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[Music] spencer doesn't want a divorce and if there has to be one there will only be
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one winner do you understand you don't win spencer frank spencer had somebody else to
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overcome his father-in-law rocco a man with connections to the mob i think rocco left him with the message
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that any further disputes between him and his daughter could result in frank getting hurt or even killed
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maria's threats to frank were so detailed so gnarly so disgusting saying that she would cut off his hands that he
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could never hold his children again this is the kind of thing that you learn from
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knowing a father who has roots in the mafia detectives in hemlock pennsylvania were
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about to unravel the life and crimes of the sanuti family and the marriage of frank spencer and maria sanuti spencer
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[Music] [Music] maria sanuti grew up in new jersey part of a large italian-american family they
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were close maria spencer was one of four kids she had three siblings maria sanudi was
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beautiful smart maria had attended a law school in georgia an unaccredited law school
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although she was barred and licensed to practice law in georgia the law a profession chosen by a young
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woman whose father had chosen a life of crime maria's father was rocco franklin rocco
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was an individual who had essentially resided in state prison for a majority of his adult life
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despite his prolonged absences rocco franklin was a big influence on daughter maria's developing personality
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i think in many ways maria may have learned from an early age that abuse and crime are things that are no
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problem that perhaps are even rewarded in the way that she grew up she's she doesn't have any problem with her
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dad being a tough guy after maria's mother teresa divorced rocco she and her children moved to
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pennsylvania where maria would eventually meet her future husband frank spencer they relocated to the selinsgrove
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area which is very close in proximity to where frank spencer grew up in columbia
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county frank and maria met in columbia county where frank and his family ran their
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junkyard business frank was instantly attracted to someone he found dynamic confident
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i think maria was a very type a personality maria seemed like an amazing person at first glance she was
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outgoing people liked her she was able to really bring out the best in people it seemed frank spencer had a
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very different personality he was popular in the central pennsylvania community where he lived frank spencer
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was just one of those really nice guys he had a lot of friends and they all considered him
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his best friend i think sometimes people are attracted to people who maybe represent a part of
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their personality they're missing or a part of their life that they're wishing to have more of and i think
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certainly maria looked like that to frank in the beginning because she was kind of exciting you couldn't really
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predict what she was going to do she was adventurous in 1997 they elope i think for maria it was something that she
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would just typically do and for frank it kind of seemed exciting okay let's do
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this you know we're in love why not for frank it represented maybe this hopeful future where he would just have
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this excitement for the rest of his life but in only a positive way over the years they have two children
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cyrus their son and frankie their daughter fast forward to the early noughties and
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maria and frank looked like they were living the classic all-american family life
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they had two lovely children both of them very athletic and prominent in their community each of the kids had
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a great deal of friends but appearances of family contentment were deceptive frank and maria by all accounts had a
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very acrimonious relationship they were at odds with each other constantly making up and breaking up seemed to be
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the course of their marriage defense attorney christian hoy got to hear maria's take on the relationship
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just seemed that frank and maria's marriage was really suffering from a great deal of
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bickering and infighting between them so it was a difficult marriage by all accounts
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frank's commitment to his job became a source of conflict between the couple
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frank's father decides to retire in 2006 and frank then at that point takes over the family
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business which is a junkyard and you know he's a good guy and he treats all the employees like family so
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this is this whole new family that's coming into their world now and maria's
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not so sure she likes it she's just not cut out for this [Music] this is not the life that she signed up
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for she pined for that life that she was adventurous and risk-taking on a daily basis now she couldn't do that as much
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she had so many responsibility to tend to children family matters and i think she grew increasingly
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unhappy and blamed her husband for it and when the spencers disagreed they didn't do it calmly
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the police were called several times as this violence and a relationship escalated
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the local police had been involved in numerous domestic disputes between the two individuals property damage property
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theft each one pointing the finger at the other maria would later tell her defense
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lawyer that both sides were equally at fault constant fighting between themselves
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some issues regarding infidelity between themselves and both of them but when it came to arguments maria
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appeared to give as good as she got when these incidents would happen frank would call the police
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he wanted it on record but he didn't really want to press charges on her i think frank definitely saw that this was
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a pattern of escalation and i think he started to fear more and more for his own safety and that's why he wanted to
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have the police document all of these events and he still would call the police and he would make them file the
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reports because i think he really knew that if he wasn't able to stop maria or if
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she didn't desire the change herself that eventually it was going to come to
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blows and that he would suffer those consequences in 2006 frank spencer decided enough was
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enough he served maria with a divorce petition but he didn't leave her the couple continues to live together
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they're trying to keep things as normal for the children as they can frank is such a wonderful father that he
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proposed this amazing way to keep the children as stable as possible and that is for the children to
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stay in the home and for the parents to travel back and forth into the homes so that they can have that stability that
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children so desperately need as splits go it was far from straightforward even though they they actually kind of
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physically separated from each other there were many times where they reconciled let's say between
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you know 2007 and 2010. there were many instances where they'd reconcile maria would
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return to the family home for months they would have another disagreement the police might get involved they had many
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of those make up break up reconciliation moments according to her friends despite their
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difficulties maria did not want to divorce frank a fact which put his life in danger
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she's told people over the years that if he ever threatened to divorce her she'd
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kill him well now she's talking more and more openly about what she wants to do
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frank first reported one of maria's threats to kill to the hemlock police department in 2007.
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yet maria sometimes managed to present a reasonable face to the world and to frank
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saturday february 6th at 3 57 p.m listen i know for some strange reason you'll think that
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i was attempting to threaten you or i was attempting to scare you back to me or i don't know how
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your mind works but listen i mixed signals from mrs sanuti spencer to her husband frank still living together
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would the divorce happen and if it did what future if any did frank spencer have
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despite divorce proceedings franco maria's on off relationship continued punctuated by frequent violent incidents
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in 2008 maria is arrested when she causes a disturbance at the school where her daughter attends she
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goes to pick up her daughter and her mother-in-law shows up at the same time and she gets in this scuffle with her
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maria is charged with disorderly conduct harassment and endangering a child because she doesn't
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buckle up the child in the car eventually the prosecutor doesn't think he can really make all those cases so he
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arranges a plea deal and she pleads to disorderly conduct and she pays a 600 fine
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during the scuffle maria had warned frank's mother she would have him killed
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not the first time not the last time that she issued that warning [Music] former homicide detective rod demery
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suspects that at the time no one in columbia county was too concerned by maria suniti spencer's brash words
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i think in hindsight you know obviously people wish they had taken these threats
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more seriously but the reality during that particular time people are listening and dismissing
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and probably chalking it up to what they did oh she's a black widow but not really thinking that it would actually
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happen perhaps on her own maria would not have acted on her threats but in early 2009
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she gained a powerful ally her father rocco franklin was eventually paroled from state prison in 2009 he relocated
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to a town about 70 miles away from where maria and frank lived in columbia county it was
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harrisburg pennsylvania which is the capital of pennsylvania when rocco was paroled
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a number of threats and a number of interactions between maria and frank took place
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namely maria suggesting that her father rocco would cause him harm or hurt him if there were any further domestic
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disputes between maria and frank and she often jokes to friends that you know if
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if my dad's out of prison you know maybe frank will behave voice mail messages recovered from
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frank's phone hint at how maria was using her father's freedom to play games
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with frank i was surprised to find that my father wants an apology that wasn't a little thing
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funny ways just want you to say sorry and i got nothing to do with it it appeared from frank's interaction
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with his friends that he was very concerned about rocco franklin being paroled from prison and being out and
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available perhaps to injure frank or cause him harm or confront him over the difficulties he
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was having with maria i thought i'd let you know because i care about you because i
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wanted you back not because i wanted to frighten you anything i just wanted you to know
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that he wanted an apology if you want to be stubborn about it that's on you take care
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frank was afraid deathly afraid of rocco maria on the other hand was pretty proud
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that it was her father i think that gave her a sense of power maria probably had been whispering in
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her father's years all these years when he was in prison about how horrible frank was and how they needed to ruin
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his life and now that maria's father was out of prison they could finally make it
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a reality in many ways maria's father was probably looking for that chaos again looking for
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that excitement and looking for a reason to commit crime once again despite the threats and frank's obvious
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fear he and maria continued to swing between blazing rows and passionate reconciliations
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until that is frank met someone new frank started dating a woman named julie dent very seriously and i believe that
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really was the final moment between the two that drove them apart and drove them to getting the
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final divorce decree in 2012. when frank met his new woman julie dent maria became really angry
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probably for a sense of loss of control or reality actually sitting in that they
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were truly getting divorced she would leave threatening messages and and tell julie you know you don't really
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think he loves you or things to kind of shake her in the relationship naturally once frank began to date julie dent who
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by all accounts was fairly squared away she had a home of her own she worked she
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had a good job a well-paying job she would often encounter the kids frank would have custody of the children uh
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julie would spend time with the children and frank i think that was something that naturally bothered maria and caused
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a lot of problems between the parties from text messages later discovered it was clear that maria had become
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increasingly paranoid about julie spending time with the children some of those text messages dealt with
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everyday custody issues involving frank and julie and maria's children and a lot of them
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frankly seemed legitimate from maria's perspective she was protecting her children she was inserting herself on
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behalf of her children hey julia taurian spencer do me a favor don't watch my children do
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not get between me and frank like you and my children do you understand me maria was upset about those events and
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that created a whole separate set of animosity between the the parties on the 31st of october 2009 halloween
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the harassment by maria and her father rocco turned into a more tangible criminal act
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the first property crime involved a breaking and entering into frank's mother's property where the junkyard was
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housed and different financial documents were stolen from the property but what's odd
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is that the only thing that's taken are business records business records that
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you know could prove how much frank actually is making but nothing else is taken it was always
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believed that those financial documents related to custody and support issues that were being played out in court in
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2009 and 2010. strangely the documents that were stolen from frank's business showed up at
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maria's doorstep again very peculiar they only benefited maria the records were potential ammunition
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for maria in the spencer's now acrimonious divorce and she made little secret of the fact
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that they had been stolen for her benefit [Music] shaken but not undeterred frank
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continued dating judy dent they are madly in love and and they they don't want this to ruin that they even
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book this romantic caribbean vacation maria wasn't going to allow that to happen
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the night before they're to leave on their vacation maria calls frank and she she says you
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know really i need to talk to you about something maria invited frank ironically to a
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hotel in a neighboring town on the night of january 23rd of 2010. on that night maria invited frank to
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dinner and then to stay overnight in the hotel she sent a message to the new woman in
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frank's life too her reasons for spending the night with frank became clear the following morning
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when frank returned to his home on the morning of the 24th he found a number of fire trucks the fire marshal and local
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police surrounding his burned out building frank's mother's home burns down
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luckily she wasn't there and he wasn't there the family dog is killed in the fire and the
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house is destroyed as the wreckage continued to smolder the following morning the architect of the
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attack made herself known maria shows up and she clearly drives by to be seen she's smiling and she
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obviously wants people to know that she had some involvement in this or control over this particular crime
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it was believed and argued by the commonwealth that maria engineered that fire using rocco franklin to set the
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fire and destroy the property maria sends frank these taunting messages you know one of them is karma
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is just a wonderful thing i mean since you've just torn our life apart you know yours your life just went up in
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flames it seems fair doesn't it the theory in court of course was that maria
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was paying frank back for taking a vacation with julie in january of 2010 and as a consequence the home was burned
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to the ground the fire is is determined to be an arson but there's just not evidence to show
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who's behind it so it remains unsolved frank began to fear what his estranged
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wife and her father would do next it seemed for sure to be escalating over time each act was worse than the last
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and i think this is when frank really became fearful for his life that this is going to end in disaster and
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possibly his own death [Music] in the summer of 2010 it was julie dent's turn to feel the heat of maria
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sanuti spencer's wrath it began with a face-to-face threat right after the bombing of
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frank's mother's house julie was confronted by maria at a game and maria told her your house is next
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then more vitriolic text messages followed you better watch your julie you know her life
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is is about to to take some dangerous turns too she's going to lose her job she's going to lose you she's going to
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lose everything so she's constantly threatening this couple she's trying to
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break them apart that she's really angry no one took maria's threat seriously
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in late summer she struck again 2010 another vacation had been planned with julian frank
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uh on august 25 of 2010 while julie dent was asleep in her home uh by herself her home was set on fire a
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side window was smashed out fluid was placed into the home and ignited by a road flare
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and the home suffered significant fire damage julie thankfully was able to get out of the home escaped
00:22:10
off of a roof and was able to escape without being harmed nevertheless her home was
00:22:16
completely destroyed by the fire once again fire marshals investigated what looked like a deliberate attack
00:22:24
when investigators are investigating arson they look for a point of origin to find out where the
00:22:30
fire actually started and kind of build a theory from there they want to find out if there were
00:22:35
accelerants used or or any other materials to get the fire to start a jack belonging to a nissan vehicle
00:22:45
once owned by mr rocco franklin was found at the scene believed to have been used to pry open a
00:22:53
window to allow the accelerant to be put into the homes to set the house on fire
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carjack a plastic jug a partially used flare a lot of physical evidence pointed to
00:23:09
rocco franklin for the firebombing of julie dent's home on august 25th of 2010.
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there was mole folks that responded to the fire saw a corvette speeding away from the scene
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rocco franklin owned a corvette at the time the evidence against rocco franklin and
00:23:32
maria was stacking up but no arrests were made it must have felt a frack like nothing
00:23:38
and no one could stop them i think it made maria feel very powerful to instill fear on somebody and to make
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them feel powerless almost two years after julie dent's home was destroyed frank and maria's divorce
00:23:53
was finally granted the parties were actually by law divorced on june 8 of 2012 which becomes
00:24:00
an important date in the case the divorce decree assigned ownership of the family home on fairview drive
00:24:07
sullensgrove to frank frank should have been relieved that his ordeal was over but he told friends he
00:24:13
still didn't feel safe a number of them had been confided in by frank in the days and weeks leading up
00:24:20
to his death wherein he indicated that he felt his days were numbered that maria and her
00:24:27
father had something planned for him and he had become very scared on june 27th frank wrote to maria asking
00:24:36
her to stay away from the house three days later news of the termination of the spencer marriage was published in
00:24:42
the local paper later that same day frank and maria had a very public run-in he had attended a baseball game for his
00:24:51
young son who was about 10 to 12 years of age at the time and played in the local little league
00:24:57
that evening maria likewise attended the game and frank was seen harassing maria
00:25:03
at the game maria was a diabetic and a very brittle diabetic at the time had lots of neuropathy difficulty walking
00:25:12
and things of that sort and all of the accounts of frank's friends who testified at trial
00:25:18
suggested that frank was mocking her publicly and kind of embarrassing her about her limitations
00:25:24
did frank's mockery push maria over the edge or had she always planned to take
00:25:29
final revenge on the husband who was determined to leave her because soon after frank spencer was dead
00:25:40
that all occurred on the evening of june 30 2012. it is believed from the forensic
00:25:46
evidence that he was killed about 12 hours later on the morning of july 1 2012. 46 year old frank spencer had been
00:25:55
killed but it would be two days before the crime was discovered on july third friends who hadn't heard
00:26:01
from frank since the baseball game went to his home in selinsgrove to investigate
00:26:06
when frank was found he was found in the doorway of his home in a pull of blood his arms were
00:26:13
stretched out above his head and it appeared that he had been dragged within minutes police arrived and
00:26:19
secured the scene the police noted prominently a gunshot wound to his head the second shot was a closer shot
00:26:30
through the bicep and into the chest cavity was this the handiwork of maria and rocco frank's friends were in little
00:26:39
doubt but detectives needed the evidence to prove it immediately on a inspection of a crime scene of a
00:26:47
shooting you're looking for blood spatter where the blood may have landed you're looking for
00:26:54
projectiles that may have come from a bullet that's entered the body or may still be in the
00:27:00
body you look for shell casings anything that can kind of get you that firearm information that you need and you're
00:27:06
looking for the angle or the trajectory for where the bullet may have went in also the the velocity of blood spatter
00:27:13
how fine the mist is on the wall or there are a lot of different things that make a shooting
00:27:19
different from any other murder the blood evidence certainly told a story frank is found dead
00:27:28
on the front porch of his home he's lying in a pool of blood and it looks as though the blood has
00:27:36
been like pushed with a a push broom or something that would indicate that someone may attempted to clean up the
00:27:44
blood or or wipe the blood investigators take a a piece of the tile floor and they are able to lift from that a bloody
00:27:54
footprint and it matches to a size 11 dr scholl's escape model sneaker the same
00:28:02
kind of shoe that maria's father rocco is known to have worn it looked likely that rocco had been at
00:28:10
the scene but what about his daughter maria finally they found a rubber glove located inside the home this was a glove
00:28:20
that would be typically worn by an individual that was cleaning a toilet or a sink or using some kind of industrial
00:28:27
cleaner in their home that glove ultimately had dna belonging to maria spencer inside of it
00:28:37
while investigators were meticulously processing evidence they noticed two significant
00:28:42
absences frank's truck and frank's dog on the morning of july 1st 2012 the
00:28:50
police were able to gather video surveillance from local stores and businesses that operated along the
00:28:57
highways that surrounded frank spencer's home they were able to piece together
00:29:02
frank's coming and goings from the night before and the morning after the june
00:29:08
30th baseball game they figured that the murder happened at about 8 30 in the morning on july 1
00:29:15
because they saw his harley-davidson pickup truck leaving along the highways adjacent to his home
00:29:23
in and around the point in time the quality of the video wasn't sufficient enough to tell who was
00:29:31
driving the vehicle but one thing was clear is that someone was driving frank's truck from the crime scene
00:29:37
the ford f-150 harley-davidson vehicle was located in sunbury township wherein maria spencer
00:29:47
her brother owns a bar so that was the first piece of evidence found in that vehicle was mr spencer's wallet which
00:29:54
was loaded with cash and credit cards so the police eliminated robbery as a motive for his killing pretty quickly
00:30:03
when the truck was found frank's dog wasn't in it as police continue their investigation
00:30:11
they get some help from an unlikely source about an hour away from frank's house
00:30:19
these two wedding planners are setting up for a wedding and all of a sudden this dog walks in
00:30:25
this this weimaraner and he's happy and healthy and wagging his tail and he's clearly somebody's dog he's not
00:30:32
a stray and you know the couple doesn't know what the deal is but they report this
00:30:38
dog you know has just turned up at our place as it turns out this dog was frank's dog motley
00:30:47
the dog was found near a catering facility about 10 miles away from the home of rocco franklin
00:30:54
the wedding venue was on the north susquahani trail at dofin 40 miles south of frank's home and just a few miles
00:31:00
from harrisburg where rocco had lived since his release from prison so the police concluded pretty quickly that
00:31:08
mr franklin's uh activities included taking mr spencer's truck loading the
00:31:15
truck with mr spencer's dog going to the son's bar in sunbury and then making
00:31:22
his way back to his home where the dog was left unharmed at a catering facility and later recovered that day
00:31:31
as detectives were building a timeline of events around frank spencer's death
00:31:36
he was in the mortuary in bloomsburg what the coroner had found would offer an even more revealing picture of how
00:31:43
frank spencer had died as investigators determined that the the first shot was from a rifle and possibly
00:31:49
a longer distance they expanded the crime scene they went into the woods frank spencer had been shot twice on the
00:32:06
doorstep of his family home but both bullets had not come from the same weapon investigators determined that frank had
00:32:14
actually been shot by two guns one was a rifle shot at a long distance the other
00:32:21
was a close-up shot and that would indicate something more personal when it's discovered that a shot may have
00:32:30
come from a rifle or a long-range weapon we're going to try to determine where
00:32:34
that shot was fired from they searched the area and it's it's at this point of the year it's summer
00:32:40
time so the woods are all leafed out and they're you know it would be easy for
00:32:44
someone to hide out in the woods they went into the woods and they found a tree that was y shaped
00:32:52
perfect for a bipod or a tripod type steadying of a rifle for a shot a tree stand that was set up in a tree
00:33:02
about 150 feet up a hill directly across the street from frank spencer's home
00:33:10
they search this area where this tree is and they find a spent bullet casing and
00:33:15
then they also find a soft case for a rifle there they believe the first shot came from rocco franklin who was perched
00:33:23
across the street in the tree stand having used a long gun or a rifle to shoot the first shot that they believe
00:33:31
went through mr spencer's neck what happened next is less clear they think and have argued at trial that a second
00:33:45
shot occurred after frank dropped at the front door after the first shot made contact with him
00:33:52
they believe that second shot came from a handgun they recovered a bullet from the body of
00:33:58
mr spencer and it was indeed later traced back to a handgun they believed the second shot was discharged from a
00:34:05
handgun at close range and actually killed frank spencer but detectives couldn't prove who had
00:34:13
fired the shots forensic evidence placed maria and her father at the scene but that didn't prove they were killers
00:34:21
so a couple of months go by and when police are trying to get them to talk they call maria in for questioning and
00:34:29
she refuses they call rocco in and he's okay so he goes in and he agrees to talk to
00:34:38
investigators and they ask him so where were you on the day of uh and rocco is you know he loves this kind of cat and
00:34:46
mouse game while i went there i you know i was home all day i didn't leave and during that interview rocco said
00:34:52
that he had not left his home in harrisburg but detectives knew differently cell phone evidence is is awesome
00:35:02
it provides investigators not only communications and in conversations but points of of
00:35:09
where they were in their travel it's gotten advanced enough to actually make animated maps of someone's
00:35:16
movement on a crime the cell phone contacts that mr franklin had showed him at or
00:35:25
near the catering location in harrisburg where the dog was found they also located him in and around the sunbury
00:35:33
township area where the f-150 had been found questioned about the presence of his dna
00:35:39
and fingerprints at the crime scene and on frank's truck rocco franklin told a
00:35:44
far from credible story and when they say you know we know you were at frank's house
00:35:51
oh you know that's right i forgot i went um i went to frank's that day to you
00:35:56
know to clean i was doing some laundry and um and i used a push broom to sweep the floors
00:36:04
this from a man who could not stand his daughter's estranged husband a man who
00:36:08
had for months made frank's life hell and he said that at one point he wanted to
00:36:15
test drive frank's truck and purchase it and frank's response to him was i'll wrestle
00:36:22
you for it so obviously you can see that he's trying to put together a a reason why his dna would show up at
00:36:30
the scene and he's enjoying every minute of it circumstantial evidence was slowly
00:36:37
stacking up in august 2013 13 months after frank's murder prosecutors convened a grand jury
00:36:44
to determine if there was enough evidence to charge maria sanuti spencer and her father rocco franklin
00:36:50
so in the months leading up to the indictment of maria and rocco maria and rocco were asked to come to testify
00:36:59
before the investigating grand jury in pennsylvania ultimately she went before that grand
00:37:04
jury as did rocco and gave statements that were obviously under oath maria in her testimony just goes on and on and
00:37:14
on she she barely stops talking she denies of course everything she denies terroristic threats and everything else
00:37:22
but the authorities have the evidence and so they filed charges on her they filed charges of
00:37:30
12 counts of perjury more than a dozen other charges and most importantly the murder of frank spencer
00:37:40
in a process fraught with delays maria was not arrested until july 28 2014 two years after frank's death
00:37:49
detectives go to arrest maria and she freaks out on the same day authorities also issue a
00:37:57
warrant for ronco's arrest but he is nowhere to be found he has flown the coup
00:38:03
it turns out right after his grand jury testimony he boarded a plane nobody knows how he got there but he
00:38:11
ended up living in argentina and he was living in argentina undiscovered for an extended period of time
00:38:21
ultimately he was located he was detained and he fought extradition during the time that
00:38:28
he was fighting extradition the trial of maria spencer commenced it was november 2015. maria stood alone
00:38:36
in the dock to answer for frank's death motive was the government's biggest
00:38:42
piece of evidence they had piles of text messages piles of police criminal reports
00:38:50
piles of circumstantial evidence of her involvement in property crime she had the motive she had the anger she had the
00:38:59
ability with her father having been out on parole and that she was the driving force
00:39:05
to get her father behind the property crimes the arsons and ultimately his you don't win spencer
00:39:18
maria's conviction looked likely because of her own words written and spoken over
00:39:23
the course of the previous 15 years one of the more prominent statements attributed to maria took place at a
00:39:30
football game uh shortly after frank spencer's murder where she allegedly said to one of his friends that she was
00:39:38
responsible for the murder and that he might be next if he steps out of line with maria and rocco
00:39:46
one of frank's friends comes up to maria you know just wants to be safe and he says you know maria
00:39:52
i would never i would never do anything to you know in front of your kids i would never do anything to disrespect
00:40:00
you and she looks at him and she says that's why you're still alive but then she goes on
00:40:09
and she says you know the last thing he saw before he died was me this said prosecutors placed maria
00:40:20
firmly at the scene of frank's death and may even have proved that she fired the
00:40:24
bullet that killed him the government argued that maria was the perpetrator of the second fatal shot in
00:40:33
other words she was the first individual onto the decking after mr spencer was shot by mr franklin from the tree stand
00:40:42
across the street and that she approached mr spencer as he lied in blood outside his front door on the
00:40:49
porch deck and administered so to speak the kill shot with a small handgun maria and her lawyers refuted that
00:40:58
version of events lots of physical evidence electronic data based evidence suggested that mr
00:41:05
franklin was the sole perpetrator of the crime we still believe that and we still
00:41:10
think that maria didn't have the physical or mental capacity to do what they claim she did
00:41:17
would the jury agree on november 18 2015 they retired to consider their verdict i think a jury and injury deliberations
00:41:28
are always nail biters because they're humans and no two humans are alike so
00:41:33
you can have a room with 12 people and 10 could be thinking the same thing with the other two
00:41:39
don't after eight hours of deliberation the jury comes back maria spencer is found guilty on all
00:41:48
charges the murder of frank spencer 12 counts of perjury arson conspiracy terroristic threats they sentence her to
00:41:59
life without parole plus 50 years if you're convicted of first degree murder the sentence the only sentence
00:42:08
you can get is a mandatory life sentence she received additional time for some of
00:42:13
the additional offenses she's currently housed in a state correctional facility in pennsylvania and will be for
00:42:20
the rest of her life in the event that her appeals are unsuccessful in october 2018 after a lengthy
00:42:28
extradition process maria's father returned to face justice despite the slew of forensic evidence he denied
00:42:36
everything two years later her father rocco goes on trial and he too is found guilty he's
00:42:44
guilty of frank's murder arson and burglary the jury sentences him to life without parole plus 45
00:42:56
years how did maria saluti spencer come to join her father in a life of violence
00:43:02
and criminality she grew up with a criminal dad she learned a lot of her worst behaviors
00:43:09
from him and so she knew how to intimidate people she knew how to carry out her threats and she didn't cover her
00:43:15
tracks very carefully because this is not what an impulsive person does an impulsive person isn't all that
00:43:20
thoughtful and planful about the crimes that you're committing you just commit
00:43:24
the crimes and it probably gave her a sense of a high in many ways they enjoy this idea of playing god being able to
00:43:30
take out somebody's life and i think they really wanted to see that suffering
00:43:34
up front they wanted to see the blood they wanted to see him take his last breath they wanted to see him suffer and
00:43:40
that really points the way to maria and her father being the worst kind of psychopath that we usually would
00:43:46
know of some continue to believe that maria is innocent but it was shown in court that
00:43:53
she was a woman who made vows to kill who terrorized frank spencer in an escalating campaign until she committed
00:44:00
the ultimate crime against the man she had once vowed to love until death parted them
00:44:12
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