Posted on 12/27/2008 9:37:19 AM PST by Maelstorm
COVINA, Calif. - A man who carried out a Christmas Eve massacre and arson dressed as Santa at the home of his former in-laws apparently intended to flee the U.S., but his plans were dashed after the inferno he created severely burned his arms and melted his red costume onto his body, police said Friday.
Bruce Jeffrey Pardo, a laid-off aerospace worker, apparently shot some of his nine victims execution-style in a plot to destroy his ex-wife's family after a costly divorce that was finalized last week. He had an airline ticket for a Christmas morning flight to Canada and $17,000 in cash on his body, some attached to his legs with plastic wrap and some in a girdle, Covina police Chief Kim Raney said. He did not know the Canadian destination.
Armed with four guns, wearing the Santa suit and carrying a fuel-spraying device wrapped like a present, Pardo showed up at the home at 11:30 p.m. Wednesday as a party of about 25 people was under way.
Raney said Pardo, 45, fired a shot into the face of an 8-year-old girl who answered the door and at first fired indiscriminately, then apparently targeted relatives of his ex-wife as other guests fled.
"There's some information that he stood over them and shot them execution-style," Raney said.
Pardo retreated to the front door and retrieved a device that mixed carbon dioxide or oxygen with high-octane racing fuel, police said. Fleeing guests saw him spraying the fuel inside the house when the vapor was ignited, possibly by a pilot light or a candle, and exploded.
"Mr. Pardo was severely injured during that explosion," Raney said. "He suffered third-degree burns on both arms and it also appears that the Santa Claus suit that he was wearing did melt onto his body."
(Excerpt) Read more at startribune.com ...
The family court judge didn’t kill nine people most who had nothing to do with this divorce (not that divorce gave him the right to kill no matter how unfair a judge was)...this despicable monster did that. There can be no excuse for such awful murderous behavior.
Yes-I have nightmare thinking that poor kid was probably excited to see Santa-bastard.
I'm not.
But his wife filed for divorce in March. He lost his job in August. Maybe he was hoping for a reconciliation, and then the final divorce papers arrived and that was the last straw. At times like that, it's hard to know what to do. But the Bible tells us what not to do. It says, "Thou shall not kill." A million other options were open to him, but he chooses the one least likely to have a good result. Not very logical, considering he was an engineer.
I know...maybe he was a guy who simply would not let go...kind of how stalkers-I’ll see you dead first think...killing kids fits into this kind of a person’s view on life.
I wasn’t referring to the “Santa” monster - I was making a comment to a person who had posed a hypothetical to me. NO I would NEVER back the monster this article was written about. In fact, my first comment was that I understood why his wife left him - that he was having a tantrum and I might have used the word “evil”. Just keep clicking back through my comments on this thread and you’ll see that I’m with you.
“How can you fork over $2,000 a month without a job?”
I don’t know maybe he can use some of the tax dollars that he cheated the system out of in claiming his disabled son on his taxes when he didn’t support the boy. Why anyone would want to support a low life piece of trash like this is beyond me. There is no place in Hell that’s hot enough for him IMO.
What did the innocent children and visitors at this party do to deserve their fate? This child may well be disfigured for life. What about the police who he rigged his car to blow up on? Do you suppose any of them might have had families that loved them? It’s unbelievablable that you’d make excuses for a POS like this. Every killer through out time thinks they have a perfect excuse for killing their victim. Since he had $17,000 dollars strapped to his body and plane tickets to Canada anyway, why didn’t he just leave?
Not excuses, but there must be a reason behind his action. Getting screwed over might lead a person to snap.
What about the 8 year old girl and the other visitors, what did they do to deserve this?
They didn't.
There can be no reason that most would find acceptable...he was evil. Some people are. He left a trail of broken hearts behind him. From what I hear, he didn’t watch the son and was at fault for the accident. He meets a woman and never tells her about his son? He deliberately targets children while wearing a Santa suit? chilling! He is evil there is no other explanation that could ever make sense of this... pure evil.
No criminal record. Well educated, worked for NASA. Not exactly a profile of evil.
He didn’t ‘snap’. He didn’t kill his ex in a fit or rage or passion. He carefully planned this horror. This is not ‘snapping’. He planned this in a calculated and cold way. He would have probably escaped except for the fact, he waited to leave the house when it was burning...wanted to shoot a few more kids I guess...his step-daughters for example and was badly burned. I hope it hurt like hell.
Look at his first marriage...he didn’t watch his kid...he lies to his new wife. Hardly the behavior of a decent person. Also, who knows what he might have done and not been caught...he was evil.
As for his negligence of his first kid, it can happen to the best of parents.
Sorry to hear that! Would you accept an occasional prayer?
Sure!
He planned it and was really pissed off.I heard the 911 call on the news.You shoot a 6 year old because of your ego.
“No criminal record. Well educated, worked for NASA. Not exactly a profile of evil.”
I know a man with no prior criminal record, well educated, who became a murderer.
It happens.
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