In all likelihood, Vincenzo Pietropaolo, a 65-year-old former treasurer of the Bank of Athens (now operating as Grobank), will spend the remaining years of his life behind prison walls.
Vincenzo Pietropaolo gets two life terms for double murder
Judge Ratha Mokgoatlheng handed down the sentence at the Gauteng High Court, on Monday. After a lengthy trial, the court deemed it necessary to execute the maximum sentence of two life terms and an addition 26 years of imprisonment, to put to an end, a horrifying family tragedy.
Judge Mokgoatlheng scathingly described Pietropaolo as a pathological liar that expected the court to believe his version of how his father Pasqualino died violently in his sleep in March 2017 and his wife Manuela shot herself nine times eight months later; and completely ignore the mounting evidence that placed him at both crime scenes.
How Pietropaolo killed his father and wife
Pasqualino was asleep in his home when an armed man broke inside and killed him where he lay. That individual was his son. To divert all suspicion from him, Pietropaolo doctored the crime scene to make it look like a botched house robbery.
While this was a possibility, investigators always found it strange that Pasqualino’s valuables were never taken. Eight months came and went with no red flags drawn on the 65-year-old. However, his reign of terror would come to an end in November.
Pietropaolo was chased down and arrested by members of the Brackenhurst Community Policing Forum after multiple gunshots were heard reverberating from the residence of Manuela.
It was later found out that the 65-year-old had, in a fit of rage, shot his estranged wife nine times and fled the scene. If it were not for the complex’s security, he would have held a stronger argument in court.
The motives behind killing his father and wife will remain with him in the confines of the prison cell he will be locked in until he draws his last breath on earth.
Judge Mokgoatlheng was boggled by the sheer lack of remorse Pietropaolo displayed in pleading his innocence after such heinous acts.
“I find that the accused is inherently evil. He murders his father, he doctors the scene, in the sense that he pretends that there was a house robbery and this resulted in the death of his father. The court has already found that there was no robbery there. What is certain is that the accused has shown no remorse or a modicum of remorse,” the judge said.