Latest / Crime Stories with Nancy Grace / Flamethrower toting Santa goes on killing rampage on Christmas Eve

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Flamethrower toting Santa goes on killing rampage on Christmas Eve · Crime Stories with Nancy Grace

• 0:05
  Speaker 1: Crime Stories with Nancy Grace. Maybe it's right, maybe it's wrong,
• 0:15
  Speaker 1: but we tend to expect so much when we all
• 0:20
  Speaker 1: gather together at Christmas and Hanukkah, the holidays where all
• 0:25
  Speaker 1: families are united. How can one Christmas holiday go so wrong?
• 0:39
  Speaker 1: Crime Stories with Nancy Grace. I don't know why, I know,
• 0:50
  Speaker 1: I know me Okay, okay, okay. He came in through
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  Speaker 1: the edge of the door and there's a tetocaster on
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  Speaker 1: fighting't peep from when we thought. I heard the thought
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  Speaker 1: that we were like topping and I was the store
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  Speaker 1: where they work for. We all and were sted panicking
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  Speaker 1: and running. So we all go under the venroom. Some
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  Speaker 1: of us do. A couple must. I don't know who.
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  Speaker 1: My mom pausing on the man the fire there. Okay,
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  Speaker 1: what are you wearing? Please? What is you wearing? What
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  Speaker 1: is you wearing on? You? Chase catcaus close? Okay, let
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  Speaker 1: me know what he's wearing? Black close. So the guy
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  Speaker 1: that intruded was wearing a Santa suit. What does this mean?
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  Speaker 1: We have to turn on the burglar alarm and make
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  Speaker 1: sure all the doors and windows are locked. When we
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  Speaker 1: gather around the Christmas tree, take a listen to this height?
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  Speaker 1: How literallyally house two houses down on the Google, I
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  Speaker 1: can't at your house? What do you think you're okay?
• 2:07
  Speaker 1: And how impy do you? Guy? How impy do you think? Play?
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  Speaker 1: Probably like you? They're right now an ex brother in
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  Speaker 1: law and a Santa suit wreaking havoc? And why when
• 2:27
  Speaker 1: the woman is clearly beside herself is the nine one
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  Speaker 1: one dispatch saying well, what is he to you? They
• 2:35
  Speaker 1: need to let the victim know there is help on
• 2:39
  Speaker 1: the way. I didn't hear that. Let me introduce you
• 2:42
  Speaker 1: an all star panel to break it down and put
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  Speaker 1: it back together again with me. Twenty seven years metro
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  Speaker 1: major case and SWAT now lawyer James shell Nut at
• 2:52
  Speaker 1: Shelnut Law Firm dot com. We're now New York psychologists
• 2:56
  Speaker 1: joining us from Manhattan. Karen Stark at Karen Stark dot com.
• 3:00
  Speaker 1: Robert Crispin former Fort Lauderdale Police, now private investigator at
• 3:05
  Speaker 1: Crispin Investigations dot com. Professor Forensics, Jacksonville State University, author
• 3:12
  Speaker 1: of Blood Beneath My Feet on Amazon. Now the start
• 3:15
  Speaker 1: of a brand new program, Poisonous Liaisons on the True
• 3:18
  Speaker 1: Crime Network. Joseph Scott Morgan Death investigator. But first to
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  Speaker 1: Ray Kaputo, lead, a news anchor at Orlando News WDBO,
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  Speaker 1: to all of you, thank you for being with us.
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  Speaker 1: First of all, when we're hearing that nine one one call,
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  Speaker 1: what day of the year was it, Ray Kaputo, Nancy?
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  Speaker 1: It was minutes before Christmas to day, just minutes the
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  Speaker 1: call came in around eleven fifty on Christmas Eve. And
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  Speaker 1: you can just imagine what people are doing around that time,
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  Speaker 1: you know, to getting ready to bring in the holiday,
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  Speaker 1: and you know it's the farthest thing from anybody's mind,
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  Speaker 1: a horror like this could take place, you know, on
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  Speaker 1: Christmas Eve just minutes before Christmas Day. You know, Jackie,
• 4:04
  Speaker 1: I want to hear that sam that you just played
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  Speaker 1: one more time, the nine one one call. We learn
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  Speaker 1: a lot in this listen. Hello, ho height literally literally
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  Speaker 1: in your house down on the Google at your house.
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  Speaker 1: I don't think your name it? Okay? And how I
• 4:34
  Speaker 1: do you? Guys who IMPI for you? You an't think
• 4:38
  Speaker 1: you play it? Probably like you they're through right now? Okay?
• 4:45
  Speaker 1: One second, okay? A Christmas Eve party turned crime scene.
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  Speaker 1: Take a listen to Terry Aquita at CBS A Christmas
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  Speaker 1: Eve party became a crime scene. The bodies inside so
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  Speaker 1: badly burned that police were uns sure if the victims
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  Speaker 1: died in the shooting rampage or the subsequent fire. Extremely
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  Speaker 1: unusual and very shocking. It's just not something we see
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  Speaker 1: here in any time of the year, especially during Christmas.
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  Speaker 1: Police say forty five year old Bruce Pardo was having
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  Speaker 1: marital problems. He walked into the party dressed as Santa
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  Speaker 1: just before midnight, then immediately took aim with a handgun
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  Speaker 1: at his estranged wife, her mother, father, sisters, brother, and
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  Speaker 1: sister in law. One family member reportedly escaped by jumping
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  Speaker 1: out a bathroom window. The home is in Covina, a
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  Speaker 1: suburb about twenty five miles east of Los Angeles. Police
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  Speaker 1: say Pardo then allegedly used some sort of explosive device
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  Speaker 1: to set the house on fire. So, based on what
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  Speaker 1: we're hearing right there, there is no doubt that this
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  Speaker 1: was premeditated because he, according to what we just heard,
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  Speaker 1: if that has to be believed, goes to the home
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  Speaker 1: of a Christmas Eve gathering of his ex family members,
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  Speaker 1: the ex in laws, and open fire. So he goes
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  Speaker 1: in with explosive and a gun to ray Kaputo, Lead
• 6:04
  Speaker 1: news anchor W dbo Orlando. Whose home was it? Nancy?
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  Speaker 1: This was the home of Bruce Pardo's ex wife's parents,
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  Speaker 1: but his ex wife was also staying in the home,
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  Speaker 1: and then all of her family was there. There was
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  Speaker 1: twenty five people in the home and they were pretty
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  Speaker 1: much all related to his ex wife, the parents, the
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  Speaker 1: brothers and sisters, niece's nephews. There was twenty five people
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  Speaker 1: in that house. You know, I'm picking up on something.
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  Speaker 1: I just heard. It said a forty five year old
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  Speaker 1: white male with marital problems. But everyone is referring to
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  Speaker 1: the victims as family of his ex So it sounds
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  Speaker 1: to me like the divorce is a done deal. Was
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  Speaker 1: the divorce over, Ray Kaputo. It was over Nancy literally
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  Speaker 1: a week before all this happened. So he's not still
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  Speaker 1: having marital problems. He's angry. He's angry. I mean, you know,
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  Speaker 1: to you James shell Nutt, twenty seven years Metro major
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  Speaker 1: case swat Now lawyer, how many times do we see
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  Speaker 1: violence and breakout over a domestic issue. But their divorce
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  Speaker 1: was done. They weren't in the middle of a heated
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  Speaker 1: custody dispute or fighting over money. It was over yeah,
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  Speaker 1: you know, it's never any you know, you know, looking
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  Speaker 1: back at you investigating homicides over the years, you know, divorce,
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  Speaker 1: marital domestic issues. You know, that is one of the
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  Speaker 1: top motives for murder, never justified, but it often can
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  Speaker 1: be linked back to those things, especially when you have
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  Speaker 1: a husband and wife that comes up missing for dead.
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  Speaker 1: But this is seisnic. I mean, he's not just stalking
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  Speaker 1: her and watching it. When she goes to the grocery store,
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  Speaker 1: he comes in. If these reports are to believe, and
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  Speaker 1: unleash's pure h double l on her whole family. Four
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  Speaker 1: minutes Christmas. This is Christmas Eve and a suburban area
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  Speaker 1: in Covina, California. Take a listen to Bill Whittaker at CBS.
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  Speaker 1: When police and fire crews arrived just before midnight, the
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  Speaker 1: house on the quiet cul de Sac was engulfed in flames.
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  Speaker 1: Police responding to frantic nine one one calls found people
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  Speaker 1: running for their lives and heard descriptions of the nightmare inside.
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  Speaker 1: They were told that a person had come to the
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  Speaker 1: house dressed in a Santa Claus outfit, and upon entering
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  Speaker 1: the house, had opened fire on the person's attending a
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  Speaker 1: Christmas Eve celebration. On first book, inspectors reported finding three
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  Speaker 1: charred corpses. In daylight, three more bodies were found. Three
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  Speaker 1: people are still unaccounted for. Our officers are on the
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  Speaker 1: scene within three minutes, and as you can imagine, they
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  Speaker 1: were met with just a scene that was indescribable. Crime
• 9:07
  Speaker 1: Stories with Nancy Grace, we are talking about a Christmas
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  Speaker 1: Eve celebration that turns deadly, multiple dead bodies. And how
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  Speaker 1: is it that a guy dressed as Santa gets into
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  Speaker 1: home but when the police he's got a gun. But
• 9:31
  Speaker 1: when police get there, the bodies are charred. How did
• 9:37
  Speaker 1: that happen? It's my understanding that he actually had a
• 9:44
  Speaker 1: flame thrower. Now, I don't know if any of you
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  Speaker 1: are familiar with flame throwers. You know, growing up as
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  Speaker 1: a little girl, I never thought I would be in
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  Speaker 1: a business where I'd be intimately familiar with flame throwers.
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  Speaker 1: But here I am, and yes, I am familiar with them.
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  Speaker 1: If you haven't seen Tarantinos Once upon a Time in Hollywood, okay,
• 10:10
  Speaker 1: flamethrowers take a very big role in Tarantino's movie. Let
• 10:16
  Speaker 1: me go back to you, shell Nut, because you have
• 10:19
  Speaker 1: experience with flame throwers explain what they are. Well, whenever
• 10:25
  Speaker 1: you have a flammable liquid or substance and you put
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  Speaker 1: it a guest a fire, it's going to going to
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  Speaker 1: explode or catch fire. We all know that. But with
• 10:34
  Speaker 1: a flame floor, there's a there's another element. With a flamethrower.
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  Speaker 1: You mix compressed gas with the combustible liquid or the
• 10:43
  Speaker 1: combustible powder, and the compressed gas shoots the flammable liquid
• 10:48
  Speaker 1: or powder through a tube and it can shoot it
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  Speaker 1: fifteen thirty forty five sometimes sixty seventy five feet and
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  Speaker 1: that makes it extremely deadly. And then when the flame,
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  Speaker 1: when the combustible substance hits whatever is at the end
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  Speaker 1: of that path, it continues to burn. To you, Justice's
• 11:06
  Speaker 1: got Morgan, professor forensics, jacksonvill State University and death investigator.
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  Speaker 1: You know, a flamethrower, while it looked really cool and
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  Speaker 1: once upent a time in Hollywood, is almost unparalleled in
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  Speaker 1: the destruction it causes. Why, Yeah, it is, And like
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  Speaker 1: James was mentioning just a moment ago, once that flame
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  Speaker 1: hits the targeted area, it's almost like it's not quite
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  Speaker 1: but it's similar to the effect that like napalm had
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  Speaker 1: in Vietnam, where you have this gelagenous flaming mass that adheres.
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  Speaker 1: This is pumping out this compressed flame at such a
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  Speaker 1: rate that anything the body literally ignites, and certainly the
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  Speaker 1: clothing will on the individual and begin to burn the body. Essentially, Nancy,
• 11:55
  Speaker 1: now hold onto your hat becomes a fuel source for
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  Speaker 1: this flame and the person begins to burn. That's why
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  Speaker 1: we use them extensively, extensively in World War Two, we
• 12:06
  Speaker 1: would hook them up to our tanks. Guys carried them
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  Speaker 1: on their backs, and that was to eradicate pillboxes where
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  Speaker 1: enemy soldiers were hunkered down in there and you could
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  Speaker 1: blast them out of there. People are terrified of fired names. Yeah,
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  Speaker 1: I guess so. And how far did you say the
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  Speaker 1: flames would go? Shall not? You know, it depends on
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  Speaker 1: the gas that's being used in the pressure in it.
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  Speaker 1: You know, if there's something like a basic fire extinguisher
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  Speaker 1: that you're using to propel this propelling out, it can
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  Speaker 1: be twenty to thirty feet. If you have a large
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  Speaker 1: gas cylinder with compressed gas, it can go as far
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  Speaker 1: as a hundred feet. And unlike using a weapon, say
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  Speaker 1: a handgun or even a long gun, you don't have
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  Speaker 1: to have perfect aim because when you pull the trigger
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  Speaker 1: on a flamethrower, the flame is continuous. It doesn't shoot
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  Speaker 1: one bullet. It's a continuous spray if you want it
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  Speaker 1: to be a homemade flamethrower. Is that where we're talking about?
• 13:04
  Speaker 1: Ray Kapeter, Was it a homemade flamethrower? Yeah, Nancy, it
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  Speaker 1: was really crude. I've seen pictures of it, and it's
• 13:09
  Speaker 1: kind of like a pro pain tank, something that you
• 13:11
  Speaker 1: would put on a grill on your patio. But then
• 13:15
  Speaker 1: it had something it looked like a fire extinguisher rigged
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  Speaker 1: to the top of it and pointing outward. So it
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  Speaker 1: looked really crude. But unfortunately, apparently it did the trick
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  Speaker 1: and it it spit fuel all over this house. And
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  Speaker 1: here was the thing too, is that it just wasn't
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  Speaker 1: any ordinary fuel. He was using race fuel, which has
• 13:32
  Speaker 1: a higher octane meaning, you know, like race car engines
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  Speaker 1: need more energy, so the fuel is just more more combustionable.
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  Speaker 1: Just you know, I've done to every diabolical detail. You know,
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  Speaker 1: this guy wanted to inflict the most amount of race
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  Speaker 1: car fuel. Where would you even get that, I don't know.
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  Speaker 1: He was an electrical engineer, so he probably knew how
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  Speaker 1: to get his hands on things that you know, someone
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  Speaker 1: like me doesn't know how to But but race car
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  Speaker 1: fuel isn't you know, it's not illegal to have. But he,
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  Speaker 1: because of his background, I knew how to get his
• 14:00
  Speaker 1: hands on things. Guys, we are talking about really an
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  Speaker 1: unsurpassed Christmas tragedy, all because of one person, and we
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  Speaker 1: believe his name to be Bruce A Parto, a forty
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  Speaker 1: five year old white male. His divorce had been final
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  Speaker 1: one week on Christmas Eve, he shows up where his
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  Speaker 1: wife is living at her parents' home and unleash his pure.
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  Speaker 1: He double l with a homemade flame thrower. Take a
• 14:34
  Speaker 1: listen to our friend Bill Whittaker at CBS. Switnesses told
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  Speaker 1: police the shooter was this man, forty five year old
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  Speaker 1: Bruce Jeffrey Pardo. At first, police had little to go on. Parly,
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  Speaker 1: we know that mister Pardo is going through some type
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  Speaker 1: of marital problems and we believe that this residence is
• 14:54
  Speaker 1: a relatives residence. Police say Pardo started this fire withincendiary devices.
• 15:00
  Speaker 1: They say the twenty five partygoers bug Pardo, disguised as Santa,
• 15:04
  Speaker 1: was their traditional entertainment for the children. Once inside he
• 15:08
  Speaker 1: shot and wounded the eight year old girl who answered
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  Speaker 1: the door, then started the killing and the fire, sending
• 15:14
  Speaker 1: survivors free, and they were just hysterical about their family
• 15:18
  Speaker 1: inside the house. Jason Schulma came out when he saw
• 15:21
  Speaker 1: his neighbor's house a blazes. The gal just kept saying,
• 15:25
  Speaker 1: he just came in and started shooting. He just came
• 15:28
  Speaker 1: in and started shooting. To Robert Crispin, a former police
• 15:33
  Speaker 1: officer and Fort Lauderdale now at Crispin's Investigations dot com
• 15:39
  Speaker 1: Crispin and Special Investigations, Robert, what kind of an uptick
• 15:44
  Speaker 1: do you see in cases around the holidays? Drastic drastic uptick,
• 15:50
  Speaker 1: because the holidays are a trigger. They're a trigger to
• 15:53
  Speaker 1: make you realize you don't have your family anymore, you
• 15:55
  Speaker 1: don't have your kids anymore. You gotta spund. I mean,
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  Speaker 1: we don't know. I don't know what exactly happened as
• 16:01
  Speaker 1: far as his settlement in this case, but clearly he
• 16:05
  Speaker 1: was angry at the entire family. Hence why he went
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  Speaker 1: to the mother's house and took out everybody in the
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  Speaker 1: entire family and then to end it for his final
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  Speaker 1: act to burn everybody, the ultimate burning of everybody for
• 16:20
  Speaker 1: the final goodbye for him, So not just shooting them
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  Speaker 1: dead then setting them on fire. Many of them probably
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  Speaker 1: still alive. To you, joice Scott Morgan, how can you
• 16:32
  Speaker 1: tell you're the death investigator? How can you tell when
• 16:35
  Speaker 1: you have to? You know? I remember Joe Scott getting
• 16:38
  Speaker 1: a text. It was a text. As I was getting
• 16:42
  Speaker 1: on a plane from New York to California for a
• 16:46
  Speaker 1: victim's rights march, I got a text there had been
• 16:50
  Speaker 1: a mass shooting at the Fulton County Courthouse where I prosecuted.
• 16:55
  Speaker 1: I got off the plane, took a cab to another
• 16:58
  Speaker 1: airport to catch a flight immediately home to Atlanta. My
• 17:03
  Speaker 1: best friend in the DA's office spent the next four days.
• 17:08
  Speaker 1: I think it was processing the scene. When you get
• 17:14
  Speaker 1: a scene like this, how do you process it? But
• 17:17
  Speaker 1: my first question would be, how could you tell if
• 17:20
  Speaker 1: someone died from gunshot wound versus a flamethrower? Okay, let's
• 17:24
  Speaker 1: take the Let's take that first. With a flamethrower or
• 17:29
  Speaker 1: with any type of flame. One of the things we're
• 17:30
  Speaker 1: going to look for, obviously at autopsy. The simplest way
• 17:34
  Speaker 1: to do this is to see what debris is contained
• 17:37
  Speaker 1: in the airway and in the lungs, and that means
• 17:40
  Speaker 1: did the individual actually inhalate any kind of the noxious environment.
• 17:46
  Speaker 1: There's all kinds of nastiness that's created in this environment
• 17:49
  Speaker 1: when you're breathing in the air within, within this world
• 17:53
  Speaker 1: that's just blowing apart. Now, as far as the fatality
• 17:58
  Speaker 1: level you have to measure of this, you don't know,
• 18:00
  Speaker 1: first off, are you even going to be able to
• 18:02
  Speaker 1: tell if the individual was shot or not? Because this
• 18:05
  Speaker 1: is so complex and so stratified relative to the debris
• 18:09
  Speaker 1: that's there. You've got a house that's collapsing on itself,
• 18:12
  Speaker 1: and the body essentially begins to kind of meld into
• 18:15
  Speaker 1: the environment. So the bodies have to be carefully x ray.
• 18:18
  Speaker 1: You have to look for these projectiles. You have to
• 18:20
  Speaker 1: examine the lungs very very carefully. Nancy Crime Stories with
• 18:37
  Speaker 1: Nancy Grace, we are talking about pure hell being unleased
• 18:48
  Speaker 1: on one family on Christmas Eve. I don't know what
• 18:52
  Speaker 1: it is about the holidays. They make me happy, but
• 18:57
  Speaker 1: for many people it's a sad time, a very sad time.
• 19:03
  Speaker 1: How did we go from a happy marriage to a
• 19:07
  Speaker 1: divorce that's final and one week later everybody is shot
• 19:15
  Speaker 1: to death or death by flame thrower. This is not
• 19:20
  Speaker 1: some Quentin Tarantino movie with Brad Pitt starring in it.
• 19:24
  Speaker 1: This is real, real people and real suffering. There on
• 19:30
  Speaker 1: Christmas Eve, the whole families together. It's four minutes till
• 19:33
  Speaker 1: Christmas morning, eleven fifty six, and everyone dies in a
• 19:40
  Speaker 1: hail of bullets and fire. But how did it all start?
• 19:46
  Speaker 1: Take a listen to Crime Onlines John Limley. The year
• 19:50
  Speaker 1: Bruce Pardot and Sylvia Ortega married began with signs of
• 19:54
  Speaker 1: a bright future. He was an electrical engineer. She worked
• 19:58
  Speaker 1: as an administrative assist at a flower breeding company. Friends
• 20:02
  Speaker 1: say that Ortega was attracted to Bruce Parto's good looks
• 20:06
  Speaker 1: and his education. He was talkative and had a good
• 20:09
  Speaker 1: sense of humor. The wedding was in January, and the
• 20:13
  Speaker 1: couple moved into a home owned by the groom in Montrose,
• 20:16
  Speaker 1: about fifteen miles north of Los Angeles. The couples combined
• 20:20
  Speaker 1: yearly income of about one hundred and fifty thousand dollars
• 20:23
  Speaker 1: made it comfortable for them to live in Parto's half
• 20:26
  Speaker 1: million dollar home in a quiet cul de sac. From
• 20:29
  Speaker 1: a previous marriage, Ortega had three children, including a five
• 20:33
  Speaker 1: year old daughter, A big brown akita named Saki rounded
• 20:37
  Speaker 1: out the family. To Ye Ray Kaputo Ladies anchor Wdbo.
• 20:43
  Speaker 1: Were those children in the home when the bullets rang out?
• 20:47
  Speaker 1: I'd assumed so, Nancy, there there were a lot of
• 20:50
  Speaker 1: kids around that all the families were there. We know
• 20:53
  Speaker 1: that there were several children. We know that there was
• 20:55
  Speaker 1: an eight year old who shot in the face of
• 20:58
  Speaker 1: I don't know for Sermany, but I assume that there
• 21:00
  Speaker 1: was a lot of family members there. Did you say
• 21:02
  Speaker 1: an eight year old was shot? Nancy? When a new
• 21:04
  Speaker 1: year old opens a door and see Santa Claus, you know,
• 21:07
  Speaker 1: you can just imagine their face lighting up. But shortly
• 21:11
  Speaker 1: after Bruce Pardo walked into that house, he pulled those
• 21:13
  Speaker 1: guns down. You can only imagine how that elation could
• 21:17
  Speaker 1: turn to complete horror for this little eight year old girl, Katrina.
• 21:21
  Speaker 1: And the only thing lucky about the situation was he
• 21:23
  Speaker 1: didn't kill her. He shot her in the face of
• 21:25
  Speaker 1: miraculous who the old girl survived? How did it go
• 21:28
  Speaker 1: from this happy marriage to think things looking so wonderful,
• 21:32
  Speaker 1: all settling in like the Brady Bunch together in a
• 21:36
  Speaker 1: new blended family, to this take a listen to John
• 21:39
  Speaker 1: Linley Crime Online. Sylvia Pardot's friends say things in the
• 21:43
  Speaker 1: marriage changed quickly. Pardeau confided that Bruce Pardot had become
• 21:48
  Speaker 1: indifferent to his new wife, and money was a problem,
• 21:51
  Speaker 1: not the lack of it, rather the idea of sharing it.
• 21:55
  Speaker 1: He insisted the couple keep their finances separate, refusing to
• 21:59
  Speaker 1: open a joint bank account. He also seemed to expect
• 22:02
  Speaker 1: her to provide for her three children without any assistance
• 22:06
  Speaker 1: from him. For Sylvia Pardoaut, the final straw was finding
• 22:10
  Speaker 1: taxpapers that showed Bruce had a son that he hadn't
• 22:14
  Speaker 1: told her about. Pardout denied it, but a call to
• 22:17
  Speaker 1: his mother confirmed it. Bruce Pardot had a severely disabled son.
• 22:22
  Speaker 1: The boy had almost drowned after falling into a pool
• 22:26
  Speaker 1: while Pardoaut was supposed to have been watching him. Sylvia
• 22:29
  Speaker 1: Pardout's best friend says she was devastated and asked for
• 22:33
  Speaker 1: a divorce. Bruce Pardot calmly moved her belongings to the
• 22:37
  Speaker 1: curb and told her to move out. And yet he's
• 22:41
  Speaker 1: angry over the divorce. I don't get it. But what
• 22:45
  Speaker 1: do we learn from divorce documents? Take a listen divorce
• 22:49
  Speaker 1: documents paint an ugly picture. Sylvia Pardoaut filed court papers
• 22:53
  Speaker 1: asking for attorney's fees and over three thousand dollars in
• 22:57
  Speaker 1: monthly spousal support. She claimed Bruce Pardeaux was transferring funds
• 23:01
  Speaker 1: from their savings to a private account. Bruce Pardoaut lost
• 23:05
  Speaker 1: his engineering job at a military defense supplier. Soon he
• 23:09
  Speaker 1: was asking a judge to have his ex wife pay
• 23:12
  Speaker 1: him support and cover his attorney's fees. He had complained
• 23:16
  Speaker 1: that his wife was living rent free with her parents
• 23:19
  Speaker 1: while he struggled. His court filing stated that he had
• 23:22
  Speaker 1: monthly expenses of eighty nine hundred dollars, had credit card debt,
• 23:26
  Speaker 1: and had a twenty seven hundred dollar monthly mortgage payment.
• 23:30
  Speaker 1: When the divorce was finalized, the judge ordered him to
• 23:32
  Speaker 1: pay Sylvia ten thousand dollars. So it boils down to
• 23:36
  Speaker 1: money he forgot to take in to add in factory
• 23:40
  Speaker 1: in that she is supporting all of her children and
• 23:44
  Speaker 1: has to go live with her parents when he moves
• 23:46
  Speaker 1: her stuff to the curb straight out to Karen Start,
• 23:50
  Speaker 1: New York psychologist. So he had always been very particular
• 23:56
  Speaker 1: about them keeping their money separate and was intent during
• 24:00
  Speaker 1: the marriage, that none of his money would go towards
• 24:02
  Speaker 1: supporting her or her children. I guess they were living
• 24:06
  Speaker 1: there with them. It sounds like that. Nancy don't have
• 24:09
  Speaker 1: the answer for whether the children were living there, But
• 24:12
  Speaker 1: I have to tell you that he really fits the
• 24:14
  Speaker 1: profile of that kind of a mass murderer where it's
• 24:18
  Speaker 1: the holiday season and he perfectly chose Christen Steve. I'm
• 24:22
  Speaker 1: sure of it, and that Santa suit. He wanted everyone
• 24:25
  Speaker 1: together and he wanted to mock the holiday. He wanted
• 24:29
  Speaker 1: to take them by surprise. And if you look at
• 24:32
  Speaker 1: the factors fired from his job to divorce, the fact
• 24:37
  Speaker 1: that she found out about his son, that he was
• 24:40
  Speaker 1: there when the sun was injured. Never could recover from that.
• 24:43
  Speaker 1: So there's humiliation, shane, guilt, depression. And it was very planned.
• 24:49
  Speaker 1: This wasn't a snack attack. He thought this out very carefully,
• 24:54
  Speaker 1: with the guns, with the flamethrower. Yeah. The other thing
• 24:56
  Speaker 1: about it, when Karen starts talking about he how he
• 25:00
  Speaker 1: planned it out, This wasn't a spur of the moment.
• 25:02
  Speaker 1: I'm angry because our divorce is final and I'm alone,
• 25:06
  Speaker 1: and it wasn't like that at all, Because what does
• 25:08
  Speaker 1: it take to actually build a flamethrower. This is a
• 25:13
  Speaker 1: homemade flamethrower. He had to build it, dress up like
• 25:16
  Speaker 1: Santa and show up at his ex in law's home.
• 25:20
  Speaker 1: Does anybody on the panel know how to build a flamethrower?
• 25:23
  Speaker 1: I'm guessing shell Nut, Crispin or Morgan would know that.
• 25:27
  Speaker 1: Any guys any idea how to build one? There's a lot.
• 25:31
  Speaker 1: There's books on the internet. You can buy a book
• 25:33
  Speaker 1: on the internet that I'm embarrassed to say I know
• 25:36
  Speaker 1: how to make a Molotov cocktail, much less a flamethrower.
• 25:39
  Speaker 1: Go ahead, shall Nut, and you know what, don't be
• 25:42
  Speaker 1: proud that you know the answer to this. Go ahead.
• 25:44
  Speaker 1: There's books on the internet that tell you how to
• 25:46
  Speaker 1: do this. You can buy these books for like twenty
• 25:48
  Speaker 1: twenty five bucks. It will actually tell you what item
• 25:52
  Speaker 1: numbers to order off Amazon or order offline, and it
• 25:55
  Speaker 1: will show you step by step how to make it.
• 25:57
  Speaker 1: I think I think I looked at the cost of
• 26:00
  Speaker 1: building one ordering all new parts like four hundred and
• 26:03
  Speaker 1: something dollars when I was researching this, And so anyone,
• 26:08
  Speaker 1: what do you need for a flame thrower? I know
• 26:11
  Speaker 1: how to go to Amazon. Here's all you need. You
• 26:14
  Speaker 1: need a tank that has compressed gas, whether it's carbon
• 26:17
  Speaker 1: dioxide or nitrogen um. You need a ignition source, which
• 26:22
  Speaker 1: you know he used race fuel, but some people use
• 26:24
  Speaker 1: kerosene or gasoline, and you need that propellant gas to
• 26:29
  Speaker 1: force that flammable. If would throw a tube across an
• 26:33
  Speaker 1: ignition source, and and that's it. You know, it's amazing
• 26:37
  Speaker 1: to me that when she's when Karen said, Karen Starks said,
• 26:42
  Speaker 1: this took time. You know it really did. Robert Crispin,
• 26:46
  Speaker 1: you know, when cops get to Pardo's home, they're gonna
• 26:50
  Speaker 1: find everything they need to show. He had a homemade
• 26:55
  Speaker 1: flame thrower. Everything's going to be there, Crispin, the whole
• 26:59
  Speaker 1: road maps to be there. Everything's going to be inside
• 27:02
  Speaker 1: that house. This was very well calculated, very well orchestrated,
• 27:06
  Speaker 1: and very well carried out. He need satisfaction. Crime Stories
• 27:22
  Speaker 1: with Nancy Grace. Guys, we were talking about holiday, a
• 27:31
  Speaker 1: Christmas holiday turned tragic. When we're talking about Pardo and
• 27:36
  Speaker 1: how he planned this mass murder that goes down at
• 27:41
  Speaker 1: his ex wife's parents home where she's living. How did
• 27:45
  Speaker 1: he plan it, how did he pull it off? Take
• 27:48
  Speaker 1: a listen to the Cavina Police. This happened about eleven
• 27:51
  Speaker 1: thirty pm on Christmas Eve. There was a family party
• 27:55
  Speaker 1: being held at the residence on Noel crast attended by
• 27:57
  Speaker 1: about twenty five people. That appear that mister Pardo drove
• 28:02
  Speaker 1: the location and parked his car in the driveway one
• 28:07
  Speaker 1: house east. At the party, he was dressed in a
• 28:09
  Speaker 1: Santa suit and brought with him a homemade device which
• 28:13
  Speaker 1: will release pictures of that later for the press. Device
• 28:17
  Speaker 1: basically consisted of two tanks, one which contained either auction
• 28:20
  Speaker 1: or CO two and the other, smaller tank appeared to
• 28:23
  Speaker 1: contain racing fuel. Take a list to more what the
• 28:26
  Speaker 1: chief has to say. He walked up to the door.
• 28:28
  Speaker 1: Once he knocked on the door, rang the doorbell and
• 28:29
  Speaker 1: gained entrance. He immediately was confronted with an eight year
• 28:32
  Speaker 1: old child who thought Santa Claus had come to the house.
• 28:36
  Speaker 1: He shot her once in the face and then proceeded
• 28:38
  Speaker 1: inside the residence. Mister Pardo was armed with four handguns
• 28:42
  Speaker 1: when he went into the residence. All four handguns have
• 28:44
  Speaker 1: been recovered and the best of our belief, as of
• 28:47
  Speaker 1: right now, all guns were empty. As he went into
• 28:51
  Speaker 1: the house, he began shooting at the partygoers, again indiscriminally,
• 28:54
  Speaker 1: it appears that he did have some intended targets, those
• 28:58
  Speaker 1: being the family members an immediate family of his ex wife.
• 29:03
  Speaker 1: Once the shooting stopped, it appeared that he then retrieved
• 29:07
  Speaker 1: the homemade device, activated that, and went through the house,
• 29:13
  Speaker 1: basically delivering that and releasing a gas paper inside the
• 29:16
  Speaker 1: house too. Karen, start your psychologists, joining us from Manhattan
• 29:20
  Speaker 1: at karen start dot com. Karen, why is it? What
• 29:24
  Speaker 1: is it about the holidays that make so many people
• 29:28
  Speaker 1: angry or sad? But let's just start with angry. Well,
• 29:32
  Speaker 1: everything was exacerbated around the holidays, Nancy. There's even a term,
• 29:37
  Speaker 1: you know, holiday depression. And in this case, this guy
• 29:41
  Speaker 1: took his sadness and projected it outward. And the reason
• 29:44
  Speaker 1: it's so intense and exacerbated around the holidays is that
• 29:49
  Speaker 1: people have this image this picture post guides, you know,
• 29:53
  Speaker 1: perfect image of families getting together, everybody enjoying themselves. And
• 29:59
  Speaker 1: so if you're alone, if you're not with a family,
• 30:02
  Speaker 1: if you're already feeling terrible, it's all going to be
• 30:06
  Speaker 1: increased around the holidays. I'm just thinking about how his
• 30:11
  Speaker 1: anger over the divorce, I mean, what did he think
• 30:14
  Speaker 1: was going to happen when his wife finds out he's
• 30:16
  Speaker 1: got a son he never told her about that, He
• 30:18
  Speaker 1: refuses to help her, support her family or support her.
• 30:24
  Speaker 1: She has nowhere to go when he moves her stuff
• 30:27
  Speaker 1: out onto the street. What did he think was going
• 30:31
  Speaker 1: to happen when he treated her that way? And I'm
• 30:34
  Speaker 1: not saying she was a saint, but I know this,
• 30:37
  Speaker 1: She certainly did not deserve the death penalty, nor did
• 30:41
  Speaker 1: the others. Her name, Sylvia Ortega Pardo, her mother Alicia
• 30:50
  Speaker 1: Saltomayor Ortega, her father Joseph Ortega, her brother Charles, her
• 30:59
  Speaker 1: sister Sherry Lynn, James, Teresa, Alicia, Michael Andre all dead,
• 31:09
  Speaker 1: and an eight year old little girl shot in the face.
• 31:15
  Speaker 1: Take a listen to John Mane with Aardo barged in
• 31:19
  Speaker 1: on the party Christmas Eve clad in a Santa suit
• 31:22
  Speaker 1: which he bought from a designer. You know, when I
• 31:25
  Speaker 1: first heard it, I knew he was wearing a Santa suit,
• 31:27
  Speaker 1: and I knew who he was because they had seen
• 31:28
  Speaker 1: him but more than one time. But I didn't think
• 31:33
  Speaker 1: anything of it until they were saying that he used
• 31:35
  Speaker 1: the Santa suit and he puts stuff in the Santa
• 31:37
  Speaker 1: suit by guns and whatever he used, And then it
• 31:41
  Speaker 1: kind of freaked me out, thinking that maybe he had
• 31:43
  Speaker 1: already planned this for a long time. Jerry diod says
• 31:45
  Speaker 1: Pardo appeared to be a decent man. He had bought
• 31:48
  Speaker 1: and rented from her costume store before, he had even
• 31:51
  Speaker 1: shared a family picture with her from Halloween. And like
• 31:55
  Speaker 1: I say, he stopped here, he'd ushered at the church
• 31:57
  Speaker 1: across the street. He stopped here a couple of times,
• 32:01
  Speaker 1: knocked on the door and said, Hi, how are you?
• 32:03
  Speaker 1: How's your dog? And mine's fine, you know, and you know,
• 32:07
  Speaker 1: just just a nice dog. Did you hear that? An
• 32:11
  Speaker 1: usher at the church? A great neighbor that would stop
• 32:15
  Speaker 1: in to check on neighbors. How did everything go so
• 32:19
  Speaker 1: wrong at that Christmas event on Christmas Eve? Back to you, right, Kiputo,
• 32:24
  Speaker 1: Lead news anchor Wdbo. What more can you tell us?
• 32:28
  Speaker 1: Only I see Bruce Pardo is a scary guy. He
• 32:30
  Speaker 1: was never in trouble with the law, you know, no
• 32:33
  Speaker 1: history of violence. And I might state an unpopular opinion
• 32:35
  Speaker 1: here if none of the killing of her happened, some
• 32:38
  Speaker 1: people might even feel a little bad for him because
• 32:41
  Speaker 1: he was married a short period of time, he's forced
• 32:43
  Speaker 1: to cough up all this money and his life starts unraveling.
• 32:46
  Speaker 1: And when we were talking about planning, Nancy, this guy
• 32:49
  Speaker 1: was planning a six months in advance. He bought his
• 32:52
  Speaker 1: first gun in June before this happened. That was around
• 32:55
  Speaker 1: the time that he was ordered to pay money, and
• 32:57
  Speaker 1: every other month he bought another handgun. And then he
• 33:00
  Speaker 1: had that that canna suit me. This was something six
• 33:03
  Speaker 1: months in the making that he had many chances to
• 33:06
  Speaker 1: pull out, of, many chances to say, you know what,
• 33:08
  Speaker 1: this isn't a good idea, but he still went along
• 33:10
  Speaker 1: with it. And I'm just speechless. This is one of
• 33:13
  Speaker 1: the most hateful crimes I've ever had to talk about. Well,
• 33:15
  Speaker 1: I'm glad you ended with that computer, because it sounded
• 33:17
  Speaker 1: to me like you were feeling badly for him because
• 33:19
  Speaker 1: he had to cough up ten grand. You know what,
• 33:22
  Speaker 1: it would have been a lot cheaper if you're talking
• 33:24
  Speaker 1: about money. To just be nice to your wife and
• 33:27
  Speaker 1: don't be a big fat liar and then end up
• 33:30
  Speaker 1: getting divorced over it. That's my advice. You know, I
• 33:34
  Speaker 1: could never do your job here and start not a
• 33:37
  Speaker 1: million years people come women all the time goes? Should
• 33:40
  Speaker 1: I stay with him like no break up? Move on,
• 33:42
  Speaker 1: cut your losses, find somebody better, don't torture yourself. Quit
• 33:46
  Speaker 1: calling him. Stop stop now. I mean I would have
• 33:50
  Speaker 1: told this guy prompto if he had asked, what you didn't?
• 33:53
  Speaker 1: You know what you don't want to pay ten grand?
• 33:55
  Speaker 1: Then clean up your act, be a loving husband, shape
• 34:00
  Speaker 1: for Pete's sake. I would give my husband anything, anything
• 34:04
  Speaker 1: I could possibly give him. I love him, and say
• 34:07
  Speaker 1: for my children even more so. So I don't get
• 34:11
  Speaker 1: how he could be angry. He had to, as Ray
• 34:14
  Speaker 1: Kaputo said, cough up, Tan Grant, he should have thought
• 34:18
  Speaker 1: about that when he was lying to his wife and
• 34:20
  Speaker 1: refusing to help her. It's not his nature, Nancy. This
• 34:23
  Speaker 1: is somebody who's very resentful. And remember he walked away
• 34:28
  Speaker 1: from a child who was in a swimming a pool
• 34:31
  Speaker 1: accident while I'm his watch, and he didn't keep staying
• 34:36
  Speaker 1: involved with his son, making sure he was okay. He
• 34:40
  Speaker 1: was forced to pay money, and then he walked away
• 34:43
  Speaker 1: and wanted to act as though it never existed. So
• 34:47
  Speaker 1: you're not talking about somebody who just could act nice,
• 34:50
  Speaker 1: share It's not the kind of person that you're married too,
• 34:54
  Speaker 1: that's for sure. You know. With my husband, I always
• 34:58
  Speaker 1: feel like I'm the one that got the be prize.
• 35:01
  Speaker 1: You know. It just hurts me to see the family
• 35:06
  Speaker 1: breaking apart, what she went through and then both she
• 35:12
  Speaker 1: and her whole family is wiped out, including an eight
• 35:16
  Speaker 1: year old little girl that gets shot in the face.
• 35:19
  Speaker 1: Listen to what we learned about this flame throw where
• 35:22
  Speaker 1: he made this is Cavina Police Chief Kim Rainey. Device
• 35:27
  Speaker 1: basically consisted of two tanks, one which contained either auction
• 35:30
  Speaker 1: or CO two and the other smaller tank appeared to
• 35:33
  Speaker 1: contain racing fuel. There was a homemade device that was
• 35:37
  Speaker 1: basically built where once he mixed those two items he
• 35:42
  Speaker 1: would turn into a vapor or atomize and he was
• 35:45
  Speaker 1: able to deliver that inside the residents. And speaking of
• 35:49
  Speaker 1: having to quote cough up ten grant, according to Ray Kaputo,
• 35:54
  Speaker 1: I disagree. Take a listen to John Moon with ap
• 35:58
  Speaker 1: Bruce and Sylvia Hardo had just finished a better divorce.
• 36:02
  Speaker 1: The forty three year old woman was hoping for better times,
• 36:05
  Speaker 1: says her friend Roxanne Harrogie. What did she have that
• 36:10
  Speaker 1: he could have wanted? Jin she came home, But they're
• 36:16
  Speaker 1: closed in her car and her kids. Literally, he had
• 36:20
  Speaker 1: the house, he had the cars. I mean, what could
• 36:26
  Speaker 1: she What could he have wanted? Sylvia had even invited
• 36:31
  Speaker 1: Roxande to her family's Christmas party this year. Um times
• 36:37
  Speaker 1: changed for us at the last minute because my parents
• 36:39
  Speaker 1: came to visit, so we couldn't go. Our thoughts and
• 36:43
  Speaker 1: prayers now with the family of those that died that
• 36:49
  Speaker 1: Christmas Eve. Nancy Grace Crime Story signing off good bye friend.