Michael Gargiulo | Ep.1

It includes explicit dialogue, listener discretion is advised. Please note, some of the voices you hear in the series have been performed by actors. Under the shimmering lights of Hollywood in the 2000s, a killer lies in weight. He's someone people think they can trust, a neighbor, but he's biting his time, stalking the streets, hunting for his next victim. From ID and arrow media, I'm criminal psychologist Dr. Michelle Ward, in this is Mind of a Monster, the Hollywood Ripper.

Chapter 1, Michael Garjulo.

Michael Garjulo was watching, always watching.

She was stamped and I mean blitured, almost 50 times in her throat was cut. I touched her and she was like, you know, ice cold, that's when the shock said it. A media frenzy erupts when this modern day serial killer is convicted of attempting to murder one woman and succeeding in murdering two other women. All neighbors he ambushed in their own homes. News at 10, actor Ashton Kutcher appears in the Hollywood Ripper trial.

For the first time in my work on the Mind of a Monster series, I'm investigating a case that, as of today, isn't over.

This killer awaits trial in another murder case in Illinois.

“Trisha parked her car and walked up to the side of the house, key in hand, but she never made it inside.”

Throughout this season, I'll be delving into the disturbed mind of Michael Garjulo. He's one of the most contemporary and as a woman living in LA at the time, troubling serial killers I've investigated. The rage of the killing of Ashton was so extreme. The attack on Rio Bruno was so vicious, so callous, it almost was like a personal thing. The methodical and systematic slaughter of women by Michael Garjulo.

That's what this case is about. It's 2019, Michael Garjulo is standing trial for multiple murder charges in Los Angeles. I remember it vividly. Dubbed the Hollywood Ripper case, it makes headlines all over the world. Journalists Nathan Solis reported on the case and he takes me into that courtroom where the sole survivor is about to face her attacker.

So Michelle Murphy takes the stand. It must have been a moment of hi-drama.

She's finally faced a face with her attacker 11 years later.

“What do you remember about her testimony and the atmosphere in the courtroom at that time?”

The room felt incredibly fraught with tension, not necessarily out of fear for her safety, but fear for her having to confront this again. She was just so incredibly brave and strong in the eyes of everyone in that room at that time. I wrote on my notes, because Sergio Lo is about 60 tall and she's petite and she's much smaller than him. But she's tearing herself like she's 10 feet tall because she had so much courage and conviction to be up there.

She struck me as someone who had no problem looking at Sergio Lo. She was the one that survived and she looked directly at him. And I don't think that's something that we can all say for ourselves. Michelle Murphy's testimony opens the trial. Everyone wants to hear from the woman who's survival unmasked as suspected serial killer.

The 37-year-old takes the stand. She's only a few feet away from the 43-year-old Michael. He's bald, pale, and wearing thick rimmed glasses. Virtually unrecognizable from the repair man with Hollywood good looks, who was Michelle's neighbor in Santa Monica back in 2008.

“Did she mention about her interactions that she'd had with Mike Gargulo before the night when he attacked her?”

Yeah. So the two of them lived in apartment buildings in Santa Monica and they had a common alley in between the two of them. And that's where they were part of their vehicles. She had a utility truck parked when she would sometimes see him and he would occasionally wafer that was the extent of their interactions.

No, no, but apparently his apartment looked right into her apartment, so it was just a matter of him looking at his window. Oh gosh.

“Michelle's testimony takes us back to April 28th, 2008, a warm spring evening in Santa Monica.”

She's put in her laundry and now she's working out in the back alley behind her apartment building. She's jumping rope. Michelle is 26 and keeps in good shape. She's 5-1 in attractive with dark shoulder length hair.

By 9 pm, her laundry is done. She empties the dryer and goes up to her second floor apartment to take a shower.

A relaxed evening lies ahead. Her roommate is out of town, so Michelle has the place to herself. But it's a Monday night, so nothing crazy, just TV and then sleep. She cracks open the living room window to let in a cooling breeze before going to bed at about 10 p.m. 1146 p.m., Michelle is in her bathroom talking to the emergency responder on the phone. She's covered in blood, terrified, shaken. Please describe for us what she says happened that night.

“She testified that she woke up to the filling of the night coming down on her, and that she couldn't immediately see what was happening.”

She knew that someone was on top of her. Wow, she felt the sensation of being stabbed. She said something to the effect of "I'm not going to let this be my end," or "I'm not going to give up here." And she struggled with him, and she grabbed up the knife, but it was slick with her blood, and so she couldn't get a good firm grip on it. So as she was struggling, she pulled her legs out from under him. She pulled her knees up to her chest, and she basically launched him. She kicked him off with whatever strength she had, if you'd go girl.

Yeah, no, it was incredible to hear her describe that, and turning that struggle is when he cut himself.

Okay, do we want to kill the knife? We shall, and sorry, I didn't pull off the door. The prosecution just laid out its evidence and was asking their questions, and included the 911 call of her. Talking to an operator about the attack, and her voice sounded composed, but very tiny, you know, the quality wasn't great. And that times you could hear her breaking down, and then she picked herself up.

So she was able to describe his physique and his height. She said, "Oh, he's 5-11." He was wearing dark clothing and it couldn't see his face. Do you remember how he got in? Yeah, if he went through a window, he cut it open with a knife. The jury was showing the photos from her apartment, and it was just covered in blood.

Just everywhere. And over her bed spread, and her hallway where she crawled out of, because she chased after him, as he was running out of her apartment, and he said, "Sorry to her, and then she locked her door." Oh, my gosh. Do you remember how he got in? Yeah, if he went through a window, he cut it open with a knife.

The jury was showing the photos from her apartment, and it was just covered in blood.

Take a second to let that sink in.

I'm sitting here processing what Nathan has said. That this girl who's small, strong, but small, in bed, a sleep, not clothed, is able to transition from sleep to attack to defend herself in no time at all. No matter who you are, it takes time to realize what is going on around you, what you're experiencing, and to engage in fight or flight. Somehow, she's able to get out from underneath this large male attacker with a weapon, somehow injure him, and chasing down the hallway.

“And then, to make it even stranger, he apologizes for what?”

Is he sorry you didn't finish the job? Is he sorry he messed up? Who's he apologizing to? To Michelle, to himself? Or perhaps he's sorry, because this means he may get caught.

Back in court, photographs are being shown to the jury of Michelle lying in a hospital bed after the attack. Stablins to a chest in arms. Were you able to get an impression of the jury's reactions as she described the injuries in the night?

And a few of them were taking notes visibly upset when they would see photos of her injuries that were put upon display.

So, you could see that they would take a beat, and they would look up, and it was kind of like a gut patch, because you're looking at this very graphic cut to this person's body. And she was in the room with this. There was also a sense that she was getting the last word in, and that she was able to face her attacker and hold him to account.

“From an emotional standpoint, how did she seem on the stand?”

She seemed for the most part composed, and the fact that she had the ability to go through those questions without breaking down was definitely surprising. I mean, despite it being 11 years later, none of us have experienced anything like that. And I can't imagine ever reliving it without being an absolute mess.

She painted a picture that you probably could never really imagine.

The idea that someone is in your bedroom at night is probably a fear that a lot of people have, but for her to paint that visual. And then for her to be in the room with this man, made her seem like she was a giant. For my research, I have access to thousands of pages of legal documents from the California State Superior Court. Throughout this series, I'll be digging into these transcripts together information. I've learned that Michael's trial revolves around four women, Michelle Murphy, whose courage ended his killing spray, Ashley Ellerin and Maria Bruno.

Plus, the judge takes a rare step of allowing the prosecution to include evidence about a fourth woman, Trisha Picaccio.

Michael will stand trial for her murder later in Illinois.

Like all of the women he's accused of killing, Michelle Murphy is good looking, outgoing, and petite. Easy for Garjoulo to overpower. Beyond neighborly, Halos, they did not know each other.

“Who is Michael Garjoulo and how did he become such a brutal killer?”

Michael, Thomas Garjoulo, is born on February 15, 1976. He's the fifth of seven children. He has three sisters and three brothers. His father has several jobs working long hours to support his growing family, leaving Michael's mother at home in charge of this boisterous gaggle of children. They live in Glenview, a leafy suburb 20 miles north of Chicago. Glenview is a small, safe town. The type of place where kids playing sprinklers on the front lawn while parents wash their cars. The mind of a monster team tracks down one of Michael's teenage friends, who agrees to an interview on condition of anonymity.

We've disguised his voice to protect his identity. We would just hang out and smoke weed and cause mischip or whatever. We would just roll around in the cars and smoke weed and Michael would find us some weed because he was a little older and some people who would help accommodate us. I wasn't the greatest son back in those days. I remember one particular time we were in my dad's Chevy Tahoe at the shopping plaza,

driving it over the grass island in the parking lot, just kind of going straight across, like off-roading it. He was like, "Gay going like a school girl." It was enjoyable, you know, for the most part to hang out with.

“I mean, we used to laugh with Michael a lot, honestly.”

It was really at the expense of others, but we would laugh with Michael a lot. He was funny. I thought he was a funny guy. So, in a lot of ways, Michael is just a typical teenager, which in and of itself is an insight. He's not a loner sitting in his room or in his garage or basement, not interacting with other kids or classmates. It might be notable that Michael's hanging out with someone who is three years younger than he is,

but remember, most of the other kids are in school or obeying rules. There's only so many misfits to choose from. Both of these boys are doing poorly in school. I don't remember him in school, and I don't remember him ever talking about school. It was my impression that I did a similar thing.

I dropped that high school and I was junior and ended up getting my high school diploma. A lot of the kids that were a little more inclined to be in trouble, then to just grab it towards that.

And this is kind of interesting. Right here it says that he was put into special education when he was 10, for being disruptive, distracting others, and teachers generally just finding him difficult. And that's all according to the psychologist who was brought in by the defense, via in Castellano. Now, she talks about him having oppositional conduct disorder.

“And I don't think that's what she means.”

I think what she means is the two separate disorders of oppositional defiant disorder and conduct disorder. But they're a little different. Oppositional defiant disorder is characterized by being disobedient and defiant with adults, which is exactly what I think Michael had at the time. Now, conduct disorder is a little bit more serious, and he's not quite there yet. That's characterized by having a disregard for the rights of others, being very physically aggressive and very anti-social.

That's like real rule breaking in these kids. And it's more than just being oppositional defiant at age 10. So I would say that's probably pretty right on that he probably had oppositional defiant disorder. Now, her evidence was part of the defense case presented at Michael's trial, so the prosecution and no other parties found any of these details. So far, I'm just saying a naughty rebellious teen.

I need to understand more about his genes and his environment to get a clearer picture. There were scruffy Italian family, and I'll be honest with you. I looked up to Michael because he had a name behind him. That our jewel name was kind of, I don't want to see, like super popular, but like the Gargilla boys were known, and they were fairly popular guys. Michael claims he's bullied by a sibling.

“I remember him telling stories about getting locked in his room and getting the crap picked out of him, and his parents didn't defend him.”

His parents didn't seem to be supporting to him.

According to him, I never witnessed any of this, but according to him, his parents just kind of let it go down.

They didn't really interact. They didn't really come to his rescue. This account is mirrored in Michael's trial, but the psychologist hired by the defense. It hasn't been verified by the prosecution or any other parties. Michael is a bully too. I want to see if his teenage friend ever saw this side of him. He was just an intimidating, volatile, unpredictable guy.

I always felt like I was lucky because for whatever reason Michael didn't take on me, he would pick one of us in the group and just, yeah, he was mean. You know, he would just belittle you and make fun of you when he was relentless. He wouldn't stop. I remember him picking on my friend. I was a bigger kid when I was young. I was already predisposed to be on guard for bullying.

So I always found it enjoyable that Michael didn't pick me to pick on me.

“But I just always remember feeling like on edge.”

You know, you never really kind of knew what he was going to do. I mean, we'd be sitting there one moment, smoking a joint. And the next moment Michael would be ripping his shirt off running across the field, screaming or, you know, attacking my body. I mean, uncing him, you know, repeatedly. He was extremely volatile.

I mean, you just never knew what he was going to do. This is more significant bullying than someone who simply targets just one person. As discussed, this looks like conduct disorder, which is more serious than oppositional defiant disorder or ODD. ODD is a pattern of negative defiant and disobedient behavior towards authority.

Conduct disorder on the other hand includes physical aggression, destruction of property, deceitfulness, and overall more serious rule violation. Now, this can be typical in someone we see on a trajectory toward full-blown anti-social personality disorder, in which we have a long-term pattern of disregard for and violation of the rights of others, like a criminal in the making.

But lots of will adjusted adults were bullies as children. So, I need to dig deeper into his familial history to try to understand all possible influences on his criminal outcome. I found out that both of Michael's grandfather's came to New York in the early 1920s on a boat from Naples.

Fred Cardafet is a professor of Italian American Studies and, like Michael, is a third-generation Italian American.

His grandparents arrived in Chicago around the same time as Michael's. Why Chicago? Why they go there? Chicago was the transportation hub of the United States. It was the point in which people went west. There was meatpacking, there were transportation, and the railroad's met there. Everybody needed workers at that time.

What kind of jobs would they have had?

They were the works for the railroad. They were the builders. You know, there's a story that says they were lured over and there was the ideas that the streets were paved with goals. And when they got here, they realized the streets were paved at all. There was no goal there, and they were the ones expected to do the painting. Many, many, many migrants died during the buildings of skyscrapers. This kind of idea that the worker was expendable.

“Life is cheap for first-generation Italian immigrants, like Michael Garśulu's grandparents.”

Their children would have witnessed the hardship. The blood, sweat, and the tears it took to do the new life. The sacrifices that meant they could leave the Italian ghetto for the leafy suburbs. Just like Michael's parents did, when they moved to Glenview in 1964. You don't know the Garjulu's, and you're a bit older than Michael.

But how was life at home for you and your family growing up?

I grew up thinking very much so that I would never live to be 40 or 50 years old.

Because violence was something that was expected. It was a way of resolving problems. You know, somebody's giving you a problem, slap on. Somebody's giving you a real problem with killing. My father was killed when I was 10. My father's father grabbed me. The day my father was killed, I was about to cry.

And he said, "You're the man in the family now. Men don't cry." I didn't cry from that day in 1963 until I went into therapy 40 years later. But when I did go to therapy, I had a therapist once who said to me, "It's a wonder you didn't become a mass murderer." Obviously, Fred Gardefe did not turn into a mass murderer. And frankly, having a violent childhood does not at all mean someone will grow up to be violent.

I don't know how much of Fred Gardefe's story rings true for Michael's family, but this tough, macho immigrant heritage is somewhat of a useful lens for which to view Michael's upbringing. We do know that we are culturally, genetically, and environmentally related to our own family. So disentangling the causes of behavior in one singular person is impossible. It's too anecdotal. We need a population statistic for that.

However, we also know that there can be cultural influences in terms of what specific behaviors are normalized within a family. Then Fred Gardefe tells me something else, deep in the Italian psyche, that might help me understand Michael better.

“So what was going on in Italy in the 1920s that made so many people want to leave?”

Italy was a land that was constantly invaded and not only invaded but occupied by foreign countries. And this idea of creating a false, front and a technique to protect your real core of who you are. That's part of the behavior of people who live in occupied countries. The Italians called it having a bellafiguda. And you make yourself look better than you are.

Or you make yourself look worse than you are. So this idea of bellafiguda. It's so ingrained in Italian culture that people like Gardeulum would have canon under his skin. It would have been in his DNA. And the idea is you don't let people know what you're thinking.

You don't really let them know the truth about you. The idea is that if you tell the truth to somebody, the devil will take over. Don't let anyone know what you're thinking. Don't let anyone know the truth about you. The perfect mantra for a serial killer.

This also makes me wonder more about Michael's parents. How he was raised and what his home life was like. Something for me to dive further into. So I'm outside playing with my dogs as they are wrestling. And it's got me thinking about Michael Gardeulum's friend and what he said about him and how he's a bully.

And he's kind of, you know, a little bit violent. And maybe a bit of a trouble maker. But so we're plenty of teenage boys.

“And what I think is yes, we could be seeing a guy on a bad trajectory.”

But we have to remember a lot of teenage boys grow out of this kind of stuff. He's a little bit on the reference of that spectrum. But he's also from a culture where some of that behavior seems positive. And he hasn't done anything quite yet to really raise red flags. But I say this.

This is the crucial crossroad.

It's where some kids mature and become reasonable adults. And others take a much more dangerous road. We'll see where he goes.

I know the first day of shopping.

And I have a lot of problems. But the platform is not one step away.

“I have the feeling that shopping trip is completely optimized.”

Everything is super integrated and balanced. And the time and the money that I can't invest in there. For Alam Invaxtum. Let's costen those tests from Shopify.de. It's 1993 in Glenview, Illinois.

And Trisha Picacho is an 18-year-old high school graduate, looking forward to her freshman year at College. I speak with Chicago, sometimes journalist, Frank Mayn. So I want to take you back to your impressions of Glenview in 1993. I'm familiar with the area.

It's a very nice upper class community, kind of a leafy, sleepy community.

“And most of the kids are upwardly mobile and heading to good universities.”

And I've read that at the time, Trisha Picacho is one of them. Trisha was heading to Purdue University to study engineering. And that's a great engineering school. So she was kind of following the path that a lot of kids from that area would follow, which is to either go to one of the big 10 schools or Ivy League schools,

or something like that. So that's kind of the neighborhood that she grew up in. Trisha is a force of nature. She's a four foot 11-inch powerhouse with the world at her feet. As well as the school debate team, she's on the badminton team,

and she will be leaving Glenview at the end of August for Purdue University in Indiana. She's beautiful, clever, and popular. Trisha's brother Doug knows Michael Garzuelo.

Mike and Doug first met at age nine.

They went to the same elementary school to Cub Scouts and even started a band together. Doug on bass, Mike, and drums. Doug and Michael are also on the football team together. Michael is fast, strong, and can kick a football father than anyone else. In August 1993, Michael or Mike, as his friends call him, is 17.

He's athletic and handsome with warm brown eyes, a charismatic smile and dark hair in a mullet. Mike's either spending time with his girlfriend, Allison Miceffey. They've been dating since they were 15 or 16, or hanging out with friends like Doug Pocaccio. In my research, I want to learn more about the Pocaccio family and where Michael fits into it. Everyone is welcome at their house, which is the next street over from the Garzuelo's.

Doug Pocaccio's mom, Diane, often cooks for her kid's friends.

But she remembers that Michael never seems particularly comfortable in the house.

Diane sets some food in front of him, and she says he pick it up, and he'd start pacing back and forth like a caged animal. She says, "Why don't you sit down with everyone else?" And he'd say, "Well, I can't." And he'd take off out the door. Could this be puzzling behavior?

Michael's known Doug for most of his life and isn't at home in his house. But it might be normal teenage awkwardness around other people's parents, or him just being uncomfortable with authority figures in general. Or is it because he has nefarious intentions toward Trisha

“that he doesn't want to accidentally reveal by sticking around for too long?”

On August 14, 1993, Trisha Pocaccio is found stabbed to death on the doorstep of her family home. In the LA courtroom in 2019, prosecuting District Attorney Dan Ackman is seeking justice for Michael Garzuelo's victims. Trisha Pocaccio's case is used in evidence, even though Michael's not on trial for her murder at this time. DA Ackman presents what he believes to be Michael's first murder and paints a heartbreaking picture of Trisha Pocaccio's last hours. On Friday, the 13th of August, in 1993, it was hot and muggy in Glenview and a thick fog had settled over the area.

Trisha is due to leave for Indiana in five days, journalist Frank Main. She was out with some friends, and they were kind of having this kind of a last rob before she went to college, and they went out to a restaurant and kind of celebrated. And then afterwards, I think that she drove her friends back to their cars and then went home. Trisha's evening ended with hugs and kisses with her friends.

To Trisha, it was the summer of her life and the end of a perfect evening with friends.

What happened that night?

The police thinks she was killed somewhere around one a.m. in the morning, but her body wasn't found until the later that morning when her dad went to walk with family dog. It was looking out at the front door and saw Jim Shoes near the stairs and it turned out to be his daughter, and obviously it was horribly traumatic. He screamed and then from what I gather, they were in such shock that eventually the police had to take both of them to the hospital because of their horror and what they had discovered.

It is so traumatizing to think about a father stumbling upon his daughter's mutilated body. I expect nothing less than then needing to be hospitalized after that. It's the the the ripple effect of victims in a case like this is so mind-boggling to me. Yeah, a crime like this looks like rage. It looks like anger and you have this sweetheart, this apple of everybody's eye.

And killed in the such a violent manner and this is on the family's stoop. Walk outside of their house probably not even knowing that their daughter's not home.

“And there she is. You have to register that she's dead. Could you describe Trisha's injuries?”

From what I recall, one of her arms was broken in the struggle that she had with her killer. And she was stabbed like a dozen times. Back in court, prosecutor Diannaigman makes the case that Michael Garjulo is responsible for killing Trisha. The evidence will show that Garjulo was waiting for her with the knife. Garjulo, who is athletic and had trained in martial arts and boxing, grabbed Trisha, who was very petite, snapped her arm and stabbed her repeatedly in the left breast arm and chest.

Garjulo left her bleeding to death on the doorstep of the family home and fled. Michael's teenage friend remembers that day vividly more than 30 years later.

“They were such huge, huge, thanks for local and beer. They have a little girl standing down on her doorstep, you know?”

I mean, that was big news in Glenbeard. Murderers are very rare in Glenbeard, and this one of an innocent girl for rociously stabbed outside her home has a shattering impact on the collective psyche. Journalist Frank Mane. So, it's a crime that obviously seems linked to extreme anger and personal animus. The question that everybody had at the time is, how did this lovely girl who was a straight-a student seem to kind of bridge all sorts of different social groups in the high school?

Why would somebody do this? Exactly. Friends at investigators seal off the scene and Trisha's body is taken away for examination. It's quickly established that Trisha has not been sexually assaulted. The stabbing is frenzy. Trisha has wounds to her chest, arms, and back.

It's overkill, much more than needed to end someone's life.

“Stabbing is an intimate act, it requires strength, skill, and practice, and it can go wrong, so why choose that as a way of killing?”

Sometimes the attacker gets pleasure through the act itself, being so close to someone as their life drains away. Prosecutor Dan Ackman shares with the jury what he believes to be Michael's MO.

Arturo Lowe's plan to kill was to first identify a target who lived near him, equate himself with that victim, and her habits, and routines,

and then watch shadow, stalk, and hunt down the victims relentlessly as part of his plan to kill. Michael stays silent throughout his trial, but after his arrest in 2008 following the attack on Michelle Murphy, his conversations in jail were secretly recorded. Throughout the series, these snippets will give us valuable insights into his state of mind. Here's an excerpt from a conversation Michael had with his cellmate.

Yeah, I think they're fishing. That's what it sounds like.

“I was like, "What? I've never heard any woman over any, just just didn't they make any money? I don't have problems with any women."”

I should write a book and publish it, and I already got a card wrongfully appeared. Michael's typical of many killers, of course he didn't do it, but that couldn't be further from the truth.

“Michael is setting patterns that will expose him as a dangerous predator, a killer who meticulously targets in stalks young women,”

before butchering them in the most horrific way. Coming up this season on Mind of a Monster, the Hollywood Ripper.

I had never ever felt that type of energy before it was cold. It was not friendly, it was not welcoming.

“She said, "How did you get in? Where'd you get that key? Get the fuck out of here."”

These killings in Los Angeles wouldn't have happened if he was in prison in Illinois. I just remembered being like, "God, this guy who I really kind of looked up to and valued my friendship where it could be such a serious monster." He's so confident that she's not going to scream. He's so confident in his ability to brutally murder somebody. Mind of a monster, the Hollywood Ripper, is produced by Arrow Media, a free mantle company for ID. I'm your host, Dr. Michelle Ward.

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