01x04 - Feared Silent

[bunniefuu]

[Donnie] There was a trailer
over on Buck Mountain Road,

I wanna say probably
about 25 yards off the road.

It's a really secluded place

on Friday, November 13th.

[Donnie]
There's no neighbors.

The way the property was set up,

there was no way you could
see anything from the road.

So once you got back there,
you were at their mercy.

There was nobody coming
to save you.

Nobody would hear you.

If you got brought out there,
that was it.

There was no walking away
from that.

[theme music plays]

[suspenseful vocalizations]

♪♪

[screaming]

[tense music plays]

On November 17th, 2015,

Virginia Rodriguez
celebrated her birthday.

Every single year,
no matter what,

her son Pepe would always
reach out to his mother.

Pepe was a good-looking guy,

Pepe's real name is Jose Herran.

He was from New Jersey,
but he had moved

to Pennsylvania because
a friend had told him,

"Hey, maybe I can
use you out here.

Maybe you can help out.
I got a place for you to stay."

But that year,
he didn't reach out to her.

[phone dialing]

[CPL. Williams]
Virginia Rodriguez,
she was somewhat frantically

calling him constantly
on his cell phone,

and it was going right
to voicemail.

He stopped all communication
with family.

[Dep. Zola] There would never
be a time or circumstance

that would take him away

from his mother
and his daughter.

[phone dialing]

[CPL. Williams]
Virginia Rodriguez told

law enforcement that the last
time she had talked to her son

was on November 13th of 2015,
that was Friday the 13th.

I was a supervisor
of a homicide unit

with the Pennsylvania State
Police for 17 years.

When we got this call
about this investigation,

I think investigators early on,
they knew there was more to it.

I was working a cold case,
and my supervisor wanted us

to drop everything
and move forward

on this new information
that was coming in.

[Sgt. Bogart] We just started
hitting the ground,

started talking to anybody
that would tell us something.

We'd listen,
we'd follow that lead,

talk to somebody else.

[CPL. Williams]
We're also looking into,

did Pepe use his passport,

and did he passport out
of the country?

You know, all those things,

and all of them kept coming
back negative.

At this point, we knew
that Pepe took a chance,

and he moves to Weatherly.

So law enforcement had
about a month window

from October
up until November 13th,

then all of a sudden,
he's gone -- vanished.

We couldn't find that he was

on the face
of the Earth anymore.

[Sgt. Bogart] Weatherly Borough
sits in northeast PA,

right on the outside of Poconos.

It sits kind of secluded
out in the middle of nowhere.

It's three and a half
square miles.

It's got about 2,500 residents.

So it's a very
tight-knit community.

People know everybody.

The town, it kind of has
that hill-have-eyes,

or that creepy feeling,
where it kinda feels like

somebody's always watching.

Just outside of Weatherly is

where it runs
into Foster Township.

It's woods, hundreds
and hundreds of acres of woods.

And then
there's the stone couch.

Sits on Buck Mountain Road.

It's a rock that looks
like a couch.

They say if you sit
on the couch,

the first time,
bad luck will happen to you.

The second time,
somebody that you know will die.

And the third time, you'll die.

I wouldn't dare sit
on that couch.

[tense piano plays]

[Sgt. Bogart] On August 6th,

since Pepe had gone missing.

It was around 2 o'clock
in the morning.

I received a phone call
from my chief,

said that we had a large fire
in town -- that jolts me.

It wakes you right up.

I jump out of bed,
grab some clothes,

jump in the vehicle.

[siren wailing]

[Cap. Breznitsky]
A Bunch of residents
had called and said,

"There's a house on fire
on Third Street,"

and we didn't really
know what was going on.

Everything was burning.

I remember the heat
being so intense,

I could feel the left side
of my face starting to blister.

That's how hot it was.

You could smell
the shingles burning,

the sting in your nose.
It's the asphalt smell.

You can smell the vinyl
siding burning.

[Sgt. Bogart]
It was a lot worse than
I expected when I got there.

There were three houses
that were on fire.

But, by the grace of God,

everybody got out
without any serious injuries.

So we had
an accelerant-sniffing dog,

and the dog definitely hit
on some areas

that were deemed to have
accelerants on 'em.

-It was arson.
-[siren wailing]

[Sgt. Bogart] I told my officers
to start doing interviews,

talking to the neighbors.

We need to go at it
and figure out who started it,

how they started it,
why they started it.

That morning after the fire,

while we were doing
this investigation,

I found out
that Roberto Torner

owned the property
on Third Street.

He was in his late 40s,
confident.

He's about as wide
as he is tall.

[Roberto]
This is what we're doing today,

taking it down caveman style,
one piece at a time.

So, of course I love my job.

Wouldn't you?

[CPL. Williams]
Roberto Torner was
a well-known name in the area.

He was really integrating
himself from being an outsider

into this small community

by wanting to be involved
in politics,

wanting to be
involved with local government,

buy properties, fix them up,

be friends with the chief
of police,

be friends with the mayor,

maybe run for mayor himself.

[Sgt. Bogart]
I asked Rob several times
if he had anything to do

with the fire,
if he set the fire,

and he adamantly says
he did not.

He said he had nothing
to do with it.

So speaking with Torner,

just asking him
basic questions --

if he had insurance on it,
if he knew what happened,

if he had any
problems with anybody.

My officers started by looking
at every single house to see

if there was any type
of surveillance camera on it.

A couple blocks away,
they found a security camera.

I noticed there was
this white Mitsubishi Eclipse

with a big spoiler on the back
that stuck out.

It was very distinctive,
and I'm not sure how

to tie it in yet,
but I need to find the car.

[siren wailing]

[Sgt. Bogart] Knowing the sheer
damage and destruction

of the fire being over
a million dollars in damage,

that's when I decided
to bring A*F in.

We got federal search warrants

for all the properties
that Torner owned.

We pull up that morning
to execute the search warrant

in the Cottage Hotel.

The Cottage Hotel
was a three-story,

Pepto-Bismol color,
pink gargoyles out front.

There was always weird
stuff going on there.

It was a transient place.

[CPL. Williams] People
that lived at the Cottage,

it seemed as though
they were afraid to talk,

and we didn't know why.

It was always,
"I don't know anything.

I can't help you."

During these interviews
with the tenants of the Cottage,

we had an individual
come forward,

and he said that I needed
to talk to a tenant there.

He's been there
for about two, three years.

He wasn't on our radar yet.

He was just another person
that we were talking to.

[Donnie] Oh, this is me in 2014
when I moved into the cottage,

and I had absolutely no idea
what I had in store for me.

About 11 o'clock at night,

I got a phone call,
and it was a blocked number.

I answered the call,
and it was Sergeant Bogart.

And he told me, like,

"Look, I'm parked
across the road.

You look out your window,
you'll see that white car."

He's like,
"Come down, get in my car,

"and I'm gonna take
you somewhere.

We're gonna go,
and I want you to talk to me."

He assured me, like,

"Nothing's gonna
happen to you.

We're gonna protect you."

And then finally I agreed.
I'm like...

"There's a place
three miles away.

"When it gets dark and I know
that everybody's gone

or in bed,
I will meet you there."

I got in the car with him.
I was terrified.

Anybody can show you a badge.

That doesn't mean
they're a cop.

And then the doors locked,
and then he took off.

So all of a sudden I'm in a car
with a big bald dude

that has a g*n,

and he's driving
towards the woods.

He took us this weird
back way into Weatherly.

I never went that way before.
He didn't say a word to me.

So that made me even
more scared.

So I'm like sitting there
with my hand on the doorknob.

I literally was gonna jump
out of the car.

We got to the Weatherly
police station,

and there was a room
full of federal agents.

So I was shocked.
I was honestly shocked.

Detective Bogart,
he tried to calm me down

the best he could.

He said, "You're cool,
you're cool, you're cool."

We actually sit down
and interview him about

what was going on.

I admitted that I knew
about the fire

and that I was there,

and I tried
to convey to them

that I was not
a willing participant.

They didn't believe me.

Like, they absolutely
did not believe me.

[CPL. Williams]
Donnie Warren, I think,

had a really tough decision
to make,

"Am I gonna be on the good
guy team,

or am I gonna be
on the bad guy team?"

So I told him,
"I know what happened to Pepe."

[Sgt. Bogart] Donnie Warren
was a resident there

at the Cottage Hotel.

Donnie is an individual --
a very unique individual,

to say the least.

The stories that Donnie
was telling us,

it was almost hard
to believe.

One of the first things
he said,

that he had the vampire disease,

you know, which I didn't
know what it was.

And we're like, "Oh, yeah,
that's interesting, Donnie."

I got treated like
a UFO abductee.

Nobody believed me.

Fast forward when
you find that it's a thing.

It's Porphyria, like,

if he gets stressed out
and he goes in the sun,

he starts to, like, break out.
You know, it's just weird.

But when he told me he drove
his white Eclipse,

and I'm like, "Does it have
a big wing on the back?"

He's like, "Yes."

And I'm like,
"His story makes sense.

He was here
because we have the photo

to show that he was here."

And it seemed Donnie was
telling the truth.

That he wanted to speak to us.

He wanted to talk to whoever
was in charge.

And I even told him, like,

"Look, this -- this is actually
what happened."

I had moved into the Cottage
around November

a couple of years ago.

Me and my girlfriend
had split up at the time.

And so I was

just basically desperate
for a place to stay.

There was people in and out
of there constantly.

This woman, Alba,

was the one that dealt

with the elderly people
they had there.

There was a family living
down the hall from me

as a couple
and a couple of children.

[Donnie]
Pepe, well, Jose Herran,
had moved into the Cottage

around the beginning
of November.

He was only there for, like,
maybe a week and a half,

maybe two weeks
at the very most.

I like Pepe.
I thought he was cool.

Sharp dresser.
He's a ladies' man.

A typical, you know,
Cuban machismo.

Kind of like a fatherly
figure type guy.

Pepe and Roberto Torner
knew each other.

[indistinct whispering]

The first time I met Rob,
I noticed straight away

that he seems like he's genuine.
He's a caring guy.

He just wants to help you.

He doesn't want anything
out of it.

Rob knew that I was broke,
and I needed money, so,

uh, he had work around.

At first,
I did a lot of painting,

and then after about a week
of living at the Cottage,

things started to take
a really sinister turn.

[tense music builds]

[Donnie]
Just out of the blue,

I was told, "Oh, I need you
to go over to Buck Mountain Road

and paint over a floor."

But you have to use this paint.

And he gave me four gallons
of oil-based paint.

Absolutely had to be
oil-based paint.

And I had to coat as many
coats over the floor as I could.

So I thought it was
a little weird.

Like, why would you be painting

over something
that carpet goes over?

So it didn't make
any sense to me.

And then when I saw
what was on the floor,

I saw the volume of blood
that was on the floor.

You try telling yourself
that that's not what it is,

like, "No, that can't be."

It was in that moment that
I realized that I saw too much,

I knew too much.

There's absolutely no way

they were gonna
let me leave there alive.

[crunching]

[Donnie] The next day,
there was a bag of weapons

that were put in my room.

There was a 45, a 9mm,

a 22, there was a shotgun
and an AK-47.

I was told to strip them down,
clean them,

make sure that there was
nothing, no fingerprints,

like, no DNA, no nothing,
using bleach and ammonia.

The moment that
I touched the weapons, like,

I knew what they were used for.

And...that was like the point
of no return.

So it was really
a horrible feeling

'cause that was, like, any shot
I had of people believing me

was the evidence
that I was destroying,

so it was really
a double-edged sword.

I did my best to, like,
make it appear that I did it,

but not erase all of it.

And then I wrapped them
in bags,

and then I put them back
in the duffel bag.

One of the first questions
I had, um,

of Donnie after he told us
his story was,

"Why didn't you call 911?
Why didn't you report it?"

And, according to Donnie,
he did.

He went to Chief Anthony Harris,
who at the time was

the Freeland Bureau
Chief of Police.

And I was like, "I don't know
what to do, what do I do?"

And he looked at me and said,

"That can just as easily
happen to you."

I'm like, "Oh, my God.
Oh, my God.

What did I just do?"

I went in the store.
I came out -- Harris was gone.

I'm like, "All right,
maybe he won't say anything."

I got home at The Cottage

and I saw Chief Harris
walk out the front door.

As soon
as I walked through the door,

all the people that
were there shut up.

Somebody hit me.

And then,
like a pack of hyenas...

I had a g*n stuck under my chin

and told that I was a snitch
and they were gonna k*ll me.

And I eventually talked
my way out of it.

I'm like, "Look,
he's misunderstood what I said.

"I don't know
what he's talking about.

I didn't say that to him."

And eventually after getting

your face beat in
and you saying the same thing,

I was allowed
to walk away from it.

But any hope
that I had of getting away

disintegrated instantly.

I lived every day of my life
waiting to get k*lled.

I tried to make myself
as invisible as possible

because I knew
if I drew attention

in any way that that was --

potentially fatal.

[Donnie sobs]

Once they trapped you,
that was it.

There was no leaving.
There was just no way out.

[Donnie sobs]

[Dep. Zola]
A witness came forward.

That was Donnie Warren.

He relayed
to the investigative team

that Jose, "Pepe," Herran was,
in fact, a missing person

and had been living
in Freeland in 2015.

[Sgt. Bogart]
We know Pepe's family
last heard from him,

Friday, November 13th, 2015.

[Dep. Zola]
So between that report

and the information
from Donnie Warren,

we knew we were onto something.

Donnie was able to get
into more details

about what it was like
for him and others

to live at The Cottage.

The Cottage was the center
of the universe, for sure.

The Cottage was a tool

used by Roberto Torner
to control people.

[CPL. Williams] A lot of these
people were just, in fact,

down on their luck,
or they had addictions,

or they just needed
a place to stay.

He was very, very good
at finding people's weaknesses

and then exploiting
that weakness to manipulate 'em.

[Sgt. Bogart] So people
are so scared of Roberto Torner

and that's what he feeds on.

There was always rumblings
when we're talking to people

and saying that, you know,

the police chief
and Torner are friends.

We see 'em together
all the time.

Once you're
in the Torner family,

it's, uh, sort of like
the mafia.

You're gonna be one
of his minions.

[Donnie] He told us flat out,
"Blood in, blood out.

It's us versus everybody else."

There was rumors in town

we were all Satanists,

that we were sacrificing
animals, cult meetings,

you know, Rob sat in a throne
and drank from a skull and,

you know,
all of us were brainwashed.

He was talked up
like Charles Manson.

And then there was
Dave Alzugaray.

He was Rob's
personal automaton.

He did whatever Rob told him.

If you saw Rob, Dave was there.

I know Dave did have
some belief in --

Santeria and voodoo.

Dave had a bunch of,
like, ritualistic items

that were related to black magic
and to Santeria.

It was a ritual stone.

It had, like,
a face carved in it.

One time Dave had did
something that made Rob mad,

so in order to pay
penance for it,

he took that carved stone
and, I mean,

literally bashed himself
in the face with it...

until blood would just
rang out of his face.

-[thud]
-[Rob groans]

[Donnie] This is my blood oath
to you -- you're my brother.

This is my life.
I'm giving you my life.

It was surreal, I mean,

saying -- it's surreal,
to watch somebody do that.

I -- I -- I've never seen
anything like it.

[CPL. Williams] Roberto Torner
owned several properties

in Carbon and Luzerne counties.

And Donnie Warren
provided investigators

with information about weapons

and where they could find
the C-4 expl*sives.

[siren wailing]

[Dep. Zola]
The Buck Mountain Road
property was a big property.

It's -- it's vast.

Torner used it to store
a lot of stuff.

If he had garbage,
or other stuff from the work

that he was doing in town,

he would take it to
the Buck Mountain Road property,

dump it and burn it.

We identified two burned piles
on the property.

[Sgt. Bogart] I think it was
like the second or third day

just excavating
down in the burn pit.

We started finding things.

At first, it's kind of like
putting a puzzle together.

You're like, "This doesn't
look like a burnt book

or normal burnt material."
Like, "What is this?"

That looks like bone fragments.

[Dep. Zola] We did, in fact,
find fragments

that a forensic anthropologist

was able to identify
as human skull.

[Sgt. Bogart]
Somebody is missing
this much skull fragment,

cannot be alive --
so you can kind of deduce that,

"Hey, we couldn't prove
that it was Pepe,

but if it wasn't Pepe,
who was it?"

[tense music plays]

[CPL. Williams]
Investigators also found
on Roberto Torner's property

C-4 expl*sives that were stolen
from an army base in Kentucky.

That led to an arrest
of David Alzugaray

and Roberto Torner.

[Sgt. Bogart]
While Torner was in prison,

I went to speak to him
about the arson.

[sirens wailing]

[Det. Bogart]
Every avenue you go down,

there's something that just
makes you, like,

you think
it can't get any worse,

and then it does.

[tense music increases]

[ominous music plays]

Roberto Torner told me he did
not want to talk on camera

and asked me to turn
the camera off.

He said he has some information
he wanted to volunteer out

for us about Pepe.

That's when he went into
telling me that he instructed

Dave Alzugaray and Pepe to take
some construction debris down

to the Buck Mountain Road
address and burn it

like they normally always do.

But he was worried,
because he knew there was some

animosity between them.

But then he's got
a bad feeling.

He needs to go check on him.

Something's not sitting
right with him.

Rob said he gets out and he
starts yelling right away,

"Pepe, Pepe, Pepe, Pepe!"

And Dave sticks his head out
from around this chicken coop

and -- and is waving to Torner.

And Rob's like, "Where's Pepe?"

And then he's like, "You believe
what that guy did?"

He goes,
"Pepe was my friend."

I had to look there
and watch my friend die.

[laughing]

[CPL. Williams] I'm at
the State Police Barracks,

and we get the call
from prison officials

that Dave Alzugaray wants
to talk to law enforcement.

And then David Alzugaray
confesses that he is the one

that k*lled Pepe.

He k*lled him at
the Buck Mountain Road property.

And that Roberto Torner
has nothing to do

with Pepe's homicide.

[Sgt. Bogart]
Friday, November 13th.

Dave Alzugaray and Pepe

went to
the Buck Mountain Road address.

They were arguing.

Pepe and Torner were friends,

and they were really clicking
and really getting along.

And there was a lot
of jealousy from Dave

to Pepe because he felt
like Pepe was kinda moving in

on his position
or his friendship with Torner.

So there was
just weird things boiling up

between Alzugaray and Pepe.

Dave ultimately said
he shot Pepe.

He dismembers him.

Puts him in five-gallon buckets.

Dave was chopping him up
like some type of butcher.

[Dep. Zola] Then Pepe was dumped
into the Lehigh River.

According to David Alzugaray,

he was chopped
into so many tiny pieces,

that we probably
wouldn't find him.

[CPL. Williams]
In my experience,

and I've investigated homicides
for 19 and half years,

it usually doesn't happen
where someone just confesses.

His demeanor,
it's very matter of fact,

very to the point.

However, he almost --

it felt
like he was trying too hard

to tell us
that he wanted all the blame,

that it was all him.

[suspenseful vocalizations]

[CPL. Williams]
We stopped the river.

We did an extensive search
of the Lehigh River.

And nothing was found.

So, at that point,

we really suspected
it was all a lie,

he was covering up
for somebody.

That's when we got
Alba Veras to flip.

We put her
into witness protection.

[CPL. Williams] Alba was
a resident of The Cottage,

and she was helping out watching

Roberto Torner's children.

She got caught in this situation
the same way I did.

She answered an ad
in the newspaper for a job,

and then they talked her
into moving in there,

and then they just pretty much
did the same thing to her

that they did to me.

[CPL. Williams] Alba wasn't
living in The Cottage anymore.

She was in a different place
in her life.

She escaped.

She wasn't
under Torner's spell anymore.

We asked her
what she knew about Pepe.

She was very forthright
in telling us

secrets from The Cottage.

Roberto Torner
had instructed her, during 2015,

that he wanted her to clean
a bunch of cutting instruments,

and he instructed her
where to hide 'em.

She told us about the weapons
and all the cutting instruments

inside The Cottage
that were still there.

So we immediately went
to The Cottage.

We went up into the attic.

Removed some insulation
in the furthest corner

of that attic, and voila!

There's ammunition.
There's cutting instruments.

There's cleavers.
There's machetes.

There's sharp objects.

And Alba, she told us

that she did have a romantic
relationship

with Roberto Torner.

Roberto Torner
started to question her

about her loyalty.

It was her, Roberto Torner,
Dave Alzugaray, and Pepe.

And they drove out to
the Buck Mountain Road property.

[whispering]
OK, you know what to do.

[CPL. Williams]
Torner handed Alba a g*n

and told her,
"I want you to sh**t Pepe."

She took the g*n in her hand.

She held it up.

Alba had to make a choice.
What was she willing to do?

[tense music builds]

[CPL. Williams] I consider
Roberto Torner a psychopath.

He's deceitful.
He's narcissistic.

He's manipulative.

The worst of the worst.

He had these people,
these minions, under him,

and he was in control.

[Sgt. Bogart] It was like
this cult-type thing,

where he just instructed
people to do things,

and they just did it for him.

Alba, Alba Veras, was willing
to do almost anything

to earn Roberto Torner's love.

[Dep. Zola] She thought
that if she k*lled Pepe,

for him, she would be somehow
proving herself to him.

She put the g*n up.

But she just could not do it.

And she broke down,

started shaking uncontrollably,
started crying.

That's when he said,
"That was a test.

I was testing your loyalty
to me."

[Dep. Zola]
When the rubber met the road,
she just could not do it.

She's not a k*ller, and it was
at that time that Roberto Torner

knew that she wasn't
going to be able to do it.

So then the plan changed.

[CPL. Williams]
On the eve of Friday the 13th,

Alba told us she heard
some noises

coming from the basement
of The Cottage.

She went down there
to investigate.

She found Roberto Torner
and David Alzugaray

manipulating semi-ammunition.

They actually created
dummy rounds.

So that would render
them incapable of firing.

They manipulated these rounds

and they provided Jose Herran
with the g*n that was loaded

with these dummy rounds.

[Donnie]
On Friday, November 13th,

I remember Pepe.

He had used my phone
to call his mother.

Within half hour, 45 minutes
after talking to his mother,

they took him out.

I tried to tell myself, like,
"No, they're not gonna do that."

Like, "There's no way."

But that was just, you know,
me lying to myself.

[Dep. Zola]
When they arrived there,

David Alzugaray pulls out
a 22 caliber revolver,

starts sh**ting.

Jose Herran tried sh**ting back,

and because they were
dummy rounds,

nothing happened.

David was in pursuit,

firing the g*n repeatedly
at him.

They shot him
at least five times.

[panting]

[Dep. Zola]
That's when Roberto Torner
walked up to Jose Herran,

and he finished and by sh**ting
him in the back of the head.

[two g*nshots blare]

And, by David Alzugaray's
own confession,

he was chopped up
into very, very tiny pieces,

put into blue buckets.

This was a carefully
staged-managed homicide

by Roberto Torner.

A short while later,
Donnie observes the van return,

but there's only two people
in it,

and it's Roberto Torner
and David Alzugaray.

[Donnie] And they were
laughing and joking,

and they had his head
in a bucket

in the back of the van.

That was horrifying.

[Dave's evil laughs]

[Donnie] "Oh, I'm Leatherface.
Oh, I'm Leatherface."

Like joking.

He peeled his face off, like,
literally peeled his face off,

stuck it over his,
was joking about

being Leatherface.

[Dave's laughs]

[Donnie]
Having seen that, it was like,
there's no way to erase it.

There's no way to not think
about it.

I still have nightmares
about it.

[CPL. Williams] We believe that
Torner did this out of jealousy.

See, Pepe's
is this good-looking guy,

he's smart, he's a good talker.

Girls started paying
more attention to him,

thought he was better looking,
and Torner didn't like this.

He just wanted someone
that was gonna follow him,

someone under his control,
and that wasn't the case.

Roberto Torner
was a very paranoid man.

It was Friday, November 13th,
when -- when they k*lled Pepe.

I don't know
if it was a way of, like,

spreading fear about himself,
you know,

a way of kind of making
himself scarier.

[Dep. Zola]
Ultimately, Liza Robles,

who was
Roberto Torner's girlfriend,

mother of his children,
came forward

and recollected that night.

She woke up to go
to the bathroom,

and both Roberto
and David were cooking.

She believed it to be steak.

She asked for a piece
of the steak,

and Roberto said, "No."

He said, "That's Pepe."

That's the allegation.

[Donnie]
I heard, what was left of Pepe?

And then they made it
into sandwiches.

They called all these people
to come over.

Rob made a big deal out of it.

"Oh, this is a special recipe,
and we've got

these Cuban sandwiches."
I knew what it was.

It was so nauseating for me,
and it was disturbing.

It was one of the most ghoulish
things I've ever witnessed

in my entire life,
and not so much the act,

but the attitude, the laughter.

They were treating it
like it was a birthday party.

I was so sickened by it,
I had to throw up.

[CPL. Williams]
So, with all the evidence,

we have the weapon
that k*lled Pepe.

We had David Alzugaray

as the person that shot him
with that weapon,

that 22 caliber revolver.

We had the GL*CK,
which was a 9-millimeter,

that matched
those manipulated rounds.

It really validated
the whole case.

So, in February of 2020,
we charge Dave Alzugaray

and Roberto Torner
for the m*rder of Jose Herran,

who is Pepe.

As reporters approached him,
they asked him about the case.

[Roberto]
I have no idea what that is.

You should ask
the Chief of Police, though.

[reporter] But David already
confessed to murdering him.

[Roberto] You got to ask
the Chief of Police.

[CPL. Williams] He was referring
to Chief Anthony Harris

of the Freeland Borough
Police Department.

Witnesses were telling us also

that there was
a friendly relationship

between Roberto Torner
and Chief Harris.

We told we told Chief Harris
that we would be in contact

with him again.
That was on a Friday.

On Monday, Anthony Harris
took his own life by suicide.

[Dep. Zola] The trial was
a little over a week,

but the jury deliberated for six
hours before they came back

and rendered their verdict
of guilty on all counts,

including first degree
m*rder and arson.

He was convicted
on Halloween Day,

which was, you know,
just symbolic.

[Dep. Zola] David Alzugaray
ended up accepting a plea deal

to third degree m*rder
with a fixed sentence, which,

when calculated out in time,
is essentially a life sentence.

Getting the verdict of guilty
on all counts was, to me,

most important to give justice
to Jose Herran's mother

and his daughter.

He was the world to them,

always making sure
that they were OK.

He was that guy in their family.

[CPL. Williams] Roberto Turner
and David Alzugaray,

they're some
of the most horrible,

diabolical monsters

I faced in my career.

Getting him off the streets,
it was very important

because who knows what else
he was capable of,

what else he would have done,

or what he did
that we don't even know about.

And I believe wholeheartedly

there's more dead people
out there.

That we'll never know
unless other witnesses

come forward.

[CPL. Williams] Alba feared
for her life all the time.

To this day, when I talk to her,
she's still afraid

of Roberto Torner, even though
he's incarcerated for life.

[Donnie]
Seeing him get arrested

and then seeing him
get convicted,

I hope that something good

will come out
of all that suffering.

It's so unbelievable.

You could never imagine
people actually

doing these things outside
of a horror movie.

[thud]

Friday, February 13th

started out like any other day.

That was the day that my
daughter never came home.

The Encino Police Department

started searching
for Amber DeBuff.

Where's Amber?
Where's Amber?

Something's wrong.
I need to find my little girl.

Is there a monster among us?

[scream]