

(53:19):
you mentioned about how most homicide victims know they're
offenders now, and this is not just true for older victims.
Based on 2023 data provided by the Bureau of Justice
Statistics, the most common victim offender relationship is
someone known to the victim but outside the family.

(53:41):
And this is across all age groups that 39% of homicides are
committed by someone known to the victim, such as a friend, Co
worker or acquaintance. And specifically for victims who
were 65 years or older, 32% werekilled by a category of what is
known as other family member. So do you believe that his

(54:03):
murder was personal and that whoever committed it or who was
behind its Commission was tryingto maybe locate something that
night as you mentioned? Yeah, it's a great.
Question. I mean, the, you know, I go into
in the book and there, there were definitely some newspapers
who explored this theory very closely because, you know, I

(54:25):
mean, my dad had been updating his estate plan before he got
killed and he was changing some things pretty vastly.
And so, you know, newspapers gotwind of that from public
documents and they reported on that.
You know, the police have also said, we know, is it possible
this could have been, you know, an old guy like your dad who got

(54:47):
into some dispute and maybe had dementia or something and, you
know, and the dispute turned violent and they they raised
that specter as well. It's just so hard to know,
right? I mean, it's just, again, you
know, if you have a very uneducated criminal who's high
on drugs and doesn't recognize what true valuables are, walks
past the valuable paintings and says, oh, these are too hard to

(55:08):
fence, OK, then, you know, I guess that makes sense.
Or, you know, you have somethingthat was very targeted where
somebody was, you know, appearedto be looking for something and,
you know, maybe maybe or maybe not found it or, or what have
you. I mean, it, it just, it's one of
the many, many things in my dad's case that doesn't make
sense. Yeah.
It it really. Doesn't.
And OK, so in your book, you discuss the the waning interest

(55:30):
and coverage of your father's case in the media over the
years, noting the high number ofhomicides that, you know, in
addition to other news and things that are going on,
especially in Hollywood that hold people's attention.
Now, I have observed that cases involving the elderly are not
frequently covered in true crime, whether the person is the

(55:51):
victim or the offender. Now, I personally have done
several cases, but I find it oddand a bit disturbing that
there's a lack of interest there.
There seems to be almost a disconnection, which is weird
because everyone has a parent ora grandparent or even an older
neighbor that they enjoy talkingto every day.

(56:11):
So it seems to me like, to some extent, society thinks like,
well, they at least had a very long, fulfilling life.
But in many respects, it seems more horrible to be killed at
the end of your life when you are the most vulnerable.
Do you think his being an older victim impacted the coverage and
interest in this case at all? Yeah.
You know I mean. It's interesting because, you

(56:33):
know, if you look at the murdersthat have captured people's
attention over the years, it is often someone young and
glamorous, right? Nicole Brown Simpson, the Black
Dahlia, you know, these are these are the murders that have
made their way into Los Angeles lore.
You know, even some of the Manson Family victims, of
course, were young and beautifuland the Manson killers were
young and beautiful in many cases.

(56:54):
And so, yeah, there there's of course there's a, you know, just
like, just like the media, you know, prefers to cover, you
know, the exploits of younger stars and starlets, then older
ones. Then I definitely think there is
something to that. You know, but I, I also like to
think that in this case, people know that my dad was, you know,

(57:14):
he was a good guy. He was a pillar of the
community. And he was somebody that, as you
said, you know, it just when you, whenever you take
somebody's life like that and, and whenever you know, it's,
it's that sudden, it's just so hard on the family, right?
Because I think, you know, if you talk with the average
elderly person, they would say, you know, I know that my time is

(57:36):
going to come at some point. And I, gosh, God, God forbid
I'll get cancer at some point, but that'll give me, you know, a
two or three-year period to say my goodbyes and get my affairs
in order and tell my kids everything I always wanted to
tell them. And, you know, if you talk to an
adult child, they would say, look, I know my, my parents are
going to go at some point, but Ihave a list of things I want to
ask them. And I'm going to make sure that

(57:57):
they get to spend time with their grandchildren and all all
that stuff, right. And anytime you kill anybody,
all right, you robbed them of, of experiences in life.
And I, I am just very sad that my kids got robbed of a doting
grandparent. You know, my dad was a terrific

(58:18):
grandparent. He was probably a better
grandfather than a father in many ways, 'cause I mean, you
know, he wasn't working right. So yeah, I was gonna say,
'cause. He had the time and energy, so
he just was, you know, so doting.
And stuff and so it just yeah, it it's something that I.
I'm very sad about. To this day.
I am so so sorry for that. I, I, I got emotional myself

(58:39):
reading your book several times.I, I really felt I felt your
loss. Thank you.
Now. In your book, you describe the,
you know, the lack of answers inthis case sets off this domino
effect of psychological and emotional effects on you.
You know, trauma and loss effects all in unique ways.

(59:01):
But just as you're saying, when you lose your loved 1 to a
homicide or really any son death, but especially something
that remains unanswered, how do you deal with that kind of
tragedy in your day-to-day existence?
I mean, how that effects your personal interactions with
others, Well, you know, so. It's tough, right?
I mean, you know, there's a period of grieving and I, I

(59:24):
never wanted to, you know, be somebody who's perpetually
grieving, even though obviously anytime you lose somebody too
early, it's a big hole. And I also tried to to, like I
said, you know, think about all the other people out there
who've gone through something like this and try to understand
how they got through it and try to help them.
You know, that being said, therewere a few things about my dad's

(59:45):
case that I think, you know, we're a little bit unique.
The police were their theory. You know, when I asked them for
the profile, they thought that the young man was somebody who
lived in the neighborhood. And they based that on the fact
that he knew where this there's this really tiny walk St. that
he fled down that kind of looks like someone's own house
staircase. Yeah, actually I looked.
That up, yeah. And so their theory was like,

(01:00:06):
well, he, he knew these little obscure paths in neighborhood.
He probably was from the neighborhood.
Now, mind you, my Los Angeles home was not far away from that.
And so, you know, this thought that the person who killed my
dad could be walking among us. Well, I mean, you know, person
still not caught. So in theory could be walking
somewhere, somewhere on in the United States among us.

(01:00:26):
But but the thought that this person could be in the
neighborhood to, you know, that would just was kind of chilling
to me. Like, you know, I I could be
going to the grocery store with my kids and, you know, that my
dad's killer could be anybody there, Right.
And that that to me was just surreal.
And, you know, it's Los Angeles is a very big city.

(01:00:48):
And, you know, it's entirely possible that whoever did this
is long gone. But that thought was very odd
and very hard to process for a long time.
Yeah, again, I just. Things just don't add up.
Now. You speak openly in the book
about the very hostile and dismissive treatment that you
received by the LAPD. They often treated you and your

(01:01:09):
invested interest in your father's murder like it was a
burden to them. And this is a prime example of
how you know many people in society, in particular loved
ones of victims, they feel disregarded and neglected by law
enforcement. Now, many people probably assume
that given your status in the California government,

(01:01:29):
especially at the time, you may have been given high priority or
even special treatment, but you were given anything but.
It almost felt as if they were resentful towards you for being
more successful and influential than they are.
Did it feel as if the detectiveswere projecting their own
feelings towards you and possibly your politics?

(01:01:51):
Yeah, in a, in a, in, in, in oneword, yes.
Thank you for asking this. So I, I, I want to stress, and
I'll start by saying that I knowthat the LAPD is like any other
big organization. It's like the Army, it's like
the federal government, whateveryou want to say, whether there's
some very, very, very good people and then there's some bad

(01:02:14):
apples and there's people who are very, very, very hard
working. And then there's some people who
are, you know, kind of just dialing it in and waiting to
retire. I know that that the team on my
dad's case right now is terrific.
And I know that the team that was assigned for the first day
was terrific because when I talked with him, you know, I, I
could see the exhaust in their eyes and I could see how they've

(01:02:34):
been up for like 24 hours working on the case and
gathering every piece of evidence, everything like that.
But you know, as I went into thebook, you know, the the team
that got assigned, the detectives you got assigned to
my dad's case from like, you know, the the few days after
through, you know, many years for whatever reason, just, you
know, did not give me a very, very good experience.

(01:02:56):
And you know, I based on a couple things.
First of all, you know, after I toured the crime scene and I
have been up for like, you know,long time myself, I'd driven
down from Sacramento you. Know the grief.
In my nuclear family, you know, and, and non-stop media
attention and just being mobbed.When I got there, I can only

(01:03:18):
imagine they sat me down and gave me a political lecture and
it was like, well, this is number one, I'm I should, I'm
not your target audience. Like I've been very, very, I
would say informed voter when entering the legislature on
criminal justice. So like, you know, give it to
give this lecture to someone else.

(01:03:38):
Secondly, like this is not the time.
It's just not the time. And I thought that was very
inappropriate. And that was like strike one.
And then strike two was, I mean,maybe a week later, you know,
they got my dad's call logs and they were like, God, you know,
he called a lot his, you know, they didn't know this, but I

(01:03:59):
mean, they called a lot his first cousin who's this elderly
lady who has a fairly unique Italian last name.
They're like, well, you know, she called, they called this
lady a lot like, who's that? I'm like, oh, it's his first
cousin. And, you know, she's 80
something years old. She's now 97.
And and then one of the, one of the detectors piped up, well,
that's a really unique last name.
Like, like, are you related to blah, blah, blah with that last

(01:04:20):
name? And I said, yeah, that's, that's
my second cousin, my dad's second cousin once removed.
And the guy's like, oh, he's just such a went on an expletive
riddled tirade. I can't repeat this in a podcast
what he said. And I'm thinking like, OK, well,
like, I'm like, well, how do youknow him?
He's like, oh, we went to high school together.
How many years ago? It's like, you know, 3540 years

(01:04:42):
ago. And he's on this rant about
something my cousin did at age 16.
And I'm thinking like my cousin's 50 something now.
Like, I mean, you know, like it was so strange to to do like
that was just the most bizarre thing in the world.
Like, and remember, this is my second cousin.
It's not me. It's not, it's not my brother.
I mean, you know, it's just thatwas strike two and then so

(01:05:06):
juvenile. Yeah.
And then? And then the, the, the third
strike or whatever is, was just the way they handled the case.
And I just don't think they understood how things would go
down because, look, I would go to, like, a groundbreaking.
Let's say I went to a groundbreaking of, you know, a
new playground by the LA River. And I would give a speech.

(01:05:27):
It's my district. I would give a speech, and I
would be seated where the peoplegiving the speeches were.
And right next to me would be the mayor of Los Angeles.
And the mayor of Los Angeles, ofcourse, is their boss's boss's
boss's boss, right? It goes detective, chief of
detectives, police chief, mayor,right?
And he would say to me, Mike, I mean, he was a friend of mine.
And he'd say to me, Mike, how's the investigation going?

(01:05:47):
And I would say, good. You know, there's no lead yet.
We're exploring this. I don't think this theory makes
sense. And we're doing this.
And of course, then, you know, he would call the chief, who
would call the chief of detectives, who would call their
supervisor, who would tell them,hey, blah, blah, blah.
And I think they took it as likeme criticizing them.
I think they took it as like me going above their head.
But truly, it wasn't like, like,you know, I don't know what they

(01:06:09):
expected me to do when you're sitting there waiting for
speeches when the mayor says, how's your dad's case going?
Should I have lied? Should I have said, well, it's
salt? It's not Should I have said
everything's going great? It's not.
I didn't criticize them by name.I didn't say anything.
I didn't call them out. I didn't seek the mayor his
attention, but, you know, I mean, he was asking for an
update on my dad's case. And I'm not going to lie to the
mayor of the city of Los Angeles.
So it it just like, and they would get so upset with me,

(01:06:33):
like, oh, you talk to the mayor again.
It was like, well, yeah, he's a friend of mine.
I've known him for 20 years, youknow, and he asked about my
dad's case. What do you want me to say?
You know, so it, it just things like that were very, very hard
and, you know, And so. Yeah.
And then look, you know, I talk about this in the book.
They later got some of them got fired, one of them in Partur got

(01:06:54):
fired. And I learned that there was a
lot of other accusations of malfeasance and other cases.
And and so it just there's usually a pattern.
Yeah, exactly. Now and you.
Did mention in the book that thepolice, they pretty much
neglected to thoroughly interview anyone within your
father's inner circle, includingfamily members, friends,
acquaintances. And that should be typical

(01:07:16):
protocol for an investigation, especially for a homicide.
And when you bring up these facts to the homicide
investigators on your case, theyend up turning their negative
attention towards you instead. And they asked you to come in
for a polygraph, which you of course happily obliged,
believing that hopefully it would be the start of a new
direction, but instead they justbrought you in.

(01:07:39):
If you feel comfortable in doingso, can you please share with
the audience what these socalledlaw enforcement officers put you
through? Yeah, that was probably the most
surreal experience of the case and one of the most surreal
experiences of my life. So I bet the context was that I
got a little bit upset because Ihired a private investigator and

(01:07:59):
the private investigator did thegumshoe shoe leather work.
That is vanishing from modern policing, right?
Modern policing suffers from something called CSI effect and
that's where both the public, right, the public and the
detectives expect there to be like some technological thing
like, oh, there was DNA or like the suspect cell phone picking

(01:08:19):
the satellites and we've pinned their location and, you know,
and everything's tied up in a bow in an hour due to
technology. CSI effect, right.
And so I was kind of like, well,wow, they, you know, they, they
doesn't seem like they've interviewed lots of people in my
dad's orbit, even neighbors. So I hired a private detective
and he went around the neighborhood and like knocked on

(01:08:41):
doors and we found that there was a woman who lived.
She lived maybe 100 feet from mydad, maybe 50 feet from my dad.
It was like his cross the streets neighbor, neighbor, if
that makes sense. And you know, she was, she told
the private detective adamantly that she had heard a gunshot
during a time that just did not fit with the timeline.
And I called her, you know, after he gave me the interview

(01:09:02):
notes and I called her myself. And I was like, I was skeptical.
How do you how do you how Are you sure that this happened at
this time? And she's like, well, I took my
son to a class in Sherman Oaks every night at precisely this
time. It took precisely 25 minutes to
get there in traffic. And we left at precisely this
time. And so I know for a fact that it
happened at this. And I was like, wow, OK, I'm

(01:09:23):
very impressed. Then I was like, well, how do
you know it was a gunshot? And she's like, Mr. Gatto, I
docked and covered and I refusedto get up off the floor of my
house. And I was dressed in nice
clothes and like, and so I was thinking like, yeah, you know,
like, OK, like, you know, you don't like, jump on the floor of
your house if you're wearing nice clothes, if you think it's

(01:09:44):
a backfire, right? So that to me, like, threw a
whole loop in the timeline. And that would blow all sorts.
You know, it would blow the the car burglar theory out of the
water. And so I was, I was angry.
I was really angry that the police hadn't talked to this
woman. And so I sent them an e-mail.
I was like, why haven't you interviewed everybody?
Why haven't you polygraphed the people in a circle?

(01:10:04):
You know, why haven't you done all these things?
And they wrote back and they're like, you know, basically like,
oh, all right, like, you want polygraphs, Why don't you start?
And I was like, sure, no problem, you know, no problem.
Like, as long as this leads to you doing this with everybody
else. I volunteer.
Where do you want me to show up?So, you know, I, I showed up to
the place where they administer them and you know, like, you

(01:10:26):
know, it's all voluntary, right?You can come or go as you want.
You can stay, you can leave. I think there's a part of me
that was just curious, like, what is this like, you know,
and, and what are they going to do?
But I mean, they basically yelled at me for like an hour
and a half, two hours. And they came at me with some
really crazy theories, which I believe is, you know, that's how
they test polygraphs, right? Is like, you know, they, they

(01:10:46):
said, they said, well, you know,is it possible that this was one
of your friends who came to yourdad for a campaign contribution?
And, and you know, your dad didn't give one.
And, and, and I'm thinking like,wow, like I have $2,000,000 in
my campaign bank account. I guarantee none of my friends
would have gone to my dad for a campaign contribution and and to

(01:11:07):
shake him down. Yeah, like I.
It, it, it, it was like it, it was so absurd.
It was really a surreal experience.
But but you know what, it wasn'ttoo long after that that the
detectives are reassigned. And I think it's because the
word got out in the department and somebody said you did what
this guy asked you some questions about, like, have you

(01:11:27):
talked with a neighbor who hearda gunshot and you polygraphed
him? Like I, I think they, you know,
I think there was a shake up in the department because of the
way they can port themselves. And I think that was strike 5.
And and I'm very, very grateful to have a new team on the case.
Yeah, I I did want to. Mention it was, It was funny
because literally the night before I finished reading your

(01:11:48):
book and was reading about this in particular, the woman that
heard the gunshot, I was literally thinking to myself
now, if his father had been shot, someone in the
neighborhood must have heard thegun.
And then it was like, well, there you go.
Yeah, it's just absolutely despicable the way that they
treated you, and I'm so glad that someone finally

(01:12:10):
acknowledged that their behaviorwas completely unacceptable.
Yeah, Thank you. No, I was.
Curious, were you ever assigned A victim advocate at any point
by the department or were the LAPD not involved in doing
anything like that at the time? No, you know, it's, it's
interesting because there, therereally is this, there's a whole

(01:12:31):
group of support that's baked inour system where, you know,
there are grief counselors who can come on the site and they
can help you with the grief. There are victims advocates.
There are, we have a thing in California called Marcy's Law,
which is ability of victims to make statements at various times
in the case. And none of it feels like none

(01:12:52):
of that really ever happened. I mean, there's, there's also
this tiny pot of money like to help victims with funeral
expenses. I do think they sent us like a
check for like 2000 bucks, whichwas, which was kind of kind of
interesting, but none of the other stuff happened.
But I also think, you know, theyknew that that my family was,
you know, like, I mean, that we have resources available to us.

(01:13:14):
And so I'm OK with those going to other people, I guess is how
I would put it, of course. But.
From a just a a support point ofview, that's really terrible
that they didn't have a victim advocate assigned to you and
your family. Yeah.
Now. If you were still an assemblyman
in California, what kind of legislation would you author or
promote it help change the way victims and their loved ones are

(01:13:36):
treated? Great question.
So I have a long list of things that that I would do.
And it's interesting because when I was still in office,
there was a proposed change in the DNA laws.
And I won't get into the great detail, but I ran legislation to
try to preserve the DNA laws because, you know, I think
that's could be critical in solving my dad's case.

(01:13:59):
And that was a emotional roller coaster and I really crazy
experience. We also had, you know, it look,
they, they say it, they say thatyou should never let your
personal experiences cloud your political or your governmental
judgement. And I tried to I tried to follow
that, but it's also hard not to notice what could be done better
when you know you're you're yourself with a family member

(01:14:20):
was, was a was a crime victim. I think generally speaking, the
law does not do a good job with some very, very giant issues.
I don't think our prison system has a good way of truly
discerning whether somebody is rehabilitated.
And for those people who, you know, made a mistake as a kid

(01:14:41):
and, you know, they're, they're serving big, big, big sentence
for, for something that they, you know, have grown out of and
they, they've, they've repented and they've changed.
You know, I, I think we don't doa good job in reintegrating that
person back into society. At the same time, I also think
there's a lot of people who do really, really bad things like
murder and rape. And we don't do a good enough

(01:15:03):
job of finding them, catching them, and then making sure that
they don't get out on bail prematurely and making sure that
they, you know, serve as their sentence.
And so, I mean, the criminal justice system is very, very
imperfect. But for me, I would be curious
into somehow drilling down why is it that the closure rate, the

(01:15:23):
number of crime, the number of murders that are solved has gone
down in the area of DNA? How is that possible?
I know. And, you know, what could we do
to give the department's the mandates and the resources to
solve more of those cases? That would be what I would focus
on. Well, and like you.
Mentioned the CSI effects so many people including
investigators now are so dependent upon finding that

(01:15:48):
technical thing, whether it's like you said, the cell phone or
actual DNA. And they neglect those instincts
and those basic protocols and basic strategies and tactics of
investigating. Yeah, and that's.
That's what's just so frustrating, right?
I mean, I think like, you know, if you if you could imagine

(01:16:08):
someone running a piece of legislation right now to help
cold cases, probably the immediate thing they would do is
say, well, let's give departments more money to like
rerun the the you know, the crime victims clothes from 1960s
through Adna thing. And you know, OK, well, that's
great. I mean, that's more CSI effect.
It's more technology and and that's great.
It would probably solve some cases, right?
But, and sometimes it does. But yeah, but but.

(01:16:30):
And that's wonderful, right? But of course, but you also
like, how do you change the culture or how do you mandate a
change in the culture, right? How do you, how do you make it
that, you know, departments do the, the gumshoot work and the,
you know, all that stuff. And I, I don't have an answer to
that. I really don't.
But but you know, it doesn't mean that we can't think about
it and try. Absolutely.

(01:16:52):
Now, Speaking of rehabilitation,I did want to bring up you spoke
at the state prison with seriousoffenders and shared your story.
I would love to hear about that experience.
Yeah. I was reached out to by a group
that sends speakers into prison to talk to the people who are, I
guess, 90% rehabilitated. So these are people who, you

(01:17:15):
know, might have committed a crime at like age 20, and
they're now 40 and they've served 20 years.
And in many cases, they've gotten a college degree in
prison. They've found God.
Some of them have written books.Some of them, you know, are very
close to going, going out. And this group called me and
they said this. And I know this is super awkward
and I know you are in no mood totalk to convicts.

(01:17:39):
And I know that you've been pretty tough on crime, but would
you come and talk to this group?And I thought about it long and
hard. And I said, my God, can I get
through this? And, and I said yes.
I said yes. And so I drove to this prison.
It was, you know, again, talk about surreal experiences that
you don't, you know, it's like, I never thought I'd be doing
this right, you know, but drive to this prison, go in there and.

(01:18:04):
And yeah. And then I'm talking with in a
classroom with a group of about 20 guys who have been in prison
for a long, long time. And they're roughly my age.
And I told them about my dad's case.
And it was crazy to see the emotion and their faces, you
know, you, you, so these guys are, you know, I'm sure some of
them are not, you know, I, I guess some of them are not

(01:18:26):
earnest people if they're criminals, You know, these are,
these are, again, remember, these are the guys who are 90%
rehabbed. And I mean, some of them were
like tearing up when I went through my dad's story.
And many of these guys had committed a crime like, you
know, based on economic need. You know, they had, they had
been growing up in a poor neighborhood and they had, you
know, stolen someone's purse or something and done aggravated

(01:18:48):
assault or something like that, right.
And some of them had actually been part of murders, but not
the actual trigger man. And some of them were like, man,
I don't know why anybody would do this like that to your dad.
And they were just in disbelief,You know what again, when I told
him also how some of the some ofthe weird things about the crime
and. And so, yeah, it was
interesting. And one of them actually stayed
in contact with me. He sent me a copy of his book.

(01:19:10):
And he was somebody that I particularly felt a little bit
bad for. He was a Vietnamese immigrant
who grew up in a bad neighborhood and was, you know,
just continually picked on. And I think one night somebody
got into a fight and they said to him, will you come with us in

(01:19:31):
order to go get revenge on this guy, to go kick his butt?
It was a group of like five guys, and I want to say he
wasn't even driving the car, buthe was like in the car.
But then the guy who confronted the guy killed him.
And as you know, the. Laws the.
Laws are that, you know, anybodywho's part of the venture is
essentially part of that murder.And so he got a pretty hefty

(01:19:51):
sentence, you know, and, and I, I mean, look, I, I don't know if
I'm a good judge of character, but I think I am.
And I really believe that this guy had been rehabilitated in
that. You know, and I put him in the
category of somebody who should probably get out and then, you
know, there's other people who, you know, have done awful things
and they should stay in for the rest of their lives.
Yeah. See I.

(01:20:12):
I'm, I'm right where you are. I, I tend to fall somewhere in
the middle. I, I believe we are too severe
in our penalties for crimes in this country overall, and we
completely have failed at providing offenders with any
real chance of living, you know,law abiding successful lives
once they rejoin society. But as you said, there's always
exceptions to the rule, whether it's serial offenders or violent

(01:20:34):
crimes or people that have just not made any steps towards
rehabilitation or progressing themselves on a personal or
spiritual level. While we wait for the truth to
surface and for justice for yourfather to be found.
Joseph Goddo has been honored inmany different ways.
Your father was an insiration tomany people in the greater Los

(01:20:57):
Angeles community. The stretch of Hwy. by the Los
Angeles Art School was named in his honor.
To acknowledge your father's legacy to the arts, you funded a
scholarship in his name. The city of Los Angeles named
the intersection Joseph Gatto Square.
It only sits a few blocks from his once home and across the
street from where you attended kindergarten.
And in 2018, he was honored by the mayor of the town where his

(01:21:19):
father was born high in the mountains of the Cosenza
province of Italy. You attended the ceremony.
Now of these honors helped in the grieving process at all.
Knowing that your father's legacy is so strong they they
have. The, the, you know, it to me
like it was so touching to have the city and, you know, these

(01:21:43):
various cities, various jurisdictions honor my dad
because, you know, in many ways he was one of these people that
he wasn't, you know, he had written books and stuff, but he
wasn't famous. He was just somebody who showed
up and did good. He never missed a day of school
in 47 years. Wow.

(01:22:06):
I want, I want to stress that that's amazing.
He was a teacher. Never missed a day of school in
47 years of teaching. During the last years that he
taught he was working for free. He could have retired at that
point at 100% pension and gottenanother job where he would have
doubled his salary, but he kept working literally for free.

(01:22:28):
I mean, there's nothing, you know, like, and I remember his
neighbors giving him grief for that.
He, he was just, you know, and, and he affected so many people's
lives. And, but I'll tell you, the
biggest legacy for my dad is my daughter Eliana.

(01:22:48):
She was the only one of my children who got to know him.
And she, you know, when he was killed, her and I were very,
very, very close. And I had to travel a lot for,
for my job in the legislature. And she would miss me terribly.
But when she had my dad around, it was like, oh, here's this guy

(01:23:10):
who reminds me of my dad and looks like my dad, except, you
know, he's older and, you know, when big difference.
He knows how to do art 'cause I 'cause I, I stink at art, right?
And so, you know, he taught her how to paint and, you know, he
did all these things and I, you know, look in her eyes a lot.
And I, I know that she feels thewound.

(01:23:35):
But at the same time, she's a terrific artist and she cares
very much about the case gettingsolved.
And so I like to think that, youknow, his biggest legacy is his
grandchildren. So, you know, that's that's
something that is better than any sign on any highway, any
place. And thank you for sharing.

(01:23:55):
That I I just, yeah, I can't. I can't imagine.
I did want to ask you what is the best communication source or
resources for people to reach out, whether it's to you or
directly to the investigators onthe case.
If anyone out there has any kindof information that could help

(01:24:20):
lead to the truth, thank you forasking that.
So I am still as accessible as Iwas when I was in office.
People can go to mikeauto.com aslong as they spell my name
right. GATTO, they go to mikeauto.com
and they can e-mail me if they have information.
You can also Google to LAP DS. We tip hotline or crime tip

(01:24:42):
hotline, but you know, things tend to get lost that way.
If you get me the tip, I will make sure it gets to the
detectives. You can also contact them
directly. We do like to think that
somebody might know something. You know it, Let's say it was
this car burger or this young man who lived in the
neighborhood, right? You know, I like to think
there's a neighbor somewhere whowas like, you know, huh.
There was a kid who came home that night really late and made

(01:25:04):
a bunch of noise and seemed likereally nervous and was like
dripping with sweat. And, you know, like a week
later, this kid moved, moved to Georgia, you know, moved to
Texas, right? Like that type of thing, you
know, would have value for us. And, you know, so that is, yeah,
we, we welcome any and all tips.I also I want to.
Encourage everyone to read Mike's book.

(01:25:25):
It's really gives an intimate, heartfelt connection to what
victims experience. And you know, even as a true
crime podcaster, like I get veryemotionally connected to cases
and people that I've never spoken to before.
So this was you've had me chokedup.
This was a great honor for you to be here with us today.

(01:25:48):
It was such an honor to. Talk with you.
Your questions were terrific andthank you so much.
I, I, I really, really appreciate all you do.
Well, thank you for. Sharing your heartbreaking story
with me and my audience. Yeah.
Your honesty, your candor, your willingness to share your loss
in your experience I find so admirable.
I have a great amount of respectfor you as a former politician,

(01:26:12):
a father, a son, and really a human being.
So thank you. Thank.
You so much and hopefully we will talk again when the case is
solved. I look forward to it.
Thank you so much for listening to the tragic, heartbreaking
case of Joseph Gatto. The life of this beloved father

(01:26:34):
and grandfather, who was a mentor to countless students in
a pillar of his community, will never be forgotten.
Yet the truth surrounding his murder is known by someone and
he and his family deserve justice.
If you enjoy the show and would like to support it, please

(01:26:56):
follow rate, review and share onyour platform of choice.
Each and every one of you and your input truly matters.
Thank you so much. Until next time, stay safe and
watch over Shades of Murder happening in the streets next

(01:27:19):
door, especially inside your ownhome.
Shades of Murder is created, researched, written and edited
by Alita Caldwell. Original music Stranger composed
by Stereo Code.

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59: The Joseph Gatto Story - A Son's Journey into the Dark

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.css-14f5ked{margin:0;word-break:break-word;display:-webkit-box;-webkit-box-orient:vertical;box-orient:vertical;-webkit-line-clamp:2;overflow:hidden;}59: The Joseph Gatto Story - A Son's Journey into the Dark