The caregiver of the retired teacher murdered last Thursday with a stab wound to the chest at his house in the Buenos Aires district of Moreno, which was intentionally set on fire, and his partner, were detained as accused of the crime, while for the investigators the motive was to rob the victim of 1,800,000 pesos.
Judicial sources reported that the caretaker of Gerardo Spinazzola (75) was seen loading bags into a green Chevrolet Corsa car at the door of the retiree’s home minutes before the house began to catch fire.
“According to a neighbor in the area, moments before the fire, this car was parked in front of the house with the trunk directed towards the house, while this woman loaded several bags into the vehicle,” explained a spokesperson linked to the cause.
With this information, the prosecutor of the Functional Instruction Unit (UFI) 3 of Moreno, Luisa Pontecorvo, requested the arrest of the woman, identified as Elizabeth Natalia Lara (42), who was captured yesterday afternoon by police officers. of the City since he has legal domicile in that district.
In this context, the woman refused to testify before the prosecutor and was charged with “criminis causa aggravated homicide and treachery in a real contest with aggravated robbery by the use of a knife.”
The defendant is the daughter of a friend
According to sources, Lara was the daughter of Spinazzola’s best friend and the one in charge of assisting him since the man had reduced mobility, so he had the keys to the home.
“The evidence suggests that the victim knew her attacker. The house was a fortress. When the Firefighters entered, they did so through the side gate, the one with the garage. It was not locked. The door at the back of the house was wide open”, clarified the source consulted.
On the other hand, judicial spokesmen indicated that the motive for the crime would be the theft of some 1,800,000 pesos that the victim kept in a false bottom of a piece of furniture.
In this regard, the sources revealed that part of the money was recovered, which was incinerated, while they warned that the fire could have caused “a major tragedy.”
“The expertise showed that some gas pipes exploded. Fortunately, it did not cause a more serious accident,” revealed an investigator.
According to what was reconstructed by the investigations, Lara threatened Spinazzola to tell him where the money was, but the retiree refused and was stabbed in the back.
In turn, the investigators estimate that, after killing him, the defendant took some valuables from the house, loaded them into bags, called a remís and then set the house on fire.
Part of this hypothesis was supported by the owner of the green Corsa car in which Lara was seen on the day of the event, since the man appeared before the Moreno prosecutor’s office, where he explained that he is a taxi driver, while providing the address of an address in the town of San Fernando to which the passenger who hired him went.
The authorities verified that Lara’s partner, identified as María Itatí Morales (41), resided in that house, and later they raided the house.
There, bags with different valuables belonging to Spinazzola were recovered, for which Morales was arrested and charged as a “necessary participant” in the murder.
The incident was discovered last Thursday after 8:00 p.m., in a house located on Calle Pio XII at 2300 of the Moreno district, in the west of Greater Buenos Aires, where the victim lived.
Judicial sources informed Télam that the investigation began when firefighters attended a fire in the building and after putting out the flames they found the man’s body.
At first, the investigations suspected an accidental death but the experts observed in the autopsy that Spinazzola had a stab wound in the back.
In this regard, the sources confirmed that Spinazzola died from carbon monoxide inhalation, although they stressed that “the outcome would have been the same without a fire.”