I did an entry about Nathan John Contos here. He’s the paramedic from Santa Cruz who allegedly molested a 14-year-old girl he met on MySpace. His MySpace has not been found as of yet, but a reader named Rebecca found Contos’ Yahoo Profile.
Looks like a winner.
UPDATE: A commenter named Doug believes that this is Contos’ MySpace. Doug found it by using Contos’ AOL handle of Nateiskiller.
Man pleads no contest in MySpace sex case:
SANTA CRUZ — A former paramedic faces a maximum sentence of three years, eight months in state prison for having sexual contact with a 14-year-old girl he lured to his house after meeting her on the Internet.
Nathan John Contos, 27, pleaded no contest in Santa Cruz County Superior Court on Thursday to two counts of child molesting and a misdemeanor count of possessing child pornography. He likely will have to register as a sex offender, attorneys said.
Contos, of Santa Cruz, conversed with the girl in an AOL chat room and through the popular MySpace.com for about a month before meeting and engaging in what investigators have called “inappropriate sexual contact.” He also asked the girl to send him nude photos of her, which she did.
Sheriff’s deputies arrested him in February.
“He’s an adult who intentionally went onto the Internet, targeted a child and molested her,” prosecutor Jeff Rosell said. “He’s a predator.”
The no-contest plea means Contos does not dispute the charges against him and is considered by the court as equal to a guilty plea.
“Today he accepted responsibility for the mistake he made,” lead defense attorney George Gigarjian said Thursday.
His attorneys said they will ask that Contos be sentenced to probation and that it’s unlikely a judge would mete out the maximum sentence. Contos has no criminal history, his attorneys said.
“We think Nathan is a good young man,” said Gigarjian, who added that about two dozen people attended Thursday’s court proceedings to support his client.
Good young men don’t molest 14-year-old girls and possess child porn.
And I’m in a slump. I haven’t been able to find any MySpaces in a while. So if you know where Contos’ MySpace is, please let me know.
Dyleski’s girlfriend takes the stand:
MARTINEZ – Scott Dyleski told his girlfriend after the slaying of Pamela Vitale that if he was linked to the killing and a credit card fraud and had to spend his life in jail, he did not want her involved, the girlfriend testified Thursday.
Jena Reddy, 18, also testified that she and Dyleski had “experimented with inflicting pain on each other,” and discussed removing organs from people and torturing children.
“We would talk about it jokingly or hypothetically that if the child was being annoying, the possibilities we could do to keep it quiet,” she said.
Shortly after the killing, Reddy said, Dyleski told her that if he was blamed for the credit card fraud, somehow he could be blamed for the murder.
“(He said) something along the lines of if he was going to jail for life, he didn’t want to involve me … no matter whether he did it or not,” Reddy said.
“Did he tell you he did not do it,” deputy district attorney Harold Jewett asked.
“No,” Reddy replied.
Here’s what’s really scary…
Another neighbor testified Thursday how she got scared when she realized that her credit card has been used to order $2,300 of indoor plant lights that were to be billed to Vitale’s address. She said she was even more frightened when she found out Vitale had been killed.
Dyleski’s neighbor, Karen Schneider, testified that when she found the fraudulent charges on her credit card, she approached Dyleski’s mother, Esther Fielding, at a neighborhood meeting the day after Vitale’s death. Fielding and Dyleski were living at the home of Fred and Kim Curiel, whose house was listed as the shipping address on the order.
Schneider had run over and injured Fielding’s dog a month earlier, and she suspected that Fielding may have been putting veterinarian bills on her credit card, Schneider testified.
“I said, ‘It looks to me like you’ve already paid yourself back, and besides that, you’re trying to kill me,’” Schneider testified.
Did Dyleski kill the wrong person? Was his intended victim Karen Schneider? Could be.
Prostie posted ad after slay?:
The baby-faced hooker who allegedly watched while her ex-con boyfriend raped and strangled a New Jersey teen tried to sell herself for sex on craigslist a day after the murder, police sources said.
Krystal Riordan, charged with helping Draymond Coleman ditch the body of 18-year-old Jennifer Moore, tried to make money by billing herself as “Lisa” on the popular online flea market, a police source said.
The 20-year-old posted her ad July 26 – just a day after police say Coleman strangled and suffocated Moore as Riordan watched, and did nothing.
“Cold-hearted, to say the least,” said another police source.
Riordan billed herself as a New Jersey escort working out of Weehawken, where the murder occurred.
Her ad offered a “$150 special.”
Cold-hearted is an understatement.
Senate majority leader Joe Bruno’s missing granddaughter was found yesterday wandering the streets of Times Square with a self-declared pimp – who uses the Internet to entice young women into selling their bodies, police sources said.
Rachel Bruno, a beautiful 20-year-old blond, ran away from her parents’ upstate home last week after meeting the married grifter, John Savage, on MySpace.com, the sources said.
Images of half-naked women and piles of money decorate Savage’s MySpace page, which declares: “pimpin at its best.”
“I believe that I’m the solution for those who r lost or need elevation to there situation,” Savage writes. “My name is Jazzo and my interests in myspace is to meet beautiful young women that want to travel and get down wit a playa.”
Police were investigating if the admitted 30-year-old pimp had committed a crime relating to Rachel Bruno’s disappearance. He was arrested on an unrelated outstanding warrant.
Cops found Bruno on W. 45th St. near Broadway shortly before 2 a.m.
Savage – who lists his occupation as “entertainment” and his income as “$60,000 to $75,000” on MySpace – was idling nearby in a new SUV. The cops asked Bruno to call him and tell him to drive over. When he did, they grabbed him, sources said.
“She was relieved to be home and scared to death and afraid she would be harmed,” the Republican added, before saying his granddaughter suffers from anorexia and “serious emotional problems” that affect her judgment.
Savage was being held by cops on a probation violation. He has been on probation since pleading guilty to attempting to bribe Bronx cops, offering them $690 for information on prostitution sweeps in 2002.
I was unable to find Savage’s MySpace at this time. Any help with that would be appreciated.
Dyleski’s Friend Testifies Against Him:
The following Tuesday, Oct. 18, Dyleski told Croen he was going to confess to the credit card scheme because he was afraid it would link him to the murder, Croen said.
Croen said Dyleski seemed anxious and was talking fast.
While Croen was worrying about getting caught for the credit card fraud, Dyleski said something strange, Croen said.
“He said the person he had seen on his walk was the person who had been killed,” Croen said. He said that Dyleski had told him that the woman had grabbed his wrist.
“He said he was afraid of being linked to the killing by some kind of DNA evidence,” Croen said.
Croen said that he had been unable to get a coherent answer from Dyleski about how he would be linked to the killing or how his DNA would be found at the murder scene.
Dyleski was arrested on Oct. 19 and Croen didn’t see him again until the preliminary hearing. Croen’s family hired a lawyer and Croen was given immunity in exchange for his testimony.
To me, Dyleski sounds like a little kid who is telling a bunch of lies to throw off suspicion even though it makes him look guilty.
Witness Casts Doubt On Dyleski’s Alleged Motive:
A prosecution witness in the Scott Dyleski murder trial testified Wednesday morning that the alleged plot to buy marijuana-growing equipment, his purported motive in the killing, had been foiled the day before 52-year-old Pamela Vitale was slain in her Lafayette home.
According to prosecutor Harold Jewett, Dyleski broke into the house Vitale shared with her husband, Daniel Horowitz, at 1901 Hunsaker Canyon Road and bludgeoned her to death as a part of a plot to buy lighting equipment for growing marijuana indoors using stolen credit card information.
Jackie Jahoski, owner of Specialty Lighting where Dyleski allegedly attempted to buy the lights, said Dyleski had placed four orders on Thursday, Oct. 13, using two separate credit cards. He requested that the lights be shipped by next-day air.
Jahoski said she became suspicious when the billing addresses didn’t match the shipping addresses. She said she notified Dyleski that she could only ship to the billing address, at which point Dyleski canceled his order.
She said he called back a short time later and asked for the order to be shipped to the billing address, 1901 Hunsaker Canyon Road. The name on the credit card, however, was that of a different Hunsaker Canyon Road neighbor.
Jahoski said she told Dyleski on Friday, Oct. 14, that she would not be shipping the order anywhere because the credit card company had declined the purchase.
That testimony does call the motive into question, but I don’t think it’s a coincidence that Dyleski was trying to use the victim’s address.
Kerns trial slated for Oct. 15:
Excuse me, but I’ve heard this before…
I’m just over it,” Tobin “Toby” Kerns said last April.
With these words, Kerns, 18, captured the frustration and exhaustion he and his family have suffered through over the past two years-two long and cumbersome years peppered with bumps, curves, holdups and setbacks since his 2004 arrest.
But come October, it will all be over.
On Thursday, Judge Louis Coffin announced an Oct. 15 start date for Kerns’ trial, which will take place in Plymouth Juvenile Court. The trial will take place over the course of five days until Oct. 20, Coffin said.
Kerns was arrested for his alleged connection to a detailed plan to orchestrate a Columbine-like attack on Marshfield High School in September, 2004 after three students-Joseph Nee, Daniel Farley and Joseph Sullivan- all former MHS students, gave Kerns’ name to police in connection with the plot.
Nee, 20, was arrested in October of that year after Farley and Sullivan later came to police implicating his involvement in the planned attack. According to Kern’s father, Ben, Nee lived with them for a few weeks during the spring of 2004. He claims Nee, not his son, was the one behind the planned attack and was the one surfing dangerous sites on the Web.
Kerns and Nee are being tried separately on charges of promotion of anarchy, conspiracy to commit murder and threatened use of a deadly weapon, but both have maintained their innocence since their arrests. Nee, who was 18 at the time of the incident, is set to be tried in Brockton Superior Court while Kerns, who was then only 16, will be tried as a juvenile. If convicted, both could serve up to 43 years in prison.
Still no word on when Joe Nee goes to trial.
A 26-year-old wedding videographer from Somers was charged Tuesday with having illicit sexual contact with a 15-year-old local girl whom he brought to Massachusetts after meeting her on the popular Internet website MySpace.com.
Jason Palmeira was arrested at his residence by the FBI, Simsbury police and state police. He is charged with using the Internet to persuade a minor to engage in sexual activity and traveling in interstate commerce for the purpose of attempting to have, and having, illicit sexual conduct with a minor.
Palmeira was presented in U.S. District Court in Hartford and released after posting $100,000 bail. U.S. Magistrate Judge Thomas P. Smith ordered Palmeira to reside with his parents at their home in Springfield. Smith also restricted Palmeira’s access to the Internet, according to a news release.
The federal arrest affidavit says the girl posted a message on the online networking website in June, saying she wanted to meet single guys in Connecticut who are under the age of 18. On June 21, Palmeira sent an e-mail saying he was 26 and the two began communicating through e-mails and the phone, according to authorities.
In July, the girl asked Palmeira if it was okay if the two did not engage in sex and Palmeira responded that they could do what she felt comfortable with, according to the affidavit. He talked with the girl about taking photographs of herself. On July 12, he sent her an e-mail saying he could get together over the next two days, according to the affidavit.
Palmeira traveled on July 13 from Massachusetts to Connecticut to meet the girl, picking her up in a green sports car. He drove the girl to Massachusetts, bringing her to a location he described as his girlfriend’s house, the affidavit says.
Once at the house, Palmeira is accused of having sexual contact with the girl, putting his finger in her vagina and driving her back to Connecticut, dropping her off at the Simsbury Public Library the following morning, according to the affidavit. He later sent an e-mail to her, saying that he hoped she didn’t get into too much trouble with her parents, that he was sorry and that he felt bad about cheating on his girlfriend. Several days later he e-mailed her, telling her to lie about her name and to call him.
Eventually, Palmeira was busted by the girl’s mom.
I wasn’t able to find his MySpace, but I did find his business site. I get the feeling that TLC will no longer be doing business with him.
Jury sees Vitale crime scene photos:
Bruises and open cuts on her body showed that Pamela Vitale put up a fierce struggle after an intruder attacked in her home, a sheriff’s investigator testified Monday.
“A lot of them appeared to have been defensive injuries,” said Alex Taflya, a criminalist with the Contra Costa County crime lab, referring to photographs a prosecutor projected for jurors.
The jury in the trial of Scott Dyleski saw for the first time photographs of the victim and the modular home where she and her husband Daniel Horowitz were living on Oct. 15, 2005 while they built a mansion nearby.
During much of Monday’s testimony, Dyleski gazed at the front of the courtroom, watching each witness, occasionally wiping his nose.
He turned his head toward the screen to view each photograph depicting the bloody crime scene.
Vitale’s family members often looked down, averting their eyes, while the prosecutor showed photos of her body. In addition to her children, her parents and Horowitz’s parents were in the audience.
Jewett first showed jurors photographs investigators took outside the house in the early evening.
Porch lights glowed in front of a dark blue dusk sky. Each picture brought jurors closer to the front door, which was open and smeared with blood.
Vitale lay just inside, curled in a fetal position, behind the door. Blood covered the back of it, some smeared by hands covered with gloves, Taflya said.
Other photos showed the home’s interior, depicting tight quarters with piles of papers and books, some scattered after a struggle.
Boxes and papers lay on the floor, spilled and strewn around. A collection of family photographs sat on an end table. A broken coffee cup smeared with blood was in the sink.
Taflya showed the jury a broken piece of pottery found near Vitale. Blood stained the edges of the broken portion, he said.
But he ruled it out as a murder weapon.
“There is not enough blood on the pot,” he testified. “The pot would probably have shattered after a few blows.”
Horowitz takes stand in Dyleski trial:
Daniel Horowitz was just inside his front door when, as he dropped his bags of groceries in shock, he saw his wife lying dead in the home they shared on a Lafayette hillside.
“It was like a crime scene photograph,” Horowitz testified Tuesday, shaking his head. “I knew it wasn’t.”
“Even though I knew she was dead, I reached and touched her,” Horowitz said, placing two fingers against his own neck as if checking for a pulse.
He said a bad feeling crept up on him when he saw his wife’s car parked in the home’s driveway. He had expected her to be at the ballet.
“I didn’t think too much,” he said. “I just knew it wasn’t good.”
Answering deputy district attorney Harold Jewett’s questions about the couple’s life together, Horowitz sometimes smiled, raising his eyebrows with enthusiasm, recounting the mansion his wife was designing and all the paperwork and materials that cluttered their temporary home.
He said he last talked to his wife the night before her death.
“We watched television,” he said. We spoke. I went to bed. She stayed up.”
Under questioning by Leonida, Horowitz said he was unsure whether anyone had compromised Vitale’s credit cards, banking or other financial accounts.
“Truthfully, I haven’t looked at anything,” he said. “I wouldn’t know.”
Interesting that both articles say that the murder weapon has yet to be revealed.
Unknown Chanel Petro-Nixon Killer:
This is America’s Most Wanted’s summation of the Murder of 16-year-old Brooklyn girl Chanel Petro-Nixon. Her killer is still at large.