The Case of Angelina Napolitano

I'm Kate Winkler-Dawson. I'm a journalist who's spent the last 25 years writing about true crime.

And I'm Paul Holes, a retired cold case investigator who's worked some of America's most complicated cases and solved them.

Each week, I present Paul with one of history's most compelling true crimes.

And I weigh in using modern forensic techniques to bring new insights to old mysteries.

Together, using our individual expertise, we're examining historical true crime cases through a 21st century lens.

Some are solved, and some are cold. Very cold.

This is Buried Bones. Buried Bones Hey, Kate, how are you today?

I'm great.

How about you? I'm hanging in there.

It's been a busy week.

Has it?

Okay.

Okay. Well, maybe this will perk you up. Well, actually, I don't know if it's going to perk you up. We'll see. So I love listener questions, viewer questions. And so we're going to keep going on these. And somebody wants to know specifically about you. What was your reason?

It's okay.

What was your reasoning for leaving Contra Costa County's sheriff's office? I don't know if we've talked about that.

Oh. So I had promoted a I was a division commander over all the forensic services. I was a captain-level position. Chief of forensics was technically my title. And was hating life from an administrative standpoint. It's memos, it's white papers, Excel spreadsheets. Disciplinary issues, you know, at one point I had 72 subordinates, you know, so that's a lot of people that, you know, things have a tendency to happen when you have that large of a group of individuals that you oversee. And the assistant sheriff, who was my boss at the time, was really starting to try to curtail my ability to work cold cases. Why? Why? Well, this is because I was now a top-tier manager, and when you promote up that high, you can't really be

also doing casework at the same time. So from a pure management perspective, he was right. And so I saw the writing on the wall that I was going to be even more bored out of my skull in that position.

Sorry to anybody who manages a lot of people out there. Bored out of your school because you want to be in the field. I mean, you always say that now. You want to be in the field.

Yeah. Yeah. And it was more of a set of specific circumstances as to why I promoted up at, you know, through the various, you know, steps up to that position. But it was never any, it was never my goal to be in that position. Now, Obviously, with, you know, the higher you promote, the bigger your salary and the better the pension. So I did financially benefit. But with the sheriff's office, I was just going, OK, I'm really hating this job. And I reached out to the elected D.A.

at the time who I had assisted with a case, a cold case that happened. We got the guy and he prosecuted. And this is a guy that was formerly on death row. He was a serial killer. He was released from death row in California. And he went out to Texas and raped six women out there after his release. But it also turns out that he killed a woman in Contra Costa County in 1978 after he was released off death row. And so I helped him. with the prosecution on that case. And so I knew he had an interest in cold cases. And now that he was the elected DA, I said, what about a job? And he agreed. And I literally created my own position at the DA's office just because I knew how. And I knew where money could be obtained. And that became somewhat

controversial because it was money that the sheriff also had interest in. You know, and it took about three years. And those three years with the sheriff, last three years with the sheriff's office were a little bit tough because they're very much into loyalty to the department. And they saw that I was not loyal. And so in some ways I was blackballed up high, you know, but it was well worth it for me to go to the DA's office and actually really focus in more on the investigative side. And, you know, I still had administrative duties.

I still oversaw homicides. unit the sexual assault unit you know so i still had subordinates that were reporting to me but this is where i started really pursuing golden state killer in in earnest where now i formally could just leave the office and start going out and doing interviews or doing you know surveillance or you know all the various things that was required to work that case.

Do you still run into the folks with the Sheriff's Department that you might have worked for, you know, decades ago on any cases or interviews or anything?

There's still, well, you know, I'm still in touch with, you know, various deputies and civilians, you know, both out of, you know, like the lab. You know, I still am in touch with some of the individuals out of forensics. I still have, you know, great friends. contacts with the various investigators I worked with over the years. Now, the people that were above me at the time, like the sheriff and the undersheriff, I have not run across them in years, you know, and I don't think that's going to be happening anytime soon. Okay.

Well, that's, you know, that's, I think, a great answer. These are pretty good questions, I think, that people ask us, because I had not heard that specific story for sure about You know, kind of feeling siloed at one place and then moving over to another. And I mean, thank goodness, you know, because then here comes the Golden State Killer case with Michelle McNamara. So how fortuitous. Yeah.

And Michelle, actually, my relationship with Michelle occurred, it spanned from the sheriff's office over to the DA's office before she passed away.

Okay. All right. All right. Well, that was a really great question. I'm sure we'll do this again where we ask people to submit questions to Paul and me, but that was good. A little more about Paul Holes.

Yeah. I've never really talked about that. You know, I write about that experience a bit in my book, you know, but in terms of just, you know, telling, you know, what happened, that's probably the first time I've done that.

Well, and, you know, for me, it's definitely an illustration of how you are able to pivot and know what really is valuable. I mean, you have so many different routes you can go to in law enforcement. You know, how you pivot and what your interest is, I think, is really important to figure out. It sounds like you did.

I know you maybe you lost out on some money, but, yeah, you've got to be happy. I mean, you talk about that in your book, too.

Well, when I talk to, you know, let's say deputies who want to promote, you know, just shooting the breeze and they're going, yeah, I want to be a sergeant. And I go, well, think about that. You know, think hard about that because it is until you walk in those shoes, you really don't know what the position entails.

I think I've mentioned this. You know, my dad was a law professor and he at one point was going to run for district judge. And he did. He has his little headshot pictures and everything. And then he just changed his mind. Because I think he really got a reality check on the hours. And I was young, you know, at the time. And he really, he, at UT, he was able to kind of come in from our farm, which is an hour away. And he would stay, you know, from, let's say, 7 a.m. at school, you know, all the way until 3 or 4. And then he could leave because his classes were in the early afternoon. And he just, he told me when I was older, he just said that was not going to happen. And so I just made a decision. And then, so I really respect that.

And I know... that, you know, this is, that's a hard decision to leave something that is, you know, higher paying or whatever. But no, that's good. I'm glad that Paul Holes knows himself well enough to know when to leave.

Well, and it really was, you know, I've always said pursue your passion. And, you know, me going with the DA's office was pursuing my passion with the unsolved cases. And it obviously worked out well. Okay.

Well, we're going to shift into a really good case, I think. And a history-making case. But I don't think you've ever heard of it. So I love that cross-section where you've never heard of this case, unlike Miranda, who you knew exactly what Miranda– I was trying to fool you with that case. But this is a history-making case, and it's really interesting. I need to tell you, though, I'm not going to– reveal who the offender is for a little bit. So you might be asking, well, what about this and what about that? And I just want to, you know, delay it and see kind of what route we can go down and then I won't be delaying it for too long, I promise.

Okay, sounds good.

Okay, let's set the scene. Okay, we are in Canada, fantastic Canada, which I adore. And this is 1911. And I have never explored Canada during this time period, but we've done some Canadian cases, but definitely not in this time period and not in this vein. So let me go ahead and explain where we are. We are in the Little Italy quarter of, oh, here we go. I got some Italian and some sort of French names too.

We are in the Little Italy quarter of Sault Ste. Marie. That And at the beginning of the 20th century, they called this area the Sioux. The Sioux was a growing industrial town. There were pulp and paper mills and steel and iron factories and a lot of mines. So there were a lot of low-wage workers in this area. And there was a very, very robust Italian population, too. One of several ethnic communities that made up the Sioux's West End.

So the Italian population was about 3,000, which is sizable. So again, remember 1911, and we are with a couple, Pietro Napolitano, and he works at a steel mill. And he is married to a woman named Angelina, and they're both Italian immigrants, about the same age. Angelina is 28 years old, and he's about the same age. So they had been married for 12 years, and in 1902, they immigrated from Caserata, which is a small town north of Naples.

And they moved to New York City. And then in 1909, they moved to Ontario. So they have a few kids. They've got four children. There's a seven-year-old, a six-year-old, a five-year-old, and a three-year-old. And Angelina is pregnant again. So in two months, she's expected to give birth. This is going to be a tight household. He doesn't make a ton of money working at a factory. But, you know, it seemed like Angelina was looking forward to it. So this is expensive. Pietro is upset over money. He is desperate for the family to have a home of their own because they rent right now. And they have a lot of debt, and he has a low-paying job, as I said, at the steel plant. So he has been— this is when we start to not like Pietro. It happens very quickly, Paul.

He has been pushing Angelina to make more money by any means necessary. So 1911— What could that mean?

It sounds like he's wanting her to get into sex work. Yeah.

They are at this boarding house. They rent a few rooms in a boarding house on James Street. And they're on the main floor and part of the second floor. And on the second floor, it's partitioned. There's two different living quarters. And there's an older man who's living there. His name is Teodora Matzo. And he lives in the adjoining room. So the point is, you know, these are close quarters. My first book was set in 1952 London in these old row houses. And, you know, the walls were paper thin and you could hear everything. So people were very aware of what was happening. And I think it sounds like that is the situation. Pietro has been drinking over the last year very heavily. I think as the money woes keep deepening, he has become increasingly violent

and abusive. So Pietro at this point is so desperate to make more money that he is forcefully telling Angelina, you must go do sex work. And he is saying that the rates would be $ 2 or $ 3 or $ 5. I have no idea what scale he's working off of here. But these days that would be somewhere between $ 40 and $ 100.

She refuses. She refuses.

And he is really, really upset about that. Every time she says no, and he screams at her, she is seven months pregnant when this is all happening.

Well, I think it's obvious. There's a set of circumstances where there's stress in the family, there's stress in the relationship, there's abuse in the relationship, and money is driving a lot of it. Now, it sounds like Pietro, he's also got the drinking problem, and he's probably spending a fair amount of money on that. And they've got four kids in the house with another one on the way. So now the sex work is the thing Pietro's turning to.

And my guess is Pietro has probably been a customer of sex workers before. He knows what the going rates are and recognizes that that could be good money, good income coming into him and the family to help, you know, buy the new house, you know, get rid of the debt. You know, but it obviously is putting Angelina in a horrible situation at seven months pregnant. You know, it's ridiculous.

And yeah, he's coming off as the bad guy.

Yeah, absolutely. And so, you know, something happens in this situation, right? And, you know, Pietro is sort of textbook what we've talked about in the past, is somebody having all this anger toward a spouse, and this has clearly been an abusive relationship. So in early November of 1910, Pietro does something that I find very confusing, Paul. He hands Angelina $ 10, which is about $ 340 today. And he says, I'm going away for a couple of weeks. He didn't tell her where.

I'm going away for a couple of weeks. you need to double or triple this by the time I get back, or, and then the or is sort of left unsaid, but she knows what that means, that he'll really abuse her or potentially even kill her. So, you know, he disappears for these couple of weeks. And then when he comes back, which is late November, she has not done sex work.

And he flies into a rage with her. And I'll tell you what happens after that. But why, Is this supposed to be inspiration? Inspiration is not the right word, but why is he giving her this money and saying, you need to double or triple this, but actually giving her money? I mean, what if she took the kids and took off with it?

Well, it sounds like he has a financial goal that needs to be met by the time he comes back from this sabbatical, if you want to, wherever the hell he went. This is where I'm starting to wonder about, well, what kind of debt? Is he under pressure to have a certain amount of money or he's going to be the one that gets punished, slapped around, or worse. He may have gambling debt, or he has debt with somebody that will do bad things to Pietro if he doesn't have that money in a couple of weeks. And that may be the reason why he's leaving town, is he may have been under a threat. And he realized he wasn't going to be able to make the money himself, and he's putting the burden on Angelina knowing that with

the sex work, she possibly could meet that financial goal. But she doesn't. You know, now he comes back and he's probably, you know, he's mad at her, but he also potentially could be scared if I'm right and that there's going to be somebody coming after him for that amount of money. Yeah.

And this is going to be even more tense because, you know, I tell you, he leaves for a couple of weeks. So Angelina thinks that he is gone, gone. And so she says, I've got to rent out part of my share, not of the other man's, you know, partitioned living space, but part of our share of the place. And so she rents it out to a guy named Nish.

And so he's giving her money. And this has only gone on for one or two weeks. And Pietro says, where's the money? And she said that I don't have sex work money for you, and I don't know if she had received any money from Niche, but she's not giving it to Pietro. So this has turned into a really big deal, and that's another reason why. She had done something, you know, he had not given her permission for, and so he flew into a huge rage at that point.

So the next day, he stabs her nine times with his pocket knife. So he slashes her neck, her shoulder, and her chest. She does not die. Her face is, though, permanently disfigured. So here's what's so sad about Angelina's situation. She is so upset she leaves the kids there, four kids there. She's pregnant. And then she goes to Lake Superior.

And there are witnesses who say this, and she later talks about it. She goes to Lake Superior, which is close by. And it sounds like she was going to plan to, that she was planning to drown herself in Lake Superior. But she's covered in blood. which is alarming to people. And it seems like that's what she's going to do. So people grab her and drag her back.

And she, with all of these bruises, plus I'm sure trauma that happened, you know, I don't know if she's fighting these people to get back into the lake, but she's hospitalized for three weeks.

Well, she's been stabbed nine times.

I mean, really? Sometimes I think, oh, it's a, you know, it's a, we've had pocket knives a lot in our stories. It's a small blade. It does not matter. A paring knife can kill you, you know?

Oh, yeah, no. I mean, you know, a sharp blade, you hit the right, in the right spot, it can be fatal. You know, stab in the neck, you know, doesn't take more than a couple inches, you know, and you've got the carotids being severed. You know, if you are able to push a pocket knife, you know, through ribs into the heart, You know, and you think about being stabbed in the abdomen, which is all just soft tissue, that pocket knife, if the blade is only three inches long, just because the abdomen can be compressed during the stabbing motion, you could have a six-inch deep stab wound that is now going in and severing or nicking the aorta or the vena cava. And now you have massive hemorrhaging going on,

which you really won't be able to survive something like that.

What kind of charge would that be today? Do you think, I know there's all sorts of different ways you could do it, but that's more than an assault, I have to assume. Wouldn't that be attempted murder?

Yeah, no, there's no question that's attempted murder, to be stabbed nine times. Plus the disfigurement to her face in California, that's what we call mayhem. That's a separate charge. You know, that carries a very serious penalty. So you stack mayhem on top of the attempted murder. You know, we'd have to take a look. Was she moved against her will?

Is there a kidnap charge there? There could be a list of 10 different criminal charges that could be applied to Pietro under this type of attack.

Okay, well, let me tell you what he's charged with, because she does end up calling the police and filing a complaint against him. He's arrested. He is charged with wounding with intent to maim someone.

So the MAME, you know, different states here in the United States, MAME is basically the same thing as that mayhem in California. Okay.

So, and what would that, I don't know if you said this, I don't think you did. What kind of sentence is that normally? Oh, geez.

I couldn't tell you what the sentence. I never was part of that. You know, I think, you know, what was done to Angelina, you know, potentially could stack into... maybe a life sentence with the possibility of parole after so long. But this is where the prosecutors and the judge, after conviction, the judge will decide, okay, do you serve these sentences for whatever charges you're convicted of? Are you serving them concurrently or consecutively? And that is way outside of my wheelhouse in terms of how sentences are structured.

Well, I know enough to know that what this judge did was wrong. So they go through this and there is a sentence and the judge sentenced Pietro to suspended sentence. So the judge gives Pietro a suspended sentence. And here's the reason why. So when Pietro came home, Within those couple of weeks that he was gone and Nish was there, the roommate that she was renting to, it turned out that they had been sleeping together. And she'll later admit that, Angelina.

So when the judge finds out about this, I have to presume from Pietro, he says that the affair had been a great provocation.

Yeah, well. So, you know, in the heat of the moment, you know, that's kind of what separates, let's say, first-degree murder from second-degree murder in California. Second-degree murder is, yeah, there's an emotional impact that is immediately followed by the infliction of violence. You fly into a rage. So that is taken into consideration. However, you still, you know, have...

attempted to murder Angelina, let alone the unborn child, you know? So, you know, I completely disagree with the judge, is that, yeah, okay, so, you know, it's not something that rises to the level of some premeditated first-degree murder charge, but it is still a serious crime.

Yeah, yeah, I mean, he's basically saying if you had not had an affair, this wouldn't have happened, right, kind of.

Yeah, yeah.

So she goes back with him. He's got the, you know, the four kids are there and he continues to be just an awful person. So we come to Easter. It's April 16th, 1911, one o'clock. And that neighbor I told you about, not Nish, the neighbor, the other one, Mr. Matsu, goes to his house, his part of the apartment, and then he knocks on the door of the Napolitano's apartment.

So he walks in, and because he's alarmed from some noises that he had heard, and then he goes to the bedroom, and there is someone laying there whose body is warm and the head is covered with a sheet. And statistically, I would assume this would be the woman, obviously. It would be Angelina. Yeah.

I think it could go either way with this couple. You know, Angelina may be protecting herself, you know, but then you also have kids in the house. Could it have been one of the kids? You know, what is Pietro doing to the kids? So, you know, I'm just, you know, bated breath waiting to hear who this person is.

The kids are seven down to three, so we could probably take the kids off the table. Okay, so here we go. It is Pietro. who is dead. And he is, as I said, he's lying on the bed on his left side. His body's still warm. His head is covered with a sheet. And the reason, if I back up a second, the reason that the neighbor goes over and knocks on the door is that Angelina knocks on his door.

And she says, an unverified quote, but I'm going to say it because if it's true, it's interesting. She says, I just killed a pig. And he said she was very sort of like flat-faced, somber about it. It's been printed in the last few decades. So I don't know if that's true. But before she calls the police, she says, please confirm that Pietro is dead to the neighbor. And then I'll call the police. So the thinking behind that is what if she just wounded him and there's no need to call the police and so she won't get in trouble?

Well, she's, you know, she's kind of digging herself into a legal hole because she is demonstrating intent with that statement.

Right.

And so this, you know, we do have cases in which, you know, the abused partner finally has had enough and kills the abuser. And of course you can understand the act and it may very well save the life of the abused. However, If it's not done in absolute self-defense, there is still the possibility Angelina is going to be facing a murder charge in this situation. And the abuse that she suffered, as well as the previous assault, would be something that would be taken into consideration to maybe mitigate some aspects of that, the charges and the sentencing.

But she could still look at being taken into custody and having to go through a murder trial.

Well, that comes to why I'm telling this story, because there has never been a battered wife defense in Canada before. And I don't think it even comes up for several decades in the United States. So that has never been a thing. He abused me and I, you know, killed him. So that's, I'm not saying it worked. I'm saying this is why this is such a big deal as a case.

So the neighbor says he's dead and she calls the police. And there is an autopsy. And our medical examiner is Thomas McQuaid. And he says that there are deep gashes over the right side of Pietro's head and neck. Brain matter spills out of two wounds. The external carotid artery is severed. Blood is covering his face and his body down to his waist. And, you know, when the doctor initially came, he said the bed is soaked with blood.

And the doctor says any one of these seven wounds would have been deadly. And he says the cause of death is shock and hemorrhaging.

Do we know what the weapon is?

Yes. So the weapon is, for all of this damage, is an axe.

Yeah, so obviously he's asleep and she comes in and, you know, takes him out probably with the first blow, but... does seven more or six more blows, which, you know, an axe can, each time, each of those blows to the head and the neck most certainly could be fatal amongst themselves. And he probably laid there with these open wounds and his heart is still beating. You know, he's brain dead, but now that's why you get so much blood that, you know, seeps or comes out of these wounds until, you know, the heart no longer can carry on.

Well, let me tell you the details because Angelina confesses. I mean, this is no big mystery at this point. She confesses. She said, I did it. And let me tell you what happened. So she's with the police magistrate. And this is what she says. She says that a few days earlier, Pietro told Angelina that if she did not make $ 20 or $ 30 by Easter, which is up to $ 1, 000 today, that he was going to kill her.

And when he returned from the steel mill on Easter morning, Angelina had not made the money. She never did sex work, she said. He was even more menacing. He said, I don't know what he's thinking here. He said, I'm going to take a nap, going to sleep, because I guess he did the overnight shift. And if there's no money here, when I wake up, I'm killing you. And he flat out says that. He goes upstairs and he goes to sleep.

He said to her before, right before that, he would put her eyes out and stab her. He said, he would abuse her to such an extent that she would wish she had gone to the river, so he means Lake Superior, I think, and killed herself. And so Angelina said, you know, he then went upstairs and took a nap, and I felt like I didn't have a choice. You know, that it was me or him, essentially. So then she details, and you can react to that, but she then details what happens after that and what she does.

Sure. You know, and I, with the history... with this couple and with Pietro, I thoroughly believe that Pietro threatened her, you know, possibly to that extent of saying, I'm going to kill you. Um, when I wake up, you know, and so there's, there's an interesting aspect, you know, and this is where, you know, you need the, the legal experts to, to really evaluate because there is a, a temporal aspect. You have a threat of death. Um, But then the person that is threatening you removes themselves, and there is now an opportunity, a cooling off period, or an opportunity to escape that threat. And so that's where, you know, I believe prosecutors who are evaluating this case are going to look at the history between this couple,

as well as what Angelina said Pietro told her, and those would be mitigating factors in terms of how this case would be charged. Would it be charged as murder? Or would it be charged as a lesser crime? Or would there be a consideration that this threat that everybody probably believes Pietro would carry out is, in essence, almost as if there's active physical violence being inflicted on Angelina.

And now... this is a self-defense and maybe a justifiable homicide. And I don't know what the answer to that would be legally, especially up in Canada, but most certainly those types of decisions have to be made by the DA that is evaluating these circumstances. You know, do you have an overzealous prosecutor that charges her to the max, which would be foolish because she's probably the most sympathetic defendant ever?

You know, how are you going to get Well, it's Canada. Do they have a jury system? They do, yeah. Okay, so now you're going to have to, you know, I don't know if they have to have it unanimous or a majority or whatever, but, you know, you're going to have a hard time convincing some of those members of the jury that Angelina should have been charged at all, or at least at the level that the prosecutor may be pulling the trigger on.

So she is charged with murder.

Okay.

And I will say a lot of this has to do with what happened with the border that she took in and ended up having a relationship with. I mean, just like with the judge who gave Pietro a suspended sentence because of that affair after he stabbed her nine times. So the Crown is charging her with murder.

So, yeah, obviously there's something else going on that you're holding back. But just right now, with what I'm hearing— is that, I mean, technically it is a murder, but, you know, this is where, well, what are the, you know, the mitigating circumstances? There probably could be, you know, a strategy by the prosecutor to charge murder and then likely plead a debt down to something less, but still, you know, reinforce the fact that Angelina did commit a crime even though she's in horrible circumstances with Pietro.

Well, let me tell you what she says happens. Okay, so she said that the cooling off period that you had mentioned, that does happen. So he came home at 7.30. They fought off and on until noon. And he finally says, I'm killing you if you don't make some money by the time I wake up. He goes upstairs, he goes to sleep. And then several hours later, She takes an axe and she goes upstairs and she stands over him and she says she cleaved his head with it. And he, of course, woke up. I mean, I know that's not a given, but he wakes up because he puts his arms up to shield himself and she hits him with the axe six more times. And then she goes downstairs, outside, puts the axe back in the outdoor woodshed where she

had gotten it to begin with. And she is wearing bloody clothes and she sits at the fireplace with the little boy and then talks to the neighbor and says, I just killed a pig. And that's where this all begins. She is in jail for three weeks after this confession.

You know, even though there appears to be a fairly longer period of time than what I initially thought in terms of her taking the axe and killing Pietro. Mm-hmm. his threat to her is when I wake up, you know, so I think that that is, that's really the finish line for Angelina is that she has this period of time where she's wondering, should I, shouldn't I, you know, because when he wakes up, he's going to kill me.

And she does have the complexity of having little kids in the house. So the, you know, the escape It could be problematic. Logistics could be tough. Where would she go? Would Pietro track them down? So even though it seems like it's a longer period of time, I still think that she is possibly being able to utilize a self-defense challenge to this murder charge.

Well, let me tell you how this all goes. She has not been assigned an attorney, even though she requested one. So there are several delays, which is, I mean, she's, you know, in jail for three weeks. She doesn't speak English very well. And so, you know, I don't know if that means anything for jail, but she's already having a hard time navigating sort of this world, not speaking English that well. And she's, of course, upset and frustrated. Finally, they get her an attorney and she goes on trial.

So the trial starts May 8th, 1911. It is an all-male jury, which, I mean, doesn't surprise me. You know, it was quite an evolution for, I think, both Canada and the United States to involve women in juries. And the defense takes this kind of argument. So he says that after years of physical abuse, Angelina was driven to murder, that she was a wronged woman. who was provoked to kill by Pietro's persistent threats of forced sex work and murderous assault on her in November of 1910. So he says she needs mercy, not only because she's an immigrant, but she didn't know anything about Canadian laws and customs.

And she was an honorable woman who was also a caring mother. And as I mentioned before, this is the first time in Canada that this defense had been used. Now I think it's the battered person defense, but they were calling it sort of the battered woman defense. And so that's his argument, that she was terrorized by this guy and she finally had enough and had a break, and that's what ended up happening. He also puts her on the stand. And she has a lot of broken English, and she might not be that easy to understand for this jury. She takes the stand. She describes his numerous affairs.

So he's having affairs. That's where I think we know about the two weeks he's been having affairs. He's very abusive. Lots of threats. She says that she was scared of him and disgusted, frankly, that he had demanded that she engage in sex work for money. She was hurt. She was seven months pregnant. And this garners a lot of sympathy from the jury.

Until.

The Crown takes over the case, and the prosecutors say that Angelina is a woman of dubious moral character, that she cannot claim that she was a wronged woman. So there was sort of this like wrong woman status in a way where it's just very clear that the man was in the wrong and she is an upstanding woman.

So the Crown says none of that is true. She is not an upstanding woman. that she was having an affair when he stabbed her the first time and that she's an adulteress. And, you know, in the trial, the judge does not find that the November assault is a legitimate provocation for Pietro's murder. And then he says that all of the stabbing evidence is inadmissible. So if anybody injured six months ago could give that as a justification or an excuse for slaying a person, it would be anarchy complete. So you can't delay it, you know, is what he's, I think what he's saying. So what do you think about all that? I don't know if the jury conclusively heard. about the stabbing story, but the judge said this is, you cannot consider this as part of

this case.

Well, I think, you know, both what the defense put in front of the jury as well as the Crown did, those, of course, would be the competing arguments, you know, for the jury to weigh. the ruling the previous attack by Pietro on Angelina as being admissible, I think legally would be technically correct under most circumstances. However, Angelina's defense is somewhat predicated on The history of Pietro attempting to murder her, and now he's threatening to murder her when she is, you know, when he wakes up. So, you know, from my perspective, I think that that is something that the jury should be weighing when they evaluate, you know, what crime Angelina should be convicted of, if convicted at all. Yeah.

Absolutely. And, you know, I talk about this with my students all the time when we listen to podcasts that involved women who are coerced and controlled and manipulated in stories and men, too. But I don't know if this is still currently something that is talked about. But the well, she never called the police. Well, there's no police. police report about this, it means nothing. It means nothing, you know?

And so, you know, that, that kind of felt a little bit like that situation to me too, where, you know, it's sort of like, well, I mean, six months ago, six months ago, what if he turned into a choir boy and she decided to stab him for insurance, you know?

You know, and it's just having been involved, you know, overseeing, you know, our domestic violence investigators at the DA's office and talking to the prosecutor and you know, we see the same thing over and over with the victim and you can't blame the victim for whatever choices they make because they are under such extreme situations. And, you know, so, you know, it's like, well, Angelina went back into the house after he stabbed her nine times. Well, you know, this is part of the psychology of the abused and that in part is, you know, they're in a situation that they feel trapped in and I think that's what happened with Angelina. And she, you know, under an active threat by Pietro, she decided, I've had enough. You know, so,

you know, again, I think there's a crime that's been committed, but it's also there's a lot of sympathy that I have for Angelina under this set of circumstances.

And so does the jury, this all-male jury. You know, they have a lot of sympathy, which throughout history I have seen often. all-male juries acquit or, you know, really recommend a reduced sentence for women who, unlike Angelina, were not justified in murdering someone, and not even their husband. You know, like Clara Phillips in Los Angeles in the 1920s, I did a Tenfold More Wicked about who literally took a hammer and killed her, what she thought was her romantic rival. And, you know, you have these juries that kind of come out and later on, like, half the jury's in love with her. And it's just a very, it's a very, I mean, look at Lizzie Borden. You know, they acquitted her in like seven minutes. And we can

debate Lizzie Borden all the time. But, okay, let me tell you what happens. This is a three-hour trial. The defense only puts Angelina on the stand and then essentially throws out the battered person defense. And at the end of the day, Angelina is found guilty. It doesn't surprise me, you know, especially for 1911. But the all-male jury recommends clemency in this. So it's like they felt like they had no choice because she murdered someone, but they do believe the abuse. Now, what the judge is going to do is sentence her to be hanged. Right.

This is just overly aggressive, you know, and, and showing a lack of empathy for the situation that Angelina was in and probably just completely ignorant about this situation. Um, the, the jury, you know, finding her guilty of murder, uh, is, you know, one thing in terms of, well, what, what crime did she commit? You know, but then take into account these mitigating circumstances and this jury of men goes, yeah, clemency.

I would completely agree with that. Or minimal sentence or whatever type of punishment that is not at the level of life in prison or now a death sentence. For me, that's just crazy under these set of circumstances.

And what is to be done if that happens today? Like there is clearly a judge who is sentencing someone to 115 years for being the lookout driver, you know, in a burglary. There's an appeal, right? Can you appeal the sentence? You can appeal the verdict, but not the sentence, right?

So, yeah, now the sentence, you know, I don't think that's justification for appeal. However, what, you know, the attorneys are going to do is they are going to appeal, you know, the various aspects in the case, you know, to get certain charges, you know, saying, hey, this legally was incorrect or my, you know, the defendant's rights were were violated. You brought up the huge sentence for the lookout driver of a robbery. And we used to have in California the felony murder rule. So if somebody goes in and robs and kills somebody, that the driver, the getaway driver, could be charged with murder. So with Angelina's case, they would have to very quickly file an appeal. Because I imagine that justice is swift in 1911 up in Canada.

So you're going to want an appeal based off some sort of legal challenge that is legit. And I don't think the sentence is, even though it's such an over-the-top sentence for this crime, I don't think that in and of itself is going to get Angelina an appeal.

Yes, it doesn't appear so. What does manage to give her more time before this execution date is that she's pregnant, remember? So you've got a trial that began in May. Her execution date is set for August. I think they would have done it weeks later if she hadn't been pregnant. So she was due probably July 20th. So they were going to wait for her to give birth, and then she does give birth, and the baby ends up dying.

Hmm. Okay. 1911, I'm sure.

Yeah, not surprising. I mean, especially in whatever, you know, the condition of the prison that she was in. So the four children are placed in Children's Aid Society, and they are put up for adoption, all four of these kids. Yes. Now, the story doesn't end, thank goodness. So she has a lot of defenders because it's clear to most people, except apparently this judge, that she was abused and this is justified.

So it became an international sensation as in, you know, the UK, America, everywhere, where really well-known people were taking up the cause. And the justification for taking up the cause in some cases is so messed up, Paul, But then you kind of have to think, OK, well, I get what I get. You know, I'll take any kind of defenders. So you've got a variety of reasons why people say this woman should not be executed. One is among the Canadian nativists who hate immigrants says that there's a lot of racism towards the Italians. And they said that the crime proved that Italian, quote unquote, foreigners are inherently hot blooded, dangerous and violent immigrants. And they say, we don't want her executed. We want her out of

this country. Hmm.

Okay.

So there's that. Then there are other groups ranging from feminists to Italian communities worldwide, including the U.S., that come to her defense. And they build one of the most, you know, expansive clemency campaigns in Canadian history. And by July, she's supposed to be executed in August, by July... more than 100,000 people had protested the sentencing. And, you know, there were other reasons which essentially she, her defense hinted at.

She's Italian, she barely speaks English, and she's stupid. She didn't know Canadian law. How could she be expected to know Canadian law, you know? So there's that aspect of it. But again, I think she's keeping her mouth shut because she wants all the help that she can get. Her kids are gone, and her baby has died at this point.

So you have all of these protests and stuff, you know, people protesting and signing petitions. So this is what's amazing. And I don't know if this is a real promise, but you have five different people, men. who are offering their lives in exchange for hers. And I've seen this throughout history, people doing that. And it happens, which is really interesting, including a doctor. So while some of these groups want her death sentence to be commuted to life in prison, you know, others want a full pardon. A lot of people say she was abused. They're also saying take death penalty off the table for these couple of months before she ultimately gives birth and the baby dies.

Because all of this trauma of knowing that she's going to be hanged in August is going to actually hurt the baby. So take that off the table. So you literally have like 10 different arguments for why she shouldn't be executed.

Yeah, well, it's a complex case from a legal aspect, you know, and a sympathy aspect as well. So I could see where these groups would be taking up, you know, the causes from various different angles. You know, I'm curious as to, is there any success in getting the death sentence overturned?

So in mid-July, a few weeks before she's supposed to be executed, the government commutes her sentence to life imprisonment. at the Kingston Prison for Women. She's still pregnant at the time. She faints when this happens. She's so overcome. And then the baby dies a few weeks after its birth. I don't know if it's connected to her fainting or if this was going to happen anyway, but it's born alive.

You know, still, imagine the stress that Angelina is under. You know, cortisol levels high. You know, is she eating? Is she drinking? So, you know, I... Even though... her death sentence got commuted, I still have a problem with the life sentence under these circumstances. Mm-hmm.

I understand. So here's the end of this. After all of this, all of this happening, she is in prison, and she is a model inmate, you know? I mean, she prays, and she writes letters to her family, and she, you know, she does all... Ultimately, she's a good, quiet inmate. So in December of 1922... After 11 years, she's paroled.

Okay.

They let her out.

Yeah.

Here's the sad part of that. She's convinced that she needs to stay in this town, Kingston. She needs to stay in the town where the prison was. I think she's just scared that if she goes somewhere else, maybe she'll be rearrested. Who knows? But she's convinced she has to stay there. And it does not seem like she ever tried or, you know, was approached by her children.

So she never reconnected with these four little kids. who were ranging from seven down to three. Instead, she takes a job as a domestic servant for a wealthy family, and she dies 10 years later. And so she was 28 when she killed Pietro. She was in prison until she was 40. She was working for this family for 10 years, so she died when she was 50. Which for 1922 is a little young, quite frankly. So I don't know what happened, but 11 years in prison would certainly take years off your life.

Sure. And then, of course, what are you exposed to? What infectious diseases are you exposed to while you're in prison?

Absolutely.

Did she come down with tuberculosis and was having to deal with that over the decades? Well, I think she served 11 years. I'm happy she got paroled. However, I just think this was botched. The judge just completely botched this from a sentencing aspect. The jury, they may have not had a choice but to convict for murder under the legal aspect, but they did the right thing by recommending clemency, in my opinion, or recommending a very, very reduced sentence.

This feels like manslaughter almost, right? Like, is that kind of what you would think? If the justification is squishy in any way, if you have a judge who's not allowing in past offenses from Pietro that he was arrested for and convicted, and this is about that sentence, right? I mean, manslaughter is like 15-ish.

So, yeah, with Angelina, you know, and that's... one of those decisions that the prosecutor would make is, does this rise to the level of a second-degree murder, or is it at the level of a voluntary manslaughter? And I had to refresh my recollection of a manslaughter. But the voluntary manslaughter, it does involve the intentional killing, and she intentionally killed Pietro, but under mitigating circumstances. And the abuse, the prior attack on her, are most certainly mitigating circumstances.

So I do think that a charge of voluntary manslaughter for Angelina was probably more appropriate than a murder charge. And then voluntary manslaughter appears from state to state to have different levels of sentencing where it could be, you know, roughly 10 years to 15 years. And therefore, if she was, you know, sentenced, let's say, to 15 years, but with a good behavior, you know, be paroled after seven years, that seems to be a perfectly acceptable set of circumstances for the crime that was committed, which was taking Pietro's life.

But I think anybody that's really truly evaluating this case most certainly is going to be sympathetic to her situation. And I do believe that there's a certain legal aspect about the threat that Pietro gave her that I believe could be judged as she acted in self-defense and that this could be a justifiable homicide.

Well, you know, we've done these cases before, I'm thinking of one case in particular in late 19th century, I think, on a farmhouse where one member of the house, it could have been a teenage son or it could have been the mother, ends up killing the father as he's sleeping in bed. And it turns out that he was incredibly abusive. So this could have happened. He could have attacked her and she could have killed him. And I wonder what the difference would be, you know, in the sentence.

But this really did clearly hinge on the affair that she admitted to having with that border and, I mean, how nauseating that is. And I certainly hope we never have another one of those cases. I'm afraid we will.

Well, you know, having an affair, at least in the United States, is not a crime. It's something that is– can be considered as being an emotional factor in terms of, you know, whoever's committing the crime and the response to finding out about the affair. You know, and it just sounds like the Crown was utilizing the affair to make Angelina less sympathetic to this jury. You know, and those are just the tactics that attorneys play all the time.

I think my bottom line is that she was overcharged and she had just a reckless judge that was unsympathetic to the situation that individuals that are in these abusive relationships find themselves in. And, you know, he just looked at it as a black and white murder.

Well, I have to say I'm grateful for this court-appointed attorney who came up with this defense. I know it would probably seem obvious, but no one had used it before. And you know this is not the first time this would have happened. So, you know, this was sort of the beginning of it and a few decades before the United States used it. And in a way, it was successful.

I mean, you are saying from this all-male jury, yes, she's guilty, but it is on the record that they said, please be lenient and here's the reasons why. Yeah. Next week, I don't know, Paul, I hope we don't have another one of these types of cases, but I like history-making cases, and I know that sometimes we don't hear enough of those.

And so, you know, glad to bring it to you.

Well, you're going to educate me some more, it sounds like. I'll try.

All right, I'm going to educate you more next week.

All right, sounds good, Kate. Thank you.

Bye. Bye. This has been an Exactly Right production.

For our sources and show notes, go to exactlyrightmedia.com slash buriedbones sources.

Our senior producer is Alexis Amorosi.

Research by Allison Trouble and Kate Winkler-Dawson.

Our mixing engineer is Ben Talladay.

Our theme song is by Tom Breifogle.

Our artwork is by Vanessa Lilac.

Executive produced by Karen Kilgariff, Georgia Hardstark, and Daniel Kramer.

You can follow Buried Bones on Instagram and Facebook at BuriedBonesPod.com.

Kate's most recent book, All That Is Wicked, A Gilded Age Story of Murder and the Race to Decode the Criminal Mind, is available now.

And Paul's best-selling memoir, Unmasked, My Life Solving America's Cold Cases, is also available now.

Listen to Buried Bones on the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts.

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