00:00:07
[Music] do [Music] welcome to true crime garage wherever you are whatever you are doing thanks
00:00:43
for listening i'm your host nick and with me as always is a man who shops at food and stuff it's where he gets his
00:00:50
food and his stuff ladies and gentlemen the cap yeah destroying the government from the inside out it's good to be seen
00:00:57
and good to see you thanks for listening and thanks for telling a friend [Music]
00:01:07
this week i am very excited to be featuring a seasonal beer from one of our very favorite breweries this week
00:01:13
look out because we are featuring peachful by the great highland brewing in beautiful asheville north carolina
00:01:21
inspired by the south's favorite fruit this ale features the soft sweetness of the peach this ale is delicious and
00:01:29
refreshing garage grade three and three-quarter bottle caps out of five and we'd like to thank some of our
00:01:35
friends for helping us out with this week's beer fun first up we got a big shout out to frank in kingsley michigan
00:01:41
and a big shout out to nicole in charlotte north carolina and here's a sonny cheers to steven in tampa florida
00:01:48
and a big we like your jib to kelly in evansville indiana let's give a cheers to ruth anna in chris field maryland and
00:01:56
last but certainly not least we have joseph in perth new zealand everyone we just mentioned went to
00:02:03
truecrimegarage.com and helped us out with this week's beer run and for that we thank you yeah say it with me bwwrun
00:02:11
beer run go to the store and get you some hey but if you're not on the mailing list go sign up right now
00:02:17
because i've been sending out promo codes i'm gonna send out another one in a couple weeks and so if you're not on
00:02:22
the list you're not in the know and colonel that's enough the business all right everybody gather round grab a
00:02:29
chair grab a beer let's talk some true crime [Music] this week's crime story reads like some kind of legal thriller
00:03:14
or crime fiction novel like those by the great john grisham but trust me my garage friends when i
00:03:22
say this unfortunately is a very real and true story this week we go to the big city of
00:03:30
baltimore a city that frankly has left us with many a mystery back in february of 2019
00:03:38
we here at true crime garage told you the story of detective sean suiter a young hard-working baltimore homicide
00:03:45
detective who was killed on the job with his service weapon the baltimore police department stated
00:03:53
they believed his death was a suicide we told you that something fishy was going on detective suiter was killed
00:04:01
just one day before he was scheduled to testify before a federal grand jury investigating police corruption in
00:04:09
baltimore to this day many still debate detective suiter's death could the baltimore police be correct in
00:04:18
their findings or was suiter murdered in the line of duty or even worse murdered by one of his own
00:04:27
in september of 2020 we followed the hit show unsolved mysteries and filled in some blanks in the ray
00:04:35
rivera case rey was an aspiring screenwriter who recently ended a long-term position
00:04:43
with one of those big financial and investment research firms ray disappeared after receiving a mysterious phone call
00:04:52
about a week later he was found at baltimore's historic belvedere hotel his body
00:04:59
somehow came crashing through the lower roof of an empty meeting room located on the
00:05:05
lobby level ray left us with many questions including a cryptic note folded up nice and tight and taped to
00:05:13
the back of his computer alongside of a blank check to this day we still do not know
00:05:21
what that note means or why rey ran out of his home after receiving that phone call
00:05:27
both ray rivera and detective suiters still unsolved unresolved cases read like a great john grisham novel
00:05:35
this week's case involves a young federal prosecutor working on a high profile trial
00:05:42
this young man is working hard probably burning the candle at both ends when he gets a late night phone call
00:05:50
he abruptly leaves his office near midnight embarking on a late night roundabout
00:05:55
journey punctuated by mysterious transactions and unexplained time gaps then his body is found in amish country
00:06:06
someone or someone's stabbed the young prosecutor 36 times yet no one was seen with him
00:06:14
his trip makes no sense and his stab wounds raise even more questions [Music] jonathan paul luna was 38 years old when
00:06:23
he was killed this case has been called baltimore's most high profile and perplexing murder
00:06:29
investigation and this is true crime garage [Music] december of 2003 jonathan paul luna is 38 years old
00:06:55
he's an assistant u.s attorney and at this time he is actively prosecuting a big case
00:07:01
jonathan left the private practice world four years earlier and became a federal
00:07:07
prosecutor at the u.s attorney's office in baltimore maryland in his role he prosecuted many cases against child
00:07:15
pornographers drug dealers counterfeiters and so on but his current case involved a locally well-known rap
00:07:22
artist whom the government was accusing of running a heroin ring out of his downtown baltimore music studio the
00:07:30
trial was in full swing on wednesday december 3rd but as happens in many cases on day
00:07:36
three of the trial the parties decided to enter into a plea agreement jonathan wrapped up court that day around 6 pm
00:07:44
and he went home jonathan lives with his family in elkridge maryland this is a family of four we have
00:07:51
jonathan's wife angela an obstetrician and their two young sons five-year-old justin and 10 month old jacob and living
00:08:00
with them is his mother-in-law so it's gonna seem like a typical evening they sit down and have dinner then after
00:08:07
dinner he explains to his wife i have to go back into the office tonight this is
00:08:12
because of that plea deal jonathan had to prepare the plea agreement that would be settled upon in court the next day so
00:08:20
he left for the federal courthouse in downtown baltimore at 8 48 p.m now my understanding here captain it's a short
00:08:28
drive for him to get to work it's about 10 miles at some point jonathan decided to
00:08:36
take his work home with him so he's at the office he's burning the midnight oil as they say and he decides you know what
00:08:43
i'm gonna finish the rest of this work up at home so he returns to the house and as he was working
00:08:51
now around 11 p.m that night jonathan received a call on his cell phone and after he hung up the phone he told
00:09:00
his wife angela that hey i gotta go back to the office again now it's our understanding that late
00:09:07
evening phone calls were far from unusual for his line of work this was a 24 hour a day job for
00:09:15
the dedicated attorney so one time going back to your office might not seem like
00:09:21
that big of a deal but two maybe raises a red flag here or there but we do know that he did go back to the
00:09:29
office a second time if i'm the wife two is definitely going to raise the red flag for me however
00:09:35
let's keep in mind that second trip back to the office is spurred by the phone call that he
00:09:41
receives and unfortunately we don't know who was on the other end of that call and as you
00:09:48
said captain we do know for a fact that he did go back to the office this is because building records show that his
00:09:54
honda that he was driving his vehicle entered the parking garage and stayed there until after 11 30. it's what
00:10:02
happened after that that is really a mystery we have some information on jonathan's
00:10:09
movements that night but before we get into that we should note that later that night jonathan's wife angela called
00:10:17
police this is to report her husband missing when he never came home and she could not reach him on his cell
00:10:25
or at his office when jonathan failed to show up for court the next morning at 9 30 a.m the u.s
00:10:33
attorney's office in baltimore raised the alarm that a federal prosecutor had gone missing
00:10:39
little did they know that jonathan's body had already been found and the location where his body was
00:10:46
found in the manner in which he died would raise more questions this case becomes more difficult because he's in a
00:10:52
line of work that you don't share the details with your spouse there's a lot of mystery in this case there's a lot of
00:11:00
mystery in jonathan luna's movements that night so we know jonathan is a lawyer but
00:11:07
colonel can you give us a little more background on who jonathan is jonathan paul luna was born to parents
00:11:13
paul and rosella he was raised in the patterson housing projects in the bronx where he picked up
00:11:20
his lifelong love for the yankees his father worked as a gentleman waiter at one of those high-end restaurants in the
00:11:28
city and his mom stayed at home with the two luna boys him and his brother jonathan was well liked but was
00:11:36
considered a bit of an egghead he was known to sit in a closet in the luna's cramped apartment reading books
00:11:44
jonathan's best friend daniel rivera told the washington post quote we thought he was a bit of an oddball
00:11:51
end quote young jonathan was known to his friends by his nickname joey again quoting from the post
00:11:58
in high school joey luna frequently showed up for class wearing suits and ties with curly hair and a runner's physique
00:12:06
the six foot tall luna was handsome tiger wood handsome is what they would say now after working his way through
00:12:13
college captain he set his sights on law school he went to the very prestigious university of north carolina law school
00:12:21
and graduated in 1992 president of his class after taking a year off to care for his
00:12:27
cancer-stricken father so you can see this is a guy he comes from humble beginnings he aims high he
00:12:34
shoots for the stars but at the same time he never lose loses track of who he is and where he came from taking time
00:12:41
off from his dream of becoming an attorney to take care of his his father who was ill
00:12:48
after law school he worked as an associate at one of dc's top law firms but soon
00:12:56
decided he wanted to be in the public sector so he moved to the federal trade commission and then the district
00:13:03
attorney's office in brooklyn again a far cry from the cushy job at a private firm i always found individuals
00:13:11
that were bookworms as a child to be very interesting and and very complex individuals but also individuals that
00:13:21
really knew themselves and eventually he gets this opportunity to join the us attorney's office in baltimore as a
00:13:27
federal prosecutor and he jumps all over it the maryland u.s attorney who hired him lynn battaglia said of jonathan
00:13:36
quote he had a really vivacious personality peppy excited full of vigor he really wanted the job he really
00:13:44
wanted to be an assistant u.s attorney end quote according to the post in his four years at the u.s attorney's office
00:13:52
he prosecuted about 80 criminal cases in six civil cases most were drug cases but there were also
00:14:01
many tough draining cases such as the conviction jonathan obtained of a man who sexually abused his
00:14:07
seven-year-old daughter and a man that jonathan got sentenced to 120 months for sexual exploitation of a
00:14:16
minor meanwhile jonathan met medical student angela on a blind date and as they say it was love at first
00:14:25
sight they were married on august 29 1993 they moved to elkridge maryland where angela
00:14:32
was from and eventually listen to the character of this young man eventually jonathan paid for his parents
00:14:40
to move nearby and help subsidize their home payments that's just the kind of person he was he
00:14:47
was going to take care of mom and dad all of his colleagues seem to like him and it does sound like captain around
00:14:55
the time of his death that might be a little more debatable but for the most part he's there for a
00:15:01
four-year span we couldn't really find anybody to publicly say a bad word about him and on the contrary he was called
00:15:10
special he was exciting and idealist a former prosecutor who worked with jonathan named joe evans said he was
00:15:18
wonderful upbeat person who was supremely dedicated to his mission and to his profession
00:15:25
even a defense attorney on the trial that jonathan was working on when he died he said he was a very decent person
00:15:34
and this is the opposing counsel you know even some of the defendants he worked so hard to put away i guess they
00:15:41
affectionately called him tito because they thought he because they thought he might look like
00:15:46
tito jackson opposing counsel but they work in the same field they're they're colleagues right
00:15:53
but also what we've learned in the last seven years is if a bunch of people like
00:15:57
you and if you walk into a room and light it up you might want to watch your back
00:16:03
thankfully for me i don't have that problem you darken the run uh he was an athletic
00:16:09
guy though captain he was an avid marathoner he loved to organize the office softball team and throw dinner
00:16:15
parties i guess he joined the barristers club in november the november before he was
00:16:21
killed this is a fraternity for judges and lawyers and his violent lonely death in that
00:16:28
cold stream in the middle of nowheresville pennsylvania was really was the last thing that anyone
00:16:34
would have expected just this initial introduction makes me think of the the movie the firm
00:16:42
but let's dive into what we know about the crime scene yeah so at 5 00 a.m on thursday morning
00:16:51
this is december 4th we have a drilling employee there's a company there i'll avoid their name but we have an
00:17:00
employee he's starting out his day as usual in the pre-dawn hours the company was located on dry tavern road
00:17:09
in lancaster county pennsylvania the worker parked his truck went inside you know did the normal
00:17:15
stuff got coffee went back outside to fill the company's trucks with fuel for their daily rounds
00:17:22
when he's doing this he spots a red light in the darkness off the road near a wooded area
00:17:31
so next we have a co-worker that shows up and the two men walked over to see what this light was it's not supposed to
00:17:38
be there as they approached they were startled to see that they had come upon what
00:17:44
appeared to them and what i'm sure they assumed was a car crash they see a silver 2003 honda accord that is 75
00:17:53
yards off of the road the vehicle's front wheels are in a small creek the headlights were off
00:18:01
but the engine was still running the red light they had seen was coming from the dashboard indicator light
00:18:09
concerned the men peered into the window of the vehicle but the car was empty in
00:18:15
the dim light keep in mind it's still dark at this time they could see what looked to them to be
00:18:21
blood on the front seat and a child's unoccupied car seat in the back of the vehicle
00:18:28
the workers called 9-1-1 and reported what they had found when asked on the phone by the operator
00:18:37
they said no we did not see the driver of the car anywhere the area of pennsylvania
00:18:45
where we're talking about here captain is a hundred miles from baltimore this is amish country it was so rural and
00:18:53
peaceful that no one was on duty from the local township police force so instead the state police handled the
00:19:01
9-1-1 call so now very quickly we have pennsylvania state police troopers who arrived on the
00:19:08
scene they had no trouble locating the car's presumed operator he was lying face down in the stream
00:19:15
basically under the front of the running honda he had no pulse emt emts noticed right away that the dead
00:19:25
man appeared to be riddled with stab wounds now back in baltimore jonathan's failure to appear in court
00:19:32
was a big deal and word spread quickly that he was missing when word came in that he had been found
00:19:39
dead 100 miles away there was an immediate call to action his boss u.s attorney for
00:19:45
maryland held a press conference on the steps of the federal courthouse building
00:19:51
and swore to solve jonathan's murder saying quote let there be no doubt that everyone in law enforcement local
00:19:58
police state police united states marshals atf fbi are united we will find out who did this
00:20:07
we are dedicated to bringing the persons responsible for this tragedy to justice
00:20:13
that's a commitment from me that's a commitment from every law enforcement officer in the state of maryland
00:20:19
jonathan's funeral would be attended by over a thousand individuals here's where we start to have a bunch of
00:20:26
problems with our true crime story this week here captain it's when you really try to dive into
00:20:32
the details to figure out what happened and a spoiler alert here for those of you that don't know the jonathan luna
00:20:40
case at some point the his whole death you know he is found stabbed and in this shallow creek in the waters of the
00:20:51
shallow creek but there will be debate in this case over the years as to was this a suicide
00:20:59
or a homicide now things were back then and are still to to this day very complicated by the refusal of law
00:21:08
enforcement to release the autopsy report in the absence of actual information from that report anonymous sourced
00:21:17
comments and rumors have skewed the narrative of the autopsy findings as a result there was a ton of
00:21:25
misinformation at the beginning of this case and i'm gonna go through some of that misinformation right now
00:21:32
so for example we have judge corals this is the judge that's presiding over jonathan's current trial when he's
00:21:39
killed this judge tells the associated press that the prosecutor jonathan had suffered multiple stab wounds and
00:21:47
gunshot wounds someone else said that jonathan appeared to be the victim of a quote an
00:21:53
execution-style murder sources told abc news another bit of information here or misinformation a search warrant
00:22:03
affidavit by the pennsylvania state police said that jonathan had suffered a traumatic wound to the right side of his
00:22:09
head now here is what we actually know and i'm going to use air quotes when i say the word actually
00:22:17
here's what we actually know with the caveat that the reports have never been officially released so we only quote
00:22:26
know this stuff from people in the know who have commented or from leaked information
00:22:34
well a lot of this information is going to come from the dr barry wall so he's a
00:22:38
family doctor but also works at the lancaster county or works as a lancaster county coroner and the
00:22:45
way that this comes out as said the the autopsy has never been officially released also they've refused to release
00:22:53
it but he's answered some questions on the record he was present when the forensic pathologist conducted the
00:23:00
autopsy now while the actual pathologist refused to discuss the results dr walp has
00:23:07
talked and he said to the baltimore sun that jonathan was found dressed in a business suit shirt and tie an overcoat
00:23:15
socks and shoes that there was no wallet or cell phone in luna's pockets but he was wearing a
00:23:23
work identification badge around his neck he was also wearing his wedding ring at
00:23:28
the time of his death now back to the wallet i have seen reports that say it was not in his pockets but was found in
00:23:38
the vehicle as for the cell phone not so much not located we'll get into the cell
00:23:43
phone in a little bit dr walp also reported that jonathan died from drowning and had suffered multiple stab wounds in
00:23:51
the neck and upper chest he was not shot his death was ruled a homicide so no matter what we want to debate
00:23:59
it was ruled ace it was ruled a homicide multiple sources say that jonathan suffered 36 puncture wounds to his upper
00:24:10
chest neck and head more than half of the wounds were to his neck well i'm going to play a little captain obvious
00:24:16
for you but in a mystery murder case one of your options that's on the table is possible suicide
00:24:24
this is not suicide period and how do we know that we have evidence of 36 puncture wounds
00:24:32
that's what they're telling us you don't puncture yourself 36 times so you can take suicide off the table
00:24:40
this lawyer jonathan luna was viciously murdered [Music] [Applause] [Music] [Music]
00:25:12
all right we are back cheers to the windows to the walls love you all i love that music captain
00:25:20
crank it up in my headphones talk hands in the air cheers to everybody for joining us in the garage
00:25:26
once again this week he was shaking his tush in his seat that's right i'm the best chair dancer you've ever seen
00:25:33
now captain these stab wounds are very interesting to me and i think you were touching on that just before the break
00:25:41
there because there were so many of these puncture wounds it's been reported by multiple sources jonathan suffered 36
00:25:49
puncture wounds let's get into some of the details about that so this dr walp said that
00:25:56
jonathan had suffered a number of shallow quote prick marks on his chest and neck in addition to
00:26:04
several deeper more serious stab wounds most of the stab wounds to jonathan are now largely reported as mostly
00:26:12
superficial this is from the post a federal prosecutor found stabbed and drowned in a rural pennsylvania creek
00:26:19
suffered numerous shallow puncture wounds described as prick marks on his chest neck and head suggesting
00:26:27
that he had been tortured now according to the coroner who examined his body said of these this referring to the
00:26:35
numerous prick marks said you would think that they were perhaps after information
00:26:41
from the guy when you see something like this or perhaps for kicks meaning these are just little little jabs and
00:26:49
little stabs and maybe somebody's holding him down and trying to get information out of him
00:26:54
or there was some kind of torture that was being performed on this young man as for jonathan several severe stab
00:27:02
wounds some penetrated at least four inches deep deep enough to cause hemorrhaging
00:27:08
on both sides of his neck the post reports that jonathan's left carotid artery had been punctured
00:27:14
causing him to bleed to death in minutes now basically what they're saying here captain is
00:27:22
he the water killed him he drowned in that small amount of water right because he's
00:27:27
found face down in the water but they're letting us know that these stab wounds and where the injuries were
00:27:34
on his body especially that carotid artery were enough to kill him so he would have died from the stab wounds
00:27:42
it's just the water killed him first makes you wonder because in this case they were going to reach agreement
00:27:50
so normally when that is happening both sides are like going to be happy about something
00:27:55
they're making a compromise it's not wanted you know oh well this guy did a bad job and now i'm going away
00:28:02
for for life and i think he screwed it up and so i'm going to make him pay it seems like like we said in this case
00:28:10
they were coming to agreement right and you're jumping to what was everyone's first suspicion in this case
00:28:17
right you got this prosecutor he's actively working this big case well it must involve the case that he
00:28:24
was currently working on and you know we said that him being found in this creek a hundred
00:28:31
miles away murdered this way was the last thing that anybody would have expected well that's not entirely true
00:28:39
there is a certain amount of danger that comes with this job right you're putting
00:28:44
away bad people who probably would like to do something bad to you so it's not the last thing that anybody
00:28:51
would expect we're spot on with our statement because of the way that he is found and where he is found nobody would
00:28:58
have expected him to be killed this way and so far from home now back to some more of this
00:29:05
information regarding the never released autopsy again dr walp said in an interview cited
00:29:12
by the post that jonathan was still breathing when he was dumped face down in the frigid water so that goes back to
00:29:19
the idea that the water killed him first but he certainly would have died from these puncture wounds yeah brutal the
00:29:25
doctor also said that there was a considerable amount of congealed blood which indicated to him
00:29:32
that jonathan had probably been lying there in that position for a period of time i hate when they use the phrase a
00:29:39
period of time we know he was there for a period of time was it a long period of
00:29:43
time or a short period of time yeah at least give us that yes dr walp corrected the statement in the
00:29:49
police affidavit citing the traumatic injury to jonathan's head he said that there was no there was no
00:29:57
such injury however and this makes a lot of sense the post reports that there was a head wound
00:30:04
but it's believed to have happened when he landed in the creek that maybe it wasn't somebody striking him over the
00:30:11
head with something it's simply when he fell face down into the creek that's when he
00:30:19
had this injury to the head defensive wounds were there any we this is what we want to know especially when
00:30:27
people are going to argue suicide so the post reported that there were cuts to jonathan's hands and a fingernail mark
00:30:36
near his wrist but there were no cuts to his arms and most reports say citing anonymous law enforcement sources that
00:30:44
there were no defensive wounds i debate that a little bit based off of the information that their work cuts to
00:30:52
his hands but again without this document being released we don't know exactly what is fact and
00:30:59
what is fiction here yeah is the doctor telling us the truth or is he just speculating on what he believes happened
00:31:06
now the vehicle jonathan's vehicle is going to be of major import to this case of course the maryland tags on the honda
00:31:15
stood out right away to the pennsylvania state police tracks on the ground showed how the
00:31:20
honda had turned off of the road and ended up creekside the car's doors were closed the headlights were off the
00:31:28
engine was idling i'm assuming it was in park or was stuck in a way that it couldn't move the
00:31:35
front wheels were reportedly right on the edge of the short embankment to this this very shallow stream
00:31:43
leaving indentations in the soft mud a police affidavit indicated that there was blood in the car and we know that we
00:31:51
have the two gentlemen that call 9-1-1 they say that they saw blood in the vehicle
00:31:56
as well but according to this police affidavit captain along with the blood inside the car there was cash
00:32:03
scattered inside the vehicle the post reported that about two hundred dollars in cash was found in the vehicle
00:32:10
and also something that they're calling cell phone equipment was found in the back of the vehicle i'm guessing that
00:32:16
might just be cell phone charger was found in the background maybe it's old zack morris phone
00:32:22
right well it's 2003. uh the affidavit also said he was holding on to his vintage the affidavit
00:32:30
also said that the investigators found blood smeared on the outside of the driver's side door
00:32:36
and left front fender of the vehicle inside the car the affidavit said that there was a large pool of blood
00:32:44
on the right rear floor of the car so we know that he has 36 puncture wounds he's going to be unfortunately leaving a
00:32:54
lot of blood at this scene it's really interesting to me where they're finding a lot of this
00:33:01
blood it would appear to me that he suffered a lot of these wounds before exiting the vehicle and he might
00:33:08
at some point have been in the rear seat of this vehicle right the fbi conducted
00:33:15
dna tests on the blood found in the honda it looks like they were looking to see
00:33:20
if all of the blood found was jonathan's or perhaps someone else someone else's blood as well had been
00:33:27
bleeding in the car there were many early reports this is incredibly interesting to me how
00:33:35
these things seem to go away in this case but early on captain there were many early reports
00:33:41
that it was determined that there was blood from a second person found in the vehicle but nothing
00:33:47
else about this has ever been released to the public right what was not found in jonathan's car again his cell phone
00:33:57
it was sitting in his office at the courthouse and so were his eyeglasses you'd think
00:34:03
that if he met somebody at his office they would have record of this or have some kind of cctv
00:34:10
surveillance you would be shocked at the lackluster security setup at the courthouse i was
00:34:19
really surprised when you have these people who are working with dangerous individuals that probably receive
00:34:26
threats on the reg that there's not better security or better surveillance at this area now
00:34:35
his cell phone and his eyeglasses being found at the office could be an indicator of either he
00:34:41
rushed out of the office for some reason or if he were to have been abducted at some
00:34:47
point that night maybe it happened at the office or he simply just forgot them it's really confusing but i think it's a
00:34:55
piece in this case that we cannot overlook and it should not be understated well it's strange though because he had
00:35:02
two important calls that we know of that altered the events of his night so you would think that if even if he's
00:35:12
leaving in a rush he's making sure he has that cell phone just in case he gets another
00:35:17
call well since jonathan luna is a federal employee the fbi is going to head up this investigation and it looks like a
00:35:27
field agent in baltimore her name jennifer love handled the case she made a public request for information saying
00:35:34
that the agency was aggressively investigating the circumstances surrounding jonathan's death
00:35:41
they looked at his computer files emails financial records past trials and prosecutions they poured over his phone
00:35:50
logs and palm pilot information i forgot all about palm pilots they interviewed his family friends colleagues and
00:35:58
associates and so on just like we would expect them to do investigators descended on
00:36:05
this lancaster county in the days after the death showing jonathan's photo to motel desk
00:36:13
clerks and gas station attendants and asking for guest logs and video security camera footage
00:36:20
the only avenue that bore fruit was when they started retracing his steps after he left the office on that fateful night
00:36:29
jonathan's car had in it what in the state of maryland and other states is called an easy pass transponder
00:36:37
so this allows one to do automated payments at toll booths so that you don't have to stop and throw
00:36:44
change in the bucket or hand over some cash to the tollbooth operator investigators gathered the electronic
00:36:51
toll records from his transponder and the security video of the transactions at toll booths where
00:36:59
payments were registered that night they also pulled his atm and credit card records and looked to see
00:37:07
where those cards were used if they were used that night and and they were and the picture that started to emerge
00:37:15
of jonathan's last hours well frankly they're very very confusing well before we dive into
00:37:22
the events of that night let's go back to this trial because they're set to make
00:37:27
a deal which like i said sets his evening in motion so what was this whole trial about okay
00:37:36
so you're spot on here captain because this was everyone's first assumption in luna's death and in fact so much so that
00:37:45
as soon as his body was found his co-prosecutor on the drug trial and his family and luna's family were all placed
00:37:53
under immediate law enforcement protection judge lynn battaglia who had hired jonathan in 1990 when she was a u.s
00:38:02
attorney for maryland told the post quote i was fearful that he had been killed in relationship to the job which
00:38:09
is what everyone thought and quote so these guys that he worked this deal with walter and
00:38:16
dion we know that they were both behind bars at the time of jonathan's death so they physically weren't the ones who
00:38:24
killed him but could they have arranged for some type of hit now this would make a lot
00:38:29
more sense as you're pointing out here captain if there were no plea bargain on the table
00:38:35
right and jonathan luna is the one that made the plea bargain to them and so we have one of the attorneys for
00:38:42
these guys that goes well out of their way to point out look not only was this a plea agreement in in
00:38:49
favor of these two guys that were facing all these charges it was a really good deal for both of
00:38:56
them more serious charges were being dropped in fact and so it was a really good deal for them and
00:39:04
so the attorney goes out of his way to say look they're not involved they didn't have
00:39:08
anything to do with it because if something happened to jonathan luna they run the risk of something happening
00:39:15
to that really good deal that they were going to get i do want to point something out here though before we move
00:39:21
off of this idea i don't think that this should be so quickly dismissed i agree because look a lot of criminals are
00:39:29
pretty dumb people all right and what happened if they ordered some kind of hit and the information of the plea deal
00:39:35
being offered that same day never makes it its way to the person that's going to
00:39:40
carry out the hit and so what if the hit was arranged before things had turned in
00:39:45
their favor and it was a dramatic turn in their favor an abrupt turn in their favor so what if that information didn't
00:39:52
reach the right set of ear balls and some monster goes out there and handles things the old dirty way
00:39:59
before they receive the information i think that that should still be a possibility however
00:40:06
however the big but on that one is duh this is investigated by the fbi and others this is the angle that they would
00:40:14
have pursued first and that they would have really looked at the most severely early on in this
00:40:20
case and so while i don't think we can so quickly dismiss this idea i'm a firm believer that this was
00:40:28
thoroughly looked at and considered maybe not ruled out completely but but really strongly looked at in this
00:40:36
case let me just say i like big butts and i cannot lie but maybe it's some kind of combination
00:40:43
of that oh yeah okay the the case shifts and you're going to give get me a deal but maybe this criminal from the
00:40:50
beginning said if this guy doesn't get me off then he's he's gone and to send a message to everybody else
00:40:59
i mean who knows but it seems like they were involved in quite a bit of wrongdoings yeah so the
00:41:07
the way these guys were violent individuals as well they weren't just selling drugs they were also violent one
00:41:13
in fact was accused of of murder but the thing here though captain is when i say
00:41:19
dramatic and abrupt shift in the case it was very much that because what ended up
00:41:24
happening was the witness that was going to put these guys away was an informant that was working for
00:41:32
the fbi and gathering information on these types of people right but at the same time
00:41:38
this individual was slipping out of their their ankle monitor that they were supposed to stay at home
00:41:45
and continue to sell drugs themselves continue to do violent behavior and break the law
00:41:52
all while being on the take from the fbi the problem with this then becomes for the prosecution because it's going
00:42:00
to look to everyone like hey there's an incentive for this guy to testify against these people
00:42:07
he's he's doing the fbi a favor they're taking care of him and he's putting away
00:42:12
these these other two bad guys meanwhile he's committing all these same crimes himself so it's a big big problem for
00:42:19
the prosecution and it's my understanding i did not pour through all of the court records on this
00:42:26
situation but it's my understanding that jonathan luna may have been aware of this and
00:42:32
i say may it's very very likely that he was aware of this and this is what brought on the plea agreement
00:42:38
because it looks to me like he failed to disclose that the prosecution it's a whole team so i shouldn't just say he
00:42:47
but they failed to disclose that information to the defense and so some big wrong doing yes yes here
00:42:56
in the united states you got to share the information so when they have that they're like oh
00:43:01
well maybe we can plead this thing out give these guys a really primo deal they take it and nobody no one's the wiser
00:43:08
yeah maybe they maybe these individuals figured out that this guy had information that he lied
00:43:15
about and then we shouldn't limit the possibility of a revenge type killing for his job to just this one trial i
00:43:22
mean think about how many people he had put away in his four years working for or working as an attorney
00:43:29
it looks to me like the the overall consensus regarding these individuals in that
00:43:35
trial are the investigators decided that jonathan's murder was not connected to that trial
00:43:42
and they even go out of their way to say that his murder was not connected to his work
00:43:48
so then they're going to have to start really looking elsewhere for an explanation well we have evidence that
00:43:54
he is not disclosing information that he should have been disclosing so that starts making me question his character
00:44:04
and like we said he could have had one character for most of his life but some of these guys they
00:44:10
they they start compromising their character to try to get ahead yes and this is going to require the law
00:44:16
enforcement to look into why there might be a personal motive to murder jonathan luna
00:44:24
so again per the post investigators have interviewed luna's wife angela as well as his friends and associates paul luna
00:44:31
the prosecutor's father who was 83 at the time of when he was interviewed said federal
00:44:36
investigators questioned him and his wife for three hours at their apartment in columbia the
00:44:42
investigators asked detailed questions about jonathan's personal life they asked whether jonathan had financial
00:44:49
problems they asked if he had girlfriends or boyfriends that maybe angela doesn't know about
00:44:56
and the digging did expose some secrets some deceptions also some rumors and allegations and
00:45:04
unfounded accusations all of which were seized on by the media and the public this is why jonathan's
00:45:12
family would eventually stop talking about the case altogether the officials who were involved refused
00:45:19
to address it any further and the whole thing today remains a sword in impenetrable mess
00:45:27
it's almost impossible to determine what is true what isn't what's significant and what's a total and complete red
00:45:34
herring or even outright fallacy so in february of 2004 this is at a news conference
00:45:42
fbi assistant director cassandra chandler said that the agency had been looking into more than 600 leads and
00:45:51
explained that its delving into jonathan's personal life was necessary to find answers the baltimore sun
00:45:58
reported that while jonathan was said to be outstanding at and dedicated to his job
00:46:05
that maybe things were not so bright and shiny on the inside co-workers told the paper that jonathan
00:46:12
had fallen out of favor with his boss but we do have his boss who publicly denied whispers that jonathan wasn't
00:46:19
cutting it but again it's been kind of private that's confirmed but that's after the
00:46:24
fact correct and some people will not speak of the dead right and it looks like okay so he was hired by one boss that
00:46:34
boss moves on to bigger and better things and then he gets a new boss and some of
00:46:40
us have experienced this where maybe the old regime really likes you and likes the cut of your jib and how you do
00:46:45
things and maybe the new regime does things differently and doesn't like the cut of your jib that's what it sounds
00:46:51
like to me but again on the public level his boss at the time of his death was saying you know everything was fine he
00:46:58
was a good employee well what about some other rumors or speculation that we've heard well this also kind of stems
00:47:06
from his job too so even if we have the boss saying everything was fine again privately people were saying no
00:47:15
things weren't so fine that his boss didn't like him we also have three legal sources who spoke to the son that told
00:47:23
the paper that jonathan was not acting like himself as of late leading up to his death
00:47:29
he they said he was distracted and disorganized which doesn't sound like him at all
00:47:35
based off of what we've already discussed i wonder if there's any possible drug use
00:47:40
well keep in mind just on the morning the morning before that fateful drive that later that night
00:47:46
on december 3rd jonathan was late to court and of course judges do not like that so the judge fined jonathan 25 for
00:47:55
being tardy this is just kind of a little you know slap on the on the hand there to remind you hey you got a job to
00:48:02
do we expect you and everybody else here to be on time right jonathan told the court that he was at the hospital all
00:48:08
night with his son who was ill this is difficult this could just be you know you're caught in the moment and you
00:48:16
tell a little white lie i couldn't find anything to confirm that he was at the hospital or that his son
00:48:22
was at the hospital the night before the other thing too keep in mind his wife is
00:48:26
a doctor so she could provide uh medical care and assessment of the sun at home better than
00:48:36
most of us of course the judge did hand out the fine regardless of the excuse but the sun's legal sources say that the
00:48:46
rumors of jonathan not being a good fit at the u.s attorney's office were right again three people said that he had
00:48:53
hinted that he was getting ready to leave the prosecutor's office and as you pointed out though captain
00:49:00
a lot of this guy's work and a lot of things that the work being done within this office are kind of off limits to
00:49:07
the public they're all going to kind of be very secret stuff we're not going to know all of the ins and outs of what
00:49:13
everybody was doing or their performance reviews and the like now you asked about other things well of
00:49:21
course the police are asking about other things too one thing in particular was debt that they wanted to know about yeah
00:49:28
financial troubles this can be a reason for murder or suicide or the baltimore sun reported that law enforcement
00:49:36
sources said that jonathan luna was 25 000 in debt on several credit cards okay so let's examine this though
00:49:46
this on the surface may seem like a lot but really is it a lot for a man who has
00:49:51
a family a mortgage two cars is helping to support his parents and probably still has law school debt
00:50:00
right maybe not here's where the problem comes in the sun says that he had as many as 16
00:50:07
credit cards that's what the newspaper says as many as 16 credit cards and some that maybe his wife didn't know about
00:50:15
okay that's a lot of cards right um i don't know if i picture the george costanza wallet when i hear that but
00:50:22
some people are better with money than others some people like to carry credit cards for the points
00:50:29
jonathan's friends all said that he never seemed to lack money well of course he's got 16 credit cards his wife
00:50:35
was a doctor so they had plenty of money coming in one thing that i've always kind of
00:50:41
thought about this when you see very successful people that are carrying debt that might be a little higher than one
00:50:47
would expect a couple of things one are these just little debts that mounted up to much larger debt at some point and
00:50:56
it kind of got forgotten about because they're successful people that are working very difficult demanding jobs
00:51:02
right and they have two small children and he's taking care of his parents these are little things that are just
00:51:08
part of everyday life and then one day you you review your finances at the end of the year and you go oh my goodness
00:51:14
well it was a bad year or boom over the last few years we racked up all of this debt
00:51:20
the other thing though too when we talk about credit cards that his wife did not
00:51:24
know about this goes out to the the married people out there the people that have been married
00:51:31
this has never been my experience but i have heard and been involved in conversations throughout my years on
00:51:38
this big blue marble where people have told me so and so has been married for years and
00:51:43
found out oh we were not in as good of standing as i thought we were we were behind on our bills or we had a lot more
00:51:51
debt than i thought when i go why didn't you know what was going on well my husband handles the finances or
00:51:58
my wife handles the finances and i just didn't pay any attention to it i thought that
00:52:03
she or he had it under control and i learned whoa we're in trouble so this this whole thing doesn't
00:52:12
look and i know that people have been killed over a lot less money but when we talk about money troubles i
00:52:17
think the only reason why this is a factor here and this number is mentioned this 25 thousand dollars and so on as
00:52:24
mentioned here in luna's case is because then there was suspicions that he could have been
00:52:30
involved in a theft that there were whispers about a possible theft [Music] thank you so much for joining us here on
00:52:48
the grounds today so much more to get to if you need more true crime garage for your ear balls go to truecrimegarage.com
00:52:57
and click on the off the record link it's our bonus show so it gives you a bonus
00:53:03
of true crime garage yeah check out the bonus show you get all of the back catalog of off the record as well which
00:53:09
we've done over 100 episodes and it's as i've been told many times it's america's favorite podcast so check that
00:53:17
one out join us back here in the garage tomorrow until then be good be kind [Music]
00:53:57
you