Final Vows

by Karen Kingsbury

  Again, due to circumstances beyond my control both in health and finances, I have not been able to satisfy this debt. However, I am certain that this situation is reversing.

  Therefore, I request that my markers be held until at least 4/21/88—submission of them at this time could definitely impact the loan negotiations in a negative way. Again thank you for your consideration, Dan Montecalvo.

  In fact by late April Dan’s financial situation had vastly improved, and not long afterward he was able to pay back each of his gambling debts. The casino collectors figured Dan’s home loan must have been approved.

  What the collectors didn’t know until later, when homicide investigators began asking questions, was that the payoff hadn’t come from Dan’s home loan—which had been turned down almost immediately. The money had come from Carol’s life insurance settlement.

  Chapter 26

  By January 1990 Dan had collected $400,000 in insurance money and spent nearly that much at various blackjack tables in Las Vegas and Lake Tahoe. The remaining $200,000 in policy money was still being contested by certain insurance companies because of Dan’s role as a suspect.

  The idea of Dan collecting Carol’s insurance money while still being considered a suspect in her murder did not sit well with Carmelo Tronconi. By then the relationship between Dan and the Tronconi family had undergone many changes. The first was triggered by Carol’s murder. During Dan and Carol’s eight-year marriage, the couple had very little contact with her family. Occasionally Carol would write to her sister, Roseanna, in New York, and once in a while, around the holidays, Carmelo would call his younger daughter. But for the most part, when Carol took Dan as her husband she severed her shaky ties with her family.

  However, after Carol’s murder, her brother, sister, and father flew to Burbank to attend her memorial service. During their brief visit, the Tronconis were cordial and sympathetic to Dan, who appeared to be grief stricken over his wife’s death.

  On April 28, four weeks after she died and shortly after returning home from the memorial service, Carol’s brother, Jon, wrote to Dan.

  In the letter, Jon tried to explain the separation that had taken place between Carol and her family. He said Carol was a very intelligent person and that he and her other family members could not understand why she would be attracted to a criminal still serving his prison sentence.

  “Time ran out on us,” Jon wrote.

  He then wrote that he hoped to befriend Dan as a result of Carol’s death. “I cannot change the past, but only learn from [it] and realize how foolish I was to allow this estrangement to occur.”

  He also offered to help Dan in any way possible and asked him to visit whenever he might have time. He also wrote that Dan should speak louder during their telephone conversations. “You don’t have anything to be ashamed of. I hope the message of love and concern comes through. . . .”

  But Jon’s decision to give Dan a chance was short-lived. Over the next few months, detectives Kight and Lynch kept in contact with the Tronconis, apparently informing them of their suspicions about Dan.

  On October 14, 1988, Carmelo Tronconi wrote to the Montgomery Ward Insurance Company requesting that Carol’s life insurance benefits be placed in the control of the California courts. He also told the company that Dan was now a suspect in his daughter’s murder.

  When Dan learned from the insurance company that his claim was being contested by Carol’s father, he told Maree Flores and other friends that he felt angry and betrayed. He requested a copy of the letter. Upon receiving it he noticed the footnote on the bottom of the page, which indicated that another copy had been sent to Detective Lynch.

  Dan immediately concluded that Carmelo Tronconi was in collusion with the Burbank Police Department to frame him for Carol’s murder. He even went so far as to suggest that Carmelo’s real motive for interfering with the insurance policies might have been financial gain rather than any real suspicions about his son-in-law’s role in Carol’s death. After all, he reasoned, Carol’s family hadn’t doted on her over the past eight years. He had. They were only coming back now for a piece of the pie she’d left behind.

  While Dan remained convinced that Carol’s family had now become part of a plot to frame him for her murder, it became quite clear that the Tronconis were no longer interested in a friendly reunion with their son-in-law. They believed that Dan was guilty. Simple as that. In fact, their opinion was shaped less by what the detectives told them and more by the information they received from the insurance companies. Being Carol’s next-of-kin after Dan, Carmelo Tronconi was notified by the insurance companies in late April as to the status of her policies. Since Dan was an official suspect, the companies had deemed it necessary to contact Carol’s father with this information.

  Carmelo learned that on April 13, 1988—less than two weeks after Carol’s murder and only five days after Dan’s release from the hospital—he filed a claim with Liberty Life Insurance Company. Six days later he signed a claim for the life insurance policy issued by Liberty Life Insurance Company. That same day he wrote this letter to Integrity Life Insurance Company:

  To whom it may concern: The following is a brief explanation regarding the events that led to the death of my wife, Carol Montecalvo. On March 31, 1988, after returning from a walk, we surprised at least two intruders in our home. As a result, both my wife and I were shot. I survived; unfortunately my wife did not. I hope this will help you in processing this claim? Sincerely, Daniel Montecalvo.

  Carmelo Tronconi believed he could read a considerable amount between the lines of Dan’s request. In his opinion Dan filed the claims far too quickly. At a time when Dan should have been consumed with grief, he seemed to have just one thing on his mind—the insurance money.

  Insurance records showed something else that Carmelo found interesting. The policies had been purchased within a six-week period, exactly one year before her murder. Carol’s father believed this proved Dan had been planning to kill Carol for more than a year. He figured Dan had hoped to avoid suspicion by allowing a year to pass between purchasing the policies and carrying out his plans.

  After learning these details the Tronconi family became certain of Dan’s guilt. Especially in light of a letter Carol had written to her sister, Roseanna, in May 1987. In the past, Carol’s letters had always been upbeat and positive, raving about the way Dan had surprised her by sending a dozen red roses to her office on her birthday, or gushing about how he had taken her out to dinner—almost as if she were trying to convince Roseanna of Dan’s value.

  But there was a difference in the tone of Carol’s letter of May 15, written during that six-week period when the policies on her life were taken out:

  I hope you have a wonderful party! I’m sure just being with the family will be great. I wish I could tell you Dan and I could be there in June, but at this point it doesn’t look too good. I have started a new job with Pacific Bell Yellow Pages and . . . because of that, time and money do not allow a trip to Buffalo.

  Dan is job hunting. . . . We would have loved being there to celebrate [with you] but we will be there in spirit. . . . Maybe we will win the California lottery and things will change.

  Take care, and love to all. Carol.

  Roseanna knew as she reread the letter after Carol’s death that her sister’s financial situation must have been very grim, indeed. Otherwise Carol would have brushed over the issue as she had so many other times when things were not going well in her personal life.

  When Roseanna showed the letter to her father and brother, they agreed that Dan and Carol must have been desperately broke that spring of 1987, and with every additional life insurance policy, Dan must have begun planning a deadly solution to the couple’s financial woes.

  As the family reached that conclusion the relationship between Dan Montecalvo and his in-laws made one more, final transformation. The Tronconis were no longer angry with Dan. They hated him.


  Chapter 27

  Now that Brian Arnspiger had a complete picture of Dan and Carol’s relationship and Dan’s plunge into desperation, he began weaving together the threads he’d collected. Now it was merely a matter of convincing the district attorney’s office that the volumes of circumstantial evidence against Dan Montecalvo were enough to take before a jury.

  By the first part of February 1990 Brian’s biggest find was still the hollowed-out book. That week he compiled several other tidbits of evidence against Dan. Although these details did not prove Dan’s guilt by themselves, they certainly gave Brian’s suspicions a clear ring of truth.

  Starting with Genios—the Italian restaurant where Sergeant Goldberg had talked with Dan on several occasions—Brian uncovered a trail of bars and restaurants that Dan had frequented. Brian heard accounts of Dan’s flirtatious behavior and his animosity toward other patrons.

  Manager Scott Young from the Pago Pago cocktail lounge had a particularly interesting story about Dan. The Pago Pago was across the street from Disney Studios on Alameda Avenue in Burbank. Most of its customers were stagehands and set builders and other union types who worked at the studios. According to Young, Dan became a regular customer in the fall of 1987—the same period that the couple had been in desperate financial trouble and Carol had been working late hours trying to earn the trip to Hawaii.

  Young had no trouble remembering what nights of the week Dan hung out at the bar. Saturdays, Sundays, Mondays, and Tuesdays. Always at night. Always at the same time.

  “You must be quite a bright man, Mr. Young,” Brian stated as he leaned against the bar and watched the manager consolidate several bottles of gin. “Remembering something like that for more than two years.”

  “Memory has nothing to with it.” The man turned from what he was doing and stared at the detective.

  Brian looked concerned. “Look,” he said sharply. “This is serious. We think the guy killed his wife. You tell me he used to hang out here and you know the exact days, the exact times he’d stay. Then you tell me memory has nothing to do with it.”

  Young shrugged. “That’s right.”

  “How can you be so sure, then?”

  “Simple. Those are the nights Janice worked the bar.” He turned back to organizing the bottles. “Dan seemed to have a thing for Janice. If she was working, he was here.”

  Brian thought about Carol, slaving late into the night selling yellow page ads while her husband flirted with Janice, and he felt his jaw muscles tightening. “What makes you remember Janice’s schedule?”

  “She’s still here. Schedule hasn’t changed in years,” he said indifferently. “Only reason Dan stopped coming round was the fight.”

  Brian pulled up a stool.

  “Tell me about it.”

  The story took ten minutes and when it was finished Brian knew his case against Dan had just grown stronger. According to Young, Dan often made a nuisance of himself, talking about his involvement with organized crime and his days in the penitentiary. One night Janice had been pouring drinks for Dan when she caught a glimpse of what looked like a handgun beneath his jacket. The more Dan drank, the more nervous Janice became. Finally she pointed the gun out to Young. In Young’s opinion, the gun looked like a .32 or a .38 special—the gun police officers use.

  Before Young had time to analyze the situation Dan and another patron began raising their voices. The argument escalated quickly and soon both men were on their feet shouting, inches apart from each other. Suddenly Dan reached for the gun. Then, in what looked like a scene from across the street at the studios, three stunt men relaxing nearby lunged forward and separated the men.

  By then Young had decided that Dan would not be welcome back at the Pago Pago. No one was going to bring a gun into his restaurant and threaten his customers. He asked both men to leave and not to return. After that Young saw Dan just once—when he came in the next day to complain about the way he was treated.

  “No one pulls a gun in my bar,” Young responded. “Nothing more to say.”

  “Your loss, buddy.” Dan spat the words and turned to leave.

  “Say, Dan,” Young had asked just as Dan reached the door. “Why the gun?”

  Dan moved his jacket aside exposing the same handgun he had nearly pulled out in anger the night before and patted it tenderly. “Protection.” He smiled.

  Young never knew what Dan meant by the comment, but he figured it had something to do with Dan’s much-discussed Mafia ties.

  As Brian listened carefully, he began to wonder if other Burbank bartenders might have similar stories to tell about Dan Montecalvo.

  Later that week he found out.

  He spoke with Richard Wilkinson, a clean-cut regular at the Shaker Mountain Inn. The way Wilkinson told it Dan and he had a disagreement one night over the Monroe Doctrine. No one seemed to remember how the disagreement escalated or why it had started in the first place, but eventually the men were exchanging comments about each other’s parents. Finally Dan pulled a gun and threatened Wilkinson.

  “Listen,” other patrons remembered Dan saying, “I’m not going to fight you, I’ll just shoot you.”

  The manager immediately grabbed Dan’s wrist and broke up the argument, asking Dan to leave.

  After Wilkinson, Brian found others who remembered Dan carrying one or two guns into various Burbank bars. One man even recalled thinking Dan was a policeman because of the .38 special he carried at all times.

  “Everyone knew about Dan’s guns,” the man told Brian. “Around here we called him ‘Dan, Dan, the policeman.’ ”

  Then there were the stories Laura Foster told. She was a waitress at Genios and she told Brian how Dan would leave late at night with other women or sit in his favorite booth necking with a woman he had met only hours earlier.

  She also remembered the time Dan flashed several hundred-dollar bills at her as she waited tables. When Laura ignored him, Dan dropped the bills at her feet.

  “That could be yours,” he had told her, with a suggestive smile.

  Before she had time to leave, Dan took a Sugar Daddy candy out of his pocket and waved it at the pretty waitress. “How ’bout taking a trip to Vegas with me, honey? I’ll take care of you.”

  Laura rolled her eyes, shook her head in disgust, and walked away. Later that night—while Dan was still inside drinking—Laura and a few other waitresses sneaked quietly out behind the restaurant and found his car. Trying to suppress her giggles, one of the women began writing the words “Sugar Daddy” in the dust on the car’s back window.

  But it was Dan’s reaction that fixed the memory in Laura’s mind. Dan stormed into the restaurant and demanded to see the owners, Marvin Cecchini and his son, James. While Laura hid in the kitchen, Dan ranted about her rude behavior and poor work habits.

  The Cecchinis took Dan’s complaint in stride. Throughout 1985 and 1986, they had seen Dan flirting with strange women—buying them drinks and making out with them. They remembered that even though Dan lived less than a mile away, sometimes he drank so late and so long that he’d spend the night in his car, parked behind the restaurant.

  They also told Brian how Dan had never mentioned his wife, Carol. In fact, as they recalled, whenever the subject of marriage came up, Dan was cynical about it, laughing at the idea of being bound to a woman.

  Brian listened to the men’s stories and instantly remembered a magazine he’d found in Dan’s home. It featured an article titled “California Break-up: When Marriage Turns Into Economic War—A High-Powered Divorce Lawyer Takes You Into the Trenches.”

  The magazine was dated March 13, 1988. Eighteen days before Carol’s murder.

  In the course of a week Brian had heard enough of these stories to close several gaping holes. All along, Dan had claimed his undying love for Carol. Proof of that was the blissful relationship they had shared for eight years, and the confirmation of the Montecalvos’ church friends. Of course, those church friends
only saw Dan on an occasional Sunday morning. Their opinion of him was primarily shaped by the things Carol said, and perhaps more importantly, the things she did not say.

  Brian had already tried to take the case to the district attorney’s office. Assistant District Attorney Ben Bernard had the task of reviewing cases and deciding whether there was enough evidence to warrant a trial in Pasadena’s Superior Court. Brian had worked with Bernard before on murder cases and knew he was demanding. If he didn’t think a case was winnable, he’d turn it down. Three times Bernard had turned down the Montecalvo case.

  “It’s good stuff, Arnie,” Bernard would tell the detective each time. “One problem. You need more of it.”

  Brian considered trying a fourth time in light of Dan’s habit of carrying guns, carousing in bars, and picking up women. But something told him the evidence still wasn’t enough.

  Late one night, while Brian was lying awake in bed analyzing the circumstantial evidence against Dan and trying to imagine where he might find the missing pieces, he got an idea. Pacific Bell. That was the only place Brian hadn’t rechecked since taking on the investigation. If Carol had been afraid of Dan, someone at her former employer’s office must have known about it. Women didn’t spend ten hours a day at a place without talking to someone about their personal lives.

  The next morning Brian paid a visit to Laura Angelino, Carol’s former supervisor at Pacific Bell. The supervisor welcomed Brian into her office and immediately began searching through a file cabinet next to her desk.

  “I’m so sorry,” she said, sifting quickly through numerous files. “Really I completely forgot about it until I heard you were in the lobby.”

  Brian frowned. “Forgot about what?”

  Angelino stopped her searching and stood up to face the detective. “You don’t know about Mark Paulson?”

  Brian shook his head. For a moment he wondered if the woman had him confused with someone else. “Who’s Mark Paulson?”