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----- October 2007 August 2007 Chapter Ten: Murder Trial
Posted by Robin Gaby Fisher and Judith Lucas August 26, 2007 12:02AM
Categories: Featured Story
1975 Asbury Park Press Photo
Thirty-four-year-old Robert Zarinsky walks in handcuffs at the Freehold courthouse, where a jury heard the prosecution's circumstantial evidence and then the testimony of Zarinsky's family, who swore he was home in Linden the day Rosemary Calandriello disappeared six years earlier.Rosemary Calandriello's mother shook as she took her seat on the witness stand.
Her daughter's disappearance had taken an obvious toll on Agnes Calandriello. She was frail, having lost almost half her body weight in the six years Rosemary had been gone. Her face was creased with worry lines, and her eyes had a lifeless glaze.
Seated at the defense table no more than 10 feet away, Robert Zarinsky, the man accused of murdering the teenager from Atlantic Highlands, stared at Calandriello with a look of indifference. His mother, Veronica, sat behind him, her hair sprayed into a perfect bouffant.
The State of New Jersey vs. Robert Zarinsky began April 7, 1975, six weeks after the grand jury handed up a murder indictment.
Agnes Calandriello spent half the morning talking about her daughter. She said Rosemary had been sheltered, probably too much so -- "because she was my only daughter and I guess I kept her too much to myself."
She was a good girl, Calandriello said. She never gave her parents any trouble. She didn't smoke or drink and had just begun dating a young man, her first boyfriend.
Monmouth County Assistant Prosecutor Jack Mullaney was known for his energetic presence in the courtroom. He usually spoke loudly and walked at such a frenetic pace that his tie flew over his shoulder.
But with his first witness, he took things slow.
Mullaney reached into a box on the floor and pulled out an envelope.
"Mrs. Calandriello," he said, emptying the contents of the envelope into his hand and holding it out to the mother, "can you identify those two hair clips?"
"Yes, sir," she said. "Rosemary had quite a few of them. . . . She used them to make little side curls."
The two hair clips had been found in Zarinsky's Ford Galaxy convertible.
"Do you know if she had these type of clips in her hair when she left home?"
"Well, Mr. Mullaney," said Rosemary's mother, trying to keep her composure, "she says at 6 o'clock, 'I'll go upstairs and comb my hair.' Now I really, really believe that she had her hair pushed back with the two clips, but I'm not one hundred percent sure."
Mullaney presented the only other piece of physical evidence that could link Zarinsky to Rosemary: a pair of blue bikini underpants found on the floor of the back seat of Zarinsky's car.
"Could they have belonged to Rosemary?" Mullaney asked.
Calandriello said she could not be certain.
Rosemary owned different kinds of underwear, she explained. "She chose her own clothes to wear that day."
DAMNING STORIES
First Assistant Prosecutor Malcolm Carton, who had secured the indictment against Zarinsky, chose to watch the trial from the front row of Judge M. Raymond McGowan's courtroom in Freehold.
Carton's boss, Monmouth County Prosecutor James Coleman, monitored the proceedings from his office. The indictment had not changed his mind about the case, which he believed was hopelessly weak. But he quietly admired the zeal of his young prosecutors.
Over the next few days, Mullaney called witnesses who traced Rosemary's last steps.
Sam Guzzi of the Atlantic Highlands Police Department, who built the case against Zarinsky, painstakingly described the statements he had gathered from local residents who had seen Rosemary the day she disappeared. The strongest testimony came from four boys who said she had been sitting in a beat-up white convertible shortly after she left home.
"Do you see the person in this courtroom who drove that car?" Mullaney asked Tom Gowers, who lived across the street from the Calandriellos.
"Yes, I do," Gowers said.
"Can you point him out, please?"
"He's right there," Gowers said, pointing at Zarinsky. "He's wearing a yellow shirt and, well, he's sitting right next to the defense attorney."
The 34-year-old defendant never flinched. Not even later, when two former prison cellmates took the stand with damning stories to tell.
In November of 1969, Zarinsky had been indicted on charges of attempting to kidnap two 12-year-old girls from Leonardo, and again on charges of trying to entice a pair of teenagers from Atlantic Highlands into his car.
He would escape conviction in both cases, but in the meantime, he briefly shared a cell block at the Monmouth County jail with John Gosch Jr.
Guzzi had secretly arranged for Zarinsky to be placed near Gosch, who had agreed to spy on him in return for possible leniency on a bad-check charge.
"Don't question him," Guzzi instructed Gosch. "But if he says anything, let us know."
According to Gosch, Zarinsky had plenty to say.
One day, Gosch testified, Zarinsky went to court to try to have his bail reduced. He was counting on going home, but the judge denied the request.
"When he came back from court he was mad," Gosch testified. "He made the statement, 'They'll never find that stinkin' broad.'"
Another cellmate, Herbert Williams, testified he had witnessed the same scene.
"Did he do anything when he came back to the tier?" Mullaney asked.
"He said they wouldn't find the girl's body," Williams said. "He said he threw it from a bridge with weights on, bricks on, or something. .¤.¤. He threw it in a river."
THE RELATIVES
After eight days of testimony, the prosecution rested its case. Mullaney looked as if he hadn't slept. His eyes were heavy, and he slouched in his chair.
Richard Plechner stood and gathered himself, ready to begin his defense. Zarinsky's attorney was as plodding as Mullaney was animated.
All seven of his witnesses were Zarinsky's relatives -- and their testimony seemed rehearsed.
At 6 p.m. on Aug. 25, 1969, when Rosemary Calandriello disappeared from Atlantic Highlands, Robert was 30 miles away at home with his family in Linden, they said.
Veronica Zarinsky had been home all day with Robert's wife, Lynn, she said. Robert and her husband, Julius, had delivered produce for the family's wholesale business. They got home around 5 p.m. Veronica had dinner ready, as usual. She left for bingo at a local church at around 6:30.
"And who was home when you left?" Plechner asked.
"Well," said Veronica Zarinsky, "Lynn was home. She was in the kitchen, I think, reading or something. My husband was watching the news, 'Eyewitness News.'"
"Where was your son, Robert?" asked Plechner.
"He was in his room."
"And did you see him?"
"Yes, I did."
Julius Zarinsky corroborated his wife's story -- as did an array of aunts and uncles who claimed they saw Robert at home that night.
Lynn Zarinsky added an explanation for the incriminating blue bikini panties found in his car.
"They are mine," the petite brunette said. "I left those in the car when I'd gone down to my sister's swimming. I would throw my clothes in the back of the car. I remember missing a pair of them, but, apparently, they fell on the floor or something because I know they're mine."
The hair clips -- the ones Agnes Calandriello had said looked exactly like the ones her daughter wore -- were probably hers, too, Lynn Zarinsky said.
CLOSING ARGUMENTS
If convicted of murder, Robert Zarinsky would face a maximum sentence of life in prison. Still, he was confident he would drive back to Linden when the trial ended, a free man.
On the day of closing arguments, two weeks after the trial began, he told his wife he was sure he would be home in time for supper.
The courtroom was packed with spectators. Guzzi sat with Carton and with Rosemary's three brothers in the front row. The mother and brother of Linda Balabanow, a teenager from Union killed five months before Rosemary's disappearance, sat behind them. Like Guzzi, the Balabanows were convinced Zarinsky had killed Linda, but he had never been charged.
Zarinsky's wife and parents gathered on the opposite side of the courtroom.
Zarinsky stared straight ahead as his attorney recounted the testimony of the defense witnesses -- "incidentally, all either relatives or in-laws of the defendant," Plechner admitted.
There was a good reason for that, Plechner explained: "This is a Monday night around suppertime, and on a Monday night around suppertime, who would be your alibi witnesses?"
The witnesses all said Zarinsky was at home on the night Rosemary Calandriello disappeared. So how could he have killed her?
"We don't know where Rosemary Calandriello is," Plechner said. "We wish we did. We wish we could bring her into court here to testify for us. We hope she is well. We hope she did like many, many girls have done in recent years, and that is, left home for reasons only known to her."
Plechner's summation took most of the morning. Some of the jurors looked drowsy. The judge called for a five-minute recess.
Then it was Mullaney's turn.
The rookie assistant prosecutor focused on the thorny issue of Rosemary's body never being found.
"Is Rosemary Calandriello dead?" he asked. "Rosemary left the house barefoot, with a pair of shorts on and a top, two dollars in her pocket. Rosemary is the girl who was never out of the house at night, never hung around bowling alleys or street corners, never got in strange cars."
"The defendant lay in wait," Mullaney declared, "waiting for his prey."
The tension in the courtroom built with Mullaney's every word. Mullaney turned toward the Zarinsky family. He could barely contain his disgust.
"The defense in this case has brought in somebody to try to explain every single piece of incriminating evidence," he said, raising his voice.
"Liars!" he shouted, pounding his fist on the table. "That's what they are. Liars!"
Carton suppressed a satisfied smile. He had watched Mullaney practice the summation, and now, when it counted, he had executed it perfectly.
Mullaney's words were echoing in the courtroom as the jury of six men and six women began deliberations. Six hours later, at 5:36 p.m., they sent word to Judge McGowan that they had reached a verdict.
As the jurors filed into the courtroom. Zarinsky straddled his chair sideways and stared into their faces.
"Ladies and gentlemen, have you agreed upon a verdict?" the court clerk asked when all of the jurors were seated.
"We have," the jury foreman said.
"What is your verdict?"
"Guilty of murder in the first degree."
Sam Guzzi heard the words and broke down in tears. For six years he had waited for this moment. He glanced over at Agnes Calandriello, seated nearby. She looked numb.
Zarinsky turned to look at his mother, then shifted back in his chair and bowed his head slightly.
"The statutory penalty is mandatory," Judge McGowan said. "There is no reason to delay sentencing. I think I will sentence the defendant right now."
Plechner asked for more time -- sentencings rarely took place immediately following a verdict -- but the judge was adamant.
Zarinsky stood, his muscled shoulders slumped forward.
"Is there anything you wish to say to me before I pronounce sentence?" the judge asked.
"All I can say, Your Honor, I'm an innocent man," Zarinsky said flatly. " I have been found guilty and I really am not guilty, believe me."
Imposing a life sentence, Judge McGowan revoked bail. Seven armed guards surrounded Zarinsky, one snapping a pair of handcuffs over his wrists.
Watching as Zarinsky was led out of the courtroom, Carton suppressed a smile. He had taken a huge risk bringing the Calandriello case to trial, and he felt vindicated by the jury's verdict.
Still, his excitement was tempered by his knowledge of New Jersey's sentencing guidelines, which he understood better than most.
Zarinsky was 34 years old. Under the law, he would be required to serve 14 years and 9 months before becoming eligible for parole.
If everything went his way, he could be out at age 49.
SOURCE NOTES
All scenes described in this series are based on official documents, contemporary published accounts and interviews. Direct quotations are taken from court records, police reports or from interviews with the people who spoke the words.
Given the passage of time, extra efforts were made to confirm quotations with the people to whom they are attributed. Where possible, quotations were cross-checked with others who may have heard them. Where the source or recollection of a quotation was imprecise, the words were paraphrased or omitted.
Details of the murder trial and the scenes in the courtroom are taken from transcripts of the trial; a series of 10 interviews with Malcolm Carton between December 2006 and July 2007; interviews with James Coleman in February, June and July 2007; interviews with former Monmouth County assistant prosecutor Alton Kenney (who was working for Assistant Prosecutor Jack Mullaney at the time of the trial) in December 2006 and July 2007; interviews with Alan Balabanow in September and November of 2006 and July 2007; interviews with Lynn McDermott (formerly Lynn Zarinsky) in September 2006 and May, June and July 2007; an interview with Mullaney published in The Star-Ledger on Aug. 22, 1999; dozens of interviews with Sam Guzzi of the Atlantic Highlands Police Department between August 2006 and August 2007; and articles about the trial from The Star-Ledger in April 1975.
http://blog.nj.com/deadlysecrets/2007/08/chapter_ten.html
