South Florida
Media Coverage
*~ December, 2008 -- Page 1 ~*
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| In Loving Memory Of |
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Bochicchio family makes plea
to the public (12/4/08)
Police: Mall murders not tied to '07 slaying (12/4/08)
Leads drying up in mall murders, Boca Raton police say
(12/4/08)
Police: Slaying not related to Fla. mall murders (12/4/08)
Gorenberg, Bochicchio Cases: No Forensic Connection (12/5/08)
Boca Raton police seek clues one year after killings (12/5/08)
The trail that was missed (12/8/08)
New information in Boca Raton mall slaying (12/12/08)
Attorney amends wrongful death lawsuit against Town Center
mall (12/12/08)
Unsolved mall murders: One year later (12/12/08)
Bochicchio family makes plea to
the public
Reported by: Katie Brace
Email: kbrace@wptv.com
BOCA RATON, FL --The family of a murdered mother and daughter is pleading for help in finding the killer or killers. Almost a year after the murders there are still no suspects.
On December 12th, Nancy Bochicchio and her daughter Joey were killed. Their bodies were found bound and shot inside their SUV at the Town Center Mall parking lot.
JoAnn Bruno is Nancy's sister. She made an emotional plea saying, "It could happen to anybody...please...please...if there's anything...call."
Police say they've received 1,600 leads and have gone through 89% of them. Recently, they have not received any significant tips.
Boca Raton Police say they enough enough evidence to link the killer to the crime. They just need a suspect.
Police say they can link the Bochicchio case to a similar attack on a woman in August 2007. The woman survived. They also say the Bochicchio's killer is different than the killer in the Randi Gorenberg case.
Randi Gorenberg was last seen leaving the Town Center Mall in spring of 2007. She was shot and her body dumped from her dark SUV.
Boca Raton Police Chief Dan Alexander says, "Given their evidence and the forensic evidence in our cases that we cannot establish in the Gorenberg case lead us to believe they are not related."
There is a $350,000 reward in the Bochicchio case.
Police: Mall murders not tied to '07 slaying
By DON JORDAN
Palm Beach Post Staff Writer
Thursday, December 04, 2008
BOCA RATON — The gruesome murders of a mother and daughter outside the Boca Town Center mall a year ago are not related to the March 2007 slaying of 52-year-old Randi Gorenberg, police said Thursday.
But, officials added, forensic evidence links the man who shot Nancy Bochicchio and her 7-year-old daughter, Joey Bochicchio-Hauser, at point-blank range and left their bodies in the mall's parking lot last December with the person who kidnapped and robbed a woman and her son at gunpoint just months earlier.
Forensic clues, along with other evidence, simply didn't match up in the Bochicchio and Gorenberg cases, police chief Dan Alexander said. He refused to elaborate on what evidence the police have gathered.
The announcement left in question the fate of a special investigative task force Boca Raton police and the Palm Beach County Sheriff's Office formed, which based detectives in the same Congress Avenue substation to probe whether the two shootings were the work of the same killer.
Boca Raton's top cop made the remarks during a press conference Thursday, about a week before the one-year anniversary of the Bochicchio murders. He acknowledged that investigators are running out of leads and made a plea to the public for additional information.
Police spent 9,000 hours probing more than 1,400 leads. The remaining leads - less than 200 - have been classified as "low priority," Alexander said.
"We're certainly not going to rest until we solve this case," he said, adding that he doesn't "ever want to categorize this as a cold case."
Nancy Bochicchio's sister, JoAnn Bruno, also renewed her appeal for help from the community.
"Everyone has a mother or sister or child," said Bruno, crying as her husband, Stanley, stood beside her. "This could happen to anybody. Please, please call. Please."
Boca Raton officials are offering an unprecedented $350,000 reward for information leading to the arrest and conviction of the killer.
The Bochicchios were found dead early Dec. 13 in their idling Chrysler Aspen SUV in the Town Center mall parking lot. Bochicchio had been forced to withdraw money from an ATM and both had been bound and shot, police said. Nancy Bochicchio's neck was bound with a plastic tie strip and goggles were pulled over her face. She was bound at the wrists and ankles, and a broken pair of novelty handcuffs dangled from her wrists.
A homeless man found Bochicchio's cellphone in the Overtown section of Miami hours after their bodies were discovered.
About four months before the crime, a 30-year-old woman and her 2-year-old son also were ambushed in the mall's parking lot. A man held a gun to the boy's head and forced the woman to withdraw $600 from an ATM. Like Bochicchio, the attacker bound the earlier victim and forced her to wear blackened goggles. She and her son survived the attack.
In March 2007, Gorenberg was shot in the head and pushed from her Mercedes SUV in a park west of Delray Beach. The last recorded images of the wife and mother show her carrying shopping bags and holding a cellphone to her ear as she left the Town Center mall, 39 minutes before she was killed.
For the Bochicchios' family, the once-joyous holiday season has become a heartbreaking reminder of what is lost. Bruno said this Christmas feels worse than the last.
"Last year was more of a shock," she said. "It's really starting to sink in that they're not coming back."
And for a second time, Bruno struggled between tears to ask for help.
"My sister, she needs to rest in peace," she said. "As long as he's out there, she won't."
Leads drying up in mall murders, Boca Raton police say
Dianna Cahn |South Florida Sun-Sentinel
7:08 PM EST, December 4, 2008
A year after Nancy Bochicchio and her daughter Joey Bochicchio-Hauser were killed after leaving the Town Center mall, police said Thursday that they've developed some evidence, but leads to a possible killer are drying up.
Bochicchio, 47, and Joey, 7, were found bound and shot to death in their SUV in the Town Center parking lot on Dec. 12, 2007, hours after they'd been shopping at the mall. They'd also been robbed of $500 at an ATM.
Police said they were able to link forensic evidence developed since the murders to a similar carjacking on Aug. 7, 2007, in which a woman and her 2-year-old son were abducted as she got into her SUV at the mall. She was also forced to drive to an ATM and withdraw $600, but their lives were spared.
But investigators could find no forensic evidence linking those two attacks to the March 23, 2007, murder of Randi Gorenberg, said Boca Raton Police Chief Dan Alexander. Gorenberg's body was thrown from her vehicle west of Delray Beach a short time after she left the mall and her murder is under investigation by the Palm Beach County Sheriff's Office.
Police Capt. Matt Duggan said police have put in 9,000 investigative hours, completed 89 percent of the 1,600 leads they've developed and have forensic evidence that could implicate a suspect if they apprehend one. Bochicchio's sister issued a tearful plea Thursday for anyone with information to come forward.
"Please," sister JoAnn
Bruno said. "Everyone has a sister or a mother. It could happen
to anybody. If there's anything, please call."
Police: Slaying not related to Fla. mall murders
BOCA RATON, Fla. — Authorities say the slaying of a 52-year-old woman is not related to the gruesome killings of a mother and daughter outside an upscale Boca Raton mall.
Police said Thursday the March 2007 slaying of Randi Gorenberg is not linked to the mall murders. But authorities said that forensic evidence confirms the suspect who killed a mother and her daughter outside the Town Center also kidnapped a second mother and young child.
The bodies of 47-year-old Nancy Bochicchio and her 7-year-old daughter Joey were discovered in their car outside the mall last December. Nancy had a pair of swimming goggles over her eyes and was bound with plastic ties.
A second mother and young child were abducted in August in similar fashion but were released. No one has been charged with the crimes.
Mall security was increased after the slayings.
___
December 4, 2008 - 9:40 p.m. Copyright
2008, The Associated Press.
Gorenberg, Bochicchio Cases: No Forensic Connection
Posted: Dec 5, 2008 09:24 AM
By Kara Kostanich
Posted by Rachel Leigh
BOCA RATON, FL (WFLX) - A shocking discovery in the Boca Town Center Mall murders. A year later, there's new evidence, and what police have discovered changes everything!
Randi Gorenberg, Nancy Bochicchio, and her daughter: All murdered, all seen leaving the mall.
Nearly a year later, police have uncovered new evidence about the killer or should we say killers.
It has been nearly a year since Nancy Bochicchio and her daughter, Joey, were found brutally murdered in the parking lot of the Boca Town Center Mall.
On Thursday, Boca Police released new information about where they stand in this case. They have just learned that investigators have no forensic evidence linking the Bochicchio case to the murder of Randi Gorenberg who was also last seen alive at the mall.
However, police say, they do have forensic evidence that connects the murders of Nancy and Joey Bochicchio to the August 7 abduction of a mother and her child at the Boca Town Center Mall. Those victims survived the attack.
Nancy Bochicchio's sister and brother-in-law told members of the media Thursday they want to keep this case in the forefront of peoples minds. They say the holidays, as you can imagine, is a very difficult time.
Police are not revealing what this evidence is. But, they say, they have it. Boca police tell us they have followed up on 89 percent on the 1,600 leads on the Bochicchio case. Police say they have evidence that will identify the killer, they just don't know who that person is.
If you have any information regarding
these cases, please call Crime Stoppers at 1-800-458-TIPS.
Boca Raton police seek clues one
year after killings
Victim's sister appeals for help in Town Center carjackings
By Dianna Cahn |South Florida
Sun-Sentinel
December 5, 2008
Boca Raton - Nancy Bochicchio and her daughter Joey have been gone a year and police leads into the brutal Town Center mall killings are drying up.
But the absence of JoAnn Bruno's baby sister and niece is just starting to sink in as Bruno faces a second Christmas without them.
Police said Thursday that they've put in 9,000 investigative hours, completed most of the 1,600 leads they've developed and have forensic evidence that could implicate a suspect if they could apprehend one.
In a tearful plea, Bruno urged anyone with information to come forward.
"My sister, she needs to rest in peace and as long as he's out there, she won't," Bruno said. "It's not just what he did to her. It's what he did to her baby."
Bochicchio, 47, and Joey, 7, were found bound and shot to death in their SUV in the Town Center parking lot on Dec. 12, 2007, hours after they'd been shopping at the mall. They'd also been robbed of $500 at an ATM.
Police said they were able to link forensic evidence developed since the murders to a similar carjacking on Aug. 7, 2007, in which a woman and her 2-year-old son were abducted as she got into her SUV at the mall. The woman, who has remained anonymous, was also bound and forced to drive to an ATM and withdraw $600, but their lives were spared.
Investigators could find no forensic evidence linking those two attacks to the March 23, 2007, murder of Randi Gorenberg, said Boca Raton Police Chief Dan Alexander. Gorenberg's body was thrown from her vehicle west of Delray Beach a short time after she left the mall and her murder is under investigation by the Palm Beach County Sheriff's Office.
Police Capt. Matt Duggan said police have completed 89 percent of the leads they've developed and have spent more than $15,000 on advanced forensic testing.
Police think that like the August abductions, the Bochicchio case started as a robbery and turned fatally violent.
Police have not found any indication of more recent assaults by the same attacker, Alexander said.
"There's a lot of time and effort and money that's gone into this investigation," he said. "We are certainly not going to rest until we resolve this case.
"We have a brutal crime. It's touched all our hearts," he added.
Police are still offering a $350,000 reward for information leading to the capture of a suspect, Alexander said.
Bruno said she was begging for people to come forward with information.
"It's just sinking in how long I prayed that I'd wake up one day and it was just a bad dream," she said.
"Please," she added. "Everyone has a mother, a sister, a child. If you know anything. It could happen to anybody. It could be you."
Dianna Cahn can be reached at dcahn@SunSentinel.com or 561-243-6645.
Palm Beach Post Editorial
Monday, December 08, 2008
This week marks the first anniversary of the slayings of a mother and her 7-year-old daughter at Town Center mall in Boca Raton. Last week, the city's police department officially linked that crime to another from August 2007.
Unfortunately, the department didn't pay enough attention at the time to the report by a woman that a man had carjacked her from a parking lot at Town Center. She said that the man held a gun to her 2-year-old child's head and forced the mother to make a terror-filled drive to an ATM before releasing her. After the murders of Nancy Bochicchio and Joey Bochicchio-Hauser, the department noted the many similarities. Not until last week did the police department tie that crime to the double murder.
Even then, the department wanted to emphasize a different conclusion: that there is no connection between either of those crimes and the murder in March 2007 of Randi Gorenberg. She was abducted from Town Center and shot in the head. Like the other two women, she was driving a high-end SUV.
At a news conference, police officials said they are running low on leads in the Bochicchio murders. Sadly, the department has been behind since missing that real good lead in August 2007.
New information in Boca Raton mall slaying
The Associated Press
9:28 AM EST, December 12, 2008
BOCA RATON - Authorities have new information in the case of a woman murdered outside an upscale Boca Raton mall.
Palm Beach County Sheriff's authorities will hold a press conference Friday morning on the case that stunned this quiet, beachside town. Randi Gorenberg was killed at the mall in March 2007. Last December, the bodies of 47-year-old Nancy Bochicchio and her 7-year-old daughter Joey were discovered in their car outside the mall. Another mother and child were also kidnapped at the same mall.
Police recently said Gorenberg's murder is not related to the other crimes.
No one has been charged with the crimes.
Mall security was increased after the slayings.
Attorney amends wrongful death lawsuit against Town Center mall
By Jerome Burdi |South Florida
Sun-Sentinel
December 12, 2008
The wrongful death lawsuit filed against the Town Center mall in Boca Raton.
Well before the slaying of a mother and her young daughter, mall owner Simon Property Group and other property owners there were "put on notice" about security issues at the mall but failed to take measures to protect its patrons, according to a wrongful-death lawsuit originally filed in January on behalf of JoAnn Bruno. Bruno is the sister of Nancy Bochicchio, who was found shot dead along with her 7-year-old daughter, Joey, on Dec. 12, 2007, in their SUV in the mall's parking lot.
The other owners named in the amended suit this month are: Sears Roebuck and Co.; Bloomingdale's Boca Raton Real Estate Inc.; Burdine's Real Estate Inc.; and individual trustees Hans C. Mautner, Michael L. Johnson, G. Martin Fell, J. Michael Maloney and Mark S. Ticotin.
Attorneys for the property owners could not be reached for comment, despite attempts by telephone.
Bruno's attorney, David Shiner, said if he wins the lawsuit, it will "vindicate" the two lives lost.
"At the end of the day, there's a thing called accountability," Shiner said. "When all is said and done, the mall and property owners have a responsibility and accountability to the community and to the people that patronize their business."
Jerome Burdi can be reached at jburdi@SunSentinel.com or 561-243-6531.
Unsolved mall murders: One year later
BOCA RATON, FL -- One year ago a suburban Boca Raton mother and her young daughter brutally lost their lives after a simple trip to the mall.
Nancy Bochicchio and her daughter Joey, 7, were abducted, robbed then found murdered outside the Town Center at Boca Raton.
Nancy and Joey's house has not changed.
Their Christmas tree still stands.
Nancy's touch. Joey's touch. Everything from that December day is still in place, even Joey's Christmas card for Mom.
"My sister had it out on the counter, just like this... With the envelope like that and that's the way it stays," says Nancy's sister, JoAnn Bruno.
The notecards Joey would doodle on in front of the TV haven't been touched.
"This one says Joey, love, Sam, that was her little friend Samantha, fun," says Bruno.
On this one year anniversary, Bruno sat down exclusively with NewsChannel 5 and the Sun-Sentinel.
She says she feels a connection to them when inside their home.
"It's exactly the way she left it. I can't move anything, can't change anything. It's the way she wanted it. The way she had it. Changing it would be like pushing it away," says Bruno.
Tears come easier than words so Bruno has had to push away the phone calls, the clippings, and some of the stories.
"After seeing one of them, I just couldn't watch. They all say what happened... how they were pounding, Joey's eyes were covered... She was afraid of the dark," says Bruno.
In the dark of night December 12th, 2007, Nancy and Joey were found bound and shot in their black SUV.
It was parked outside the Town Center at Boca Raton entrance between Sears and Neiman Marcus.
The entrance surveillance video showed them exiting hours earlier.
Just four months earlier, on August 7th, a similar scenario for a Broward County woman and her toddler outside Town Center's Nordstroms.
She and her son survived, but not before being robbed and bound with plastic zip ties and goggles.
Many wondered why police and mall officials didn't notify the public about the August attack earlier.
"What happened? Why did they let that go in the first place, you know?... You gotta excuse me it, just, makes me mad," says Stanley Bruno.
The Bruno's now continue their pleas to the public, in hopes of helping police nab Nancy and Joey's killer or killers.
"If there's a girlfriend, anyone, a relative that knows him, I mean it could've been them. It could've happened to anybody. Please, please if there's anything... call," says JoAnn Bruno.
"This guy had to slip. He had to slip. He had to say something or maybe to one of his friends or somebody in a bar," adds Stanley Bruno.
Over the past year investigators released a suspect sketch, created a task force, and followed up on hundreds of leads.
Town Center installed additional surveillance cameras and community members held awareness fundraisers.
Boca Police beefed up patrols and recently announced a forensic link between the two mother-child cases.
No question it's another difficult december for all involved.
"It touches us on a personal level and the frustration's not going to go away til we can achieve justice in this case," says Boca Raton Police Chief Dan Alexander.
Rather than the Christmas tree with the angel on top, it's the one outside Joey's Saint Jude Catholic School that they gather around.
Above a plaque titled "Heaven's Angels," there sits a tree planted to remember and forever honor Nancy and Joey Bochicchio.
Joann bruno spoke exclusively
with WPTV and the Sun-Sentinel.
You can see more from the interview throughout the day Friday on WPTV
and in Jerome Burdi's article in Friday's Sun-Sentinel.
The Bochicchio/Bruno family and the woman from the August abduction have sued Simon Property Group, the company that owns the Town Center at Boca Raton.
Bruno's attorney, David Shiner, tells us the wrongful death suit now includes all of the mall's property owners, Simon plus five anchor stores, for failing to protect their patrons.
A Town Center at Boca Raton or
Simon Property Group spokesperson was not made available for this story.
Crime Stoppers is offering a $350,000 reward for information leading
to an arrest in the case. Call 1-800-458-TIPS (8477).