Richard Montanari: Kiss Of Evil

It is Paris. He has big hands, like my dad’s. For the first time in my life, everything goes quiet.

I spring.

Dad fires.

VOODOO KILLER PLEADS GUILTY BY THE ASSOCIATED PRESS

Filed at 12:31 PM

Cleveland (ap)-The man who killed his victims then mutilated their bodies with Santerian symbols pleaded guilty today to seven counts of aggravated murder, admitting that he had killed one victim by chopping off the top of her head; another, by castration.

The plea bargain promises Christian del Blanco, 30, a life sentence without the possibility of parole. He would have faced the death penalty if he had been convicted of first-degree murder on any of the counts.

After his arrest early New Year’s Day, Mr. del Blanco confessed to murdering Fayette M. Martin, 30, last December after luring her to an abandoned inner-city building, as well as Willis James Walker, 48. It is unclear as to how Mr. del Blanco knew Mr. Walker, or what drew the two men to the Dream-A-Dream Motel, a motel on Cleveland’s east side.

The other victims, Isaac C. Levertov, 79, and his wife Edith R., 81, were apparently victims of a sacrificial killing.

Another victim, Edward Moriceau, 60, was the proprietor of an herb shop that specializes in Santerian artifacts.

As he entered his plea, Mr. del Blanco shocked the prosecutors and his court-appointed defense attorney by mentioning two other victims. One, a female accomplice named Celeste L. Conroy, 26. Police found Ms. Conroy’s body in the basement of a building on East Eighty-fifth Street and Carnegie Avenue where they say she was strangled. The other, a shooting victim found in Cain Park in Cleveland Heights, a victim only recently identified as Jeremiah D. Cross, 29, a Cleveland Heights attorney who once represented the defendant’s sister on a murder charge of her own.

Due to injuries sustained during his arrest, Mr. del Blanco appeared in court in a wheelchair. Before being returned to his cell, he apologized to the victims’ families in fluent Spanish.

Sentencing is set for January 15.

The fallout from any case the size and weight of the Ochosi murders is always far-reaching. There are two books in progress. A four-part series is under way in the Plain Dealer.

Bobby Dietricht had suffered first-degree burns on his right arm and leg that night, as well as a fractured ulna in his left arm. Greg had taken three. 22 caliber bullets to the left side of his vest, breaking two ribs. Both are scheduled to be back on the job within a few weeks.

After murdering Jeremiah Cross, Christian knew that eventually the Sarah Weiss connection would be made. It was then that Christian must have taken a few of his extra trinkets and set up a makeshift altar on the second floor of Jeremiah Cross’s house, rigging some plastique to a mercury switch.

Just in case.

Records at the Veterans Administration showed that a man named Jeremiah Cross had requested a file on Demetrius Salters around a week after Jeremiah Cross had been murdered. It explains where Jeremiah Cross’s ID had gone after he was killed, as well as the fact that Christian del Blanco was moving in on the old cop.

Ronnie Boudreaux had called Paris on New Year’s Day. After having been sapped in the back of the head by Christian del Blanco the night before, Ronnie proclaimed that, although he was grateful unto the Lord that Christian del Blanco had spared his life, he and Paris are finally egal-that all debts have officially been paid.

As far as Paris could piece together, courtesy of the thick packet of letters they had found in Christian’s apartment, Christian and Sarafina del Blanco-who signed all of her letters “Fina”-had split up after the murder of their father. Christian went first to San Diego, then into Mexico where he spent the next dozen or so years of his life. Sarafina had worked as an escort and a model, mostly trade shows, traveling the country under a variety of names. Delia White, Bianca del Gato, Sarah Weiss. Her past had turned up very little when she had stood trial. The letters from Sarafina to her brother also kept tabs on Michael Ryan, the man they blamed for letting their father get away with what they felt was murder.

When Michael Ryan moved to San Diego, it became an unexpected opportunity for Christian to sneak across from Tijuana and take a shot at him. But Michael Ryan was not that easy a target in San Diego. He had been a patrolman in a heavily armed zone car.

Carrie Ryan was a different story. A beat-up old Bonneville was seen tearing around a corner, leaving the girl’s small, ruined body behind. Descriptions of the driver were given, but the teenager was never caught.

By the time Michael had moved back to Ohio, Sarafina and Christian had reunited in Cleveland, even though Christian was still wanted for questioning in his father’s murder.

They knew that Michael needed money for his daughter’s care. And they knew that Michael had something they wanted.

Sarafina met Michael, gained his confidence, struck a deal. She offered him ten thousand dollars to steal the murder investigation file of Anthony del Blanco, the disappearance of which would all but eliminate any chance of Christian’s future arrest.

That night at the Renaissance Hotel they got everything they wanted.

Including Michael Ryan’s life.

When Sarafina committed suicide, Christian was distraught. He had worked as a prostitute in Mexico, and gained a reputation as a skilled lover, especially among the S amp; M and voyeur/exhibitionist crowd in Acapulco. He signed on with NeTrix, knowing he would meet the right woman for his “spell,” if he could draw her in with his charms. Thus, Fayette Martin’s fate had become sealed.

How Christian came to meet Mary is the mystery. In her statement, Mary had said they met in front of her building and it was after that he blackmailed her into helping him, threatening her daughter’s life, a story the prosecutor’s office seems very willing to buy.

Christian isn’t talking.

Although Michael Ryan was posthumously cleared by Internal Affairs, anyone who looks closely at the evidence would never believe anything but the obvious.

Mike Ryan died in a pair of twenty-five-dollar shoes.

The money was never for him.

At the end of the first week in January, as Paris begins to box up the Ochosi files at his desk, it occurs to him how close it had all come to him once again, how close to Beth and Melissa. The man he had seen with Beth at Shaker Square-the guy with the shoulders-really was a guy Beth had met on eharmony. The man’s religious leanings, however, had not yet assuaged Paris’s jealousy.

But Christian del Blanco did have his sights set on Beth. Paris has no doubt about that. Christian had found her e-mail address, had sent her the self-launching computer file of the velvet wing chair. Perhaps he meant to put her in it before it was all over. He just ran out of time.

As Paris marches the box of files to the elevator, it is that image that chills him more deeply than the winter storm raging outside.

Her hand is still in a splint. The doctors say she will, in time, regain most of its use, but the thick mound of scar tissue where the spike had penetrated will always remain.

She is being released from the hospital within the hour.

Paris stands at the foot of the bed. Mary sits, hands in her lap, a small suitcase at her feet. The only sounds are the hush of the heat register, the pellets of freezing rain on the window. Paris looks out at the confetti of ice-slicked cars in the University Hospital lot. He waits for the proper amount of silence to pass, then says: “Do you know why I’m here?”

Mary draws a deep breath. “Well, I’ve got it down to two things,” she says, her voice shaky, hesitant. “I’m leaving here in either a cab or a police car. I’ve been up all night bouncing between the two.”