Pod Insights Casefile True Crime Case 317: Thomas Perez About this episode When 71-year-old Thomas Perez Senior failed to return home after a short walk to his mailbox in Fontana, California, his son Tom wasn’t overly concerned. He suspected his father had just gone to visit friends or family and would return home of his own accord. But when police arrived at the Perez home to complete a missing person’s report, they came to suspect something else entirely.
---
Narration – Anonymous Host https://www.instagram.com/caseys.snaps/
Research & writing – Milly Raso
Creative direction – Milly Raso
Production & music – Mike Migas http://mikemigas.com/
Music – Andrew D. B. Joslyn http://www.andrewjoslynmusic.com/
Audio editing – Anthony Telfer
Sign up for Casefile Premium:
Apple Premium https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/casefile-true-crime/id998568017?ign-itscg=30200S&ign-itsct=casefile_podcastsSpotify Premium https://spotifyanchor-web.app.link/e/9gSwcv7USsbPatreon https://www.patreon.com/casefileFor all credits and sources, please visit https://casefilepodcast.com/case-317-thomas-perez https://casefilepodcast.com/case-317-thomas-perez/
Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy https://acast.com/privacy for more information.
Transcript 0:00 Speaker 00 From journalist Olivia LaVoix, the creator of the hit investigative series The Bakersfield Three, comes the new Case File Presents series, Ada. In 2011, the body of a woman was discovered in a California vineyard. For more than a decade, she was known only as Jane Doe. Then detectives finally discovered her name. But identifying her was only the beginning. Listen to Ada wherever you get your podcasts.
0:34 Speaker 01 Get under a blanket and get comfy. This message is sponsored by ADT. It's back to school, back to work, back to cozy nights at home season. And ADT is here for every moment of it. They handle your home security so you can focus on spending time with the people who matter. They make it easy with professionally installed systems you can access right from the ADT Plus app. If you need help, their reps are on call 24/7 at the most company-operated monitoring centers in the industry. You deserve some cozy back-to-home time. ADT will keep an eye out. When every second counts, count on ADT. Visit ADT.com today.
1:14 Speaker 02 Hi, this is Mark Bittman from the podcast Food with Mark Bittman. I've been writing about food and restaurants for almost 50 years, my whole career, really. And what I know is that the good restaurants all have something in common. They're busy, genuinely, chaotically busy. And somehow, in the last few years, the best of them have begun to make it look easy. And do you know why? Because they're running on Toast's technology. Toast is built for restaurant owners who understand that Toast's tools keep the line moving and keep their customers happy with fewer mistakes and hiccups in ordering and paying. For owners, that turns busy into business. To learn more, head to toasttab.com.
1:59 Speaker 02 That's T-O-A-S-T-T-A-B, toasttab.com. Toast: Built for Busy.
2:23 Speaker 00 Our episodes deal with serious and often distressing incidents. If you feel at any time you need support, please contact your local crisis centre. For suggested phone numbers for confidential support and for a more detailed list of content warnings, please see the show notes for this episode on your app or on our website. This episode was originally released on Casefile's Patreon, Apple Premium and Spotify Premium feeds as an early bonus for our paid subscribers. These episodes are designed to be slightly shorter, allowing us to cover a broader range of cases. To receive these episodes early and ad-free, you can support Casefile on your preferred platform.
3:16 Speaker 00 On Wednesday, August 8, 2018, a call came through to the non-emergency number of the Fontana Police Department in Southern California. The caller was a 53-year-old local named Thomas Perez Jr., better known as Tom. He lived with his father, 71-year-old Thomas Perez Sr., or Papa Tom, as he was affectionately called. Tom explained that his father had left the house to check their mail sometime between 9:30 and 10:00 the previous evening of Tuesday, August 7. They lived in a cul-de-sac with a communal mailbox located at the end of the street, so it was only supposed to be a brief stroll there and back.
4:00 Speaker 00 Thomas Sr. took their beloved dog, a large husky Border Collie mix named Margot, with him. Minutes later, Margot returned to the Perez home alone. Thomas Sr. was nowhere to be seen.
4:17 Speaker 00 At first, Tom wasn't overly concerned about his father's abrupt disappearance. The pair lived relatively separate lives, and Thomas Senior was fiercely independent, with a tendency to make plans and go places without telling his son. Tom assumed he'd gone to visit a close friend or family member and would return of his own accord.
4:41 Speaker 00 But when the night passed without any word from Thomas Senior, and he still hadn't returned by the following afternoon, Tom became increasingly concerned.
4:52 Speaker 00 Although Thomas Senior was self-sufficient, he was nevertheless vulnerable due to his advanced age, limited English capabilities, and physical frailty.
5:03 Speaker 00 Tom feared that his father, who was on a slow cognitive decline, might have mindlessly wandered off while getting the mail and could be walking the streets of Fontana disoriented and lost.
5:16 Speaker 00 Tom reached out to the Fontana Police, and his call was put through to Community Services Officer Joanna Pina, who began preparing a missing persons report. But as she spoke with Tom Perez, she sensed something was off.
5:58 Speaker 00 Officer Joanna Pina was alarmed by Tom Perez's demeanor over the phone. She didn't get a sense that he was genuinely concerned about his father's well-being at all.
6:10 Speaker 00 Tom spoke in a nonchalant manner with no sense of urgency, simply requesting that police keep an eye out for a confused elderly man roaming around the neighbourhood.
6:21 Speaker 00 "Let me know," he remarked. "It may be my father." "That's it."
6:28 Speaker 00 Officer Pigna thought that Tom was also strangely aloof and easily distracted. He kept rambling on about different topics that had no relevance to his father's missing persons report.
6:42 Speaker 00 Officer Pigna spoke to her supervisor, Corporal Sheila Foley, and the two women decided to pay Tom a visit to complete the report face to face. At the very least, they figured they could gauge Tom's behaviour in person and determine if their suspicions were warranted.
7:01 Speaker 00 Officer Pigna and Corporal Foley arrived at the Perez's two-storey, three-bedroom home in Fontana's North. It was one of many similarly designed homes built around a golf course and positioned almost wall to wall with its neighbours. A large black pickup truck was parked in the driveway, right up against the garage door.
7:24 Speaker 00 Tom opened the front door, dressed casually in a pair of white cargo shorts and a collared, short-sleeved blue shirt with its top buttons undone. He greeted the officers, who promptly entered the premises.
7:42 Speaker 00 The officers were immediately struck by the state of their house. There was barely space to move, with broken furniture, tools and construction equipment strewn about, while boxes of possessions were piled in every corner. It was so chaotic that the officers felt the home was unlivable. When pressed about the mess, Tom sheepishly explained that he was separating from his wife and was carrying out renovations to the home in anticipation of selling it. As a contractor by trade, Tom was doing most of the work himself. He had eight projects on the go, which had left his home in disarray.
8:25 Speaker 00 The officers conducted a rudimentary search of the premises, filming as they went on their body-worn cameras. They were unable to locate Thomas Senior or any evidence to indicate where he might have gone, though they did notice a few peculiar things.
8:44 Speaker 00 The mattress from Thomas Senior's bed appeared to be missing, as did a shower curtain from a bathroom. Some of Thomas Senior's belongings had also been piled into a messy heap as though they were about to be discarded.
8:59 Speaker 00 Tom explained that both he and his father had been getting rid of some things in preparation of moving out, and that he'd recently dropped some of his father's clothing in a goodwill donation box.
9:12 Speaker 00 One of the walls in Thomas Senior's bedroom featured noticeable damage. Tom excused it as part of his renovation efforts, saying that he'd worked to remove the wall after his father left. To Corporal Foley, it didn't look like typical construction work. She was becoming increasingly suspicious of Tom, who had some scratches and bruises across his body.
9:40 Speaker 00 Tom claimed he'd sustained the injuries while working on the house, but when Corporal Foley asked him, "Are you sure you didn't argue with your dad?" Tom stumbled over his words as he tried to explain himself.
9:56 Speaker 00 The officers also noted that he kept getting sidetracked, talking about irrelevant things like his dog's diet. Tom professed that he was just tired, but the chaos inside of the home led the officers to believe that a struggle had taken place there.
10:16 Speaker 00 Concerns were amplified when Thomas Senior's cellphone and wallet were discovered. If he had left on his own volition like Tom claimed, it seemed odd that he would have left behind these necessary items.
10:31 Speaker 00 In the eyes of the police, this was a sign that Thomas Senior was no longer alive. Bolstering this belief was the discovery of what appeared to be several smears and spatters of dried blood found on various surfaces throughout the Perez residence. Some of it had crusted onto the cream carpet at the base of the stairs. Tom attributed the blood to his father's finger-prick diabetes tests and other unrelated innocuous accidents.
11:03 Speaker 00 Whatever the truth, Officer Pina and Corporal Foley felt Tom was markedly indifferent to the serious matter unfolding. They summoned several more officers to the premises, who agreed that the situation warranted suspicion. Tom was requested to go to the Fontana Police Department downtown to provide a statement.
11:27 Speaker 00 He was reluctant at first, but eventually agreed, and voluntarily got into the back of a police car to be driven to the station.
11:38 Speaker 00 Tom was ushered into an interrogation room, where he spoke with detectives Robert Miller and Jeremy Hale. A camera above filmed Tom's every word as he openly discussed the basic facts and timeline of his father's disappearance.
11:55 Speaker 00 The conversation was mostly polite, as Tom offered multiple explanations as to where his father might have wound up. He suggested that Thomas Senior could have taken the train to his brother's house, or to see a close friend of his in the Los Angeles area.
12:12 Speaker 00 Maybe he was heading further north to visit his daughter, Tom's sister, in Oakland.
12:19 Speaker 00 While Tom's assertions implied there was an innocent reason behind Thomas Senior's disappearance, an entirely different scenario was emerging at the Perez house.
12:30 Speaker 00 Police spoke with neighbours who described the father and son as having a volcanic relationship. They were known to have screaming matches on their front lawn. On the night Thomas Senior disappeared, Tom was also witness to backing his truck into his garage at a very early hour.
12:50 Speaker 00 Tom admitted that he'd bickered with his father right before he vanished, with the disordered state of their home being an ongoing source of contention between the pair. While the two got on each other's nerves at times, they remained living together as Thomas Senior had nowhere else to go. He was separated from his wife and not suited to the rules of a senior citizen community.
13:17 Speaker 00 The two men did their best to coexist and there was love between them, but they mostly stayed out of each other's lives to keep the peace. The one thing that brought them together was their dog, Margot, who Tom referred to as their fur baby. Tom had raised Margot from when she was a puppy and both he and his father doted on her by cooking her special meals and sharing in her care.
13:46 Speaker 00 With that in mind, there was no logical reason why Thomas Senior would abandon Margot mid-walk in the middle of the night. A search of the surrounding streets and parklands had failed to uncover any sign of the 71-year-old and there had been no reported sightings of him. With concerns growing that Thomas Senior might have met with foul play and his son acting increasingly dubious, police were granted a warrant to search the Perez home. They also seized the man's cars, computers and cellphones, as well as Tom's tools.
14:26 Speaker 00 Special equipment was brought in that could reveal traces of blood not visible to the naked eye, even when strenuous efforts had been made to clean it up. It indicated that blood had been cleaned up throughout the home. But the most ominous find occurred in Thomas Senior's bedroom. A highly trained cadaver dog was brought in and alerted to the recent presence of a human corpse. With that, the relatively benign missing persons case shifted into a full-scale homicide investigation.
15:10 Speaker 00 Case file will be back shortly. Thank you for supporting us by listening to this episode's sponsors. This episode is sponsored by BetterHelp. The end of the year can come with a lot of expectations, from family traditions and social obligations, to the pressure to find the perfect gifts. But just because something is a tradition doesn't mean you have to keep doing it, especially if it's causing more stress than joy. Sometimes, doing things differently and making time for yourself is exactly what you need. If you're looking for support, get started with BetterHelp. Their licensed therapists have at least three years and 1,000 hours of hands-on experience,
15:54 Speaker 00 and BetterHelp matches you with a therapist based on your needs and preferences. If the match isn't quite right, you can switch to a different therapist at any time. BetterHelp is now in-network with more than 125 health plans, with many copays as low as $15 for eligible members. And if you don't have eligible insurance or live outside the US, you can still get 10% off your first month. Sign up and get 10% off at betterhelp.com/casefile. That's betterhelp.com/casefile.
16:34 Speaker 00 It's the details that make a house feel like home. The sofa you look forward to sinking into at the end of the day. Shelves that display your record collection. A dining table that becomes the centre of every gathering. The details matter. And that's something Cozy understands. What started with modular sofas has grown into a whole home furniture brand. With rugs, tables, bedroom furniture, outdoor collections and more. All designed to make creating your space feel simple. And because life changes, Cozy can change with it. The pieces are modular so they can adapt to your space. And the covers are washable and interchangeable.
17:18 Speaker 00 So you can easily switch them up or give them a clean. If you're not sure where to start. Cozy offers free one-on-one design consultations to help bring the whole space together. Visit Cozy today. That's C O Z E Y dot com and make yourself at home.
17:41 Speaker 00 Black Friday and Cyber Monday are some of the busiest shopping days of the year. With millions of people looking for a bargain. But for retailers, that means a huge surge in orders to pack and ship. Often in a very short time. That's where ShipStation comes in. It brings all your orders into one place. Helping teams stay organised and manage the rush without scrambling when order volumes spike. ShipStation also offers smarter LTL freight shipping. Helping businesses compare carriers and track shipments every step of the way. For retailers managing a high volume of orders. Having those tools in one place can make a real difference. Over one million businesses have relied on ShipStation to get through peak season.
18:24 Speaker 00 Scaling their fulfilment capacity up to forty times when they need it most. Case file team member Paulina uses ShipStation to manage orders for her own Shopify store. And having that extra time back makes a real difference. Before switching, she spent hours tracking orders and following up with customers. Now she's Cut that time in half, giving her more time to focus on growing her business and preparing for the busy shopping periods when orders start rolling in. Peak season doesn't wait, and neither should you. Get ahead of it today with ShipStation and get 60 days free at shipstation.com with code CASEFILETC. That's shipstation.com code CASEFILETC.
19:09 Speaker 00 Taxes and fees apply.
19:13 Speaker 00 Thank you for listening to this episode's ads. By supporting our sponsors, you support Casefile to continue to deliver quality content.
19:29 Speaker 00 As night fell on Wednesday, August 8, 24 hours had passed since Thomas Perez Sr. had reportedly been missing.
19:39 Speaker 00 With everything police had uncovered so far, they felt they had sufficient cause to believe that a serious crime had taken place involving Thomas Sr.'s son, Thomas Perez Jr. Further warrants were obtained to examine both men's phone and internet records, while investigators turned up the heat on their prime suspect.
20:02 Speaker 00 Tom Perez was still answering questions at the Fontana Police Department when he was informed that police believed his father had come to harm. Before long, fingers were pointed directly at Tom himself.
20:18 Speaker 00 He appeared shocked, confused, and upset, and was seemingly at a loss for words. He told the detectives that they were "nuts". As the interrogation continued into the night, Tom remained steadfast that his father was still alive somewhere.
20:38 Speaker 00 By the early morning of Thursday, August 9, upwards of seven hours had passed since Tom was first brought in for questioning. While he hadn't revealed anything that implicated him in his father's disappearance, the police were certain he was feigning ignorance and that he knew exactly what had happened to Thomas Sr.
21:01 Speaker 00 The first interviewing detectives finished their shift and were replaced by detectives David Yanush and Kyle Guthrie. After being briefed on the case, they were told by a lieutenant that the feeling among the police was that Tom had killed his father.
21:19 Speaker 00 Not only did evidence support this theory, as far as they were concerned, there was simply no other logical explanation. It was just a matter of getting Tom to fess up.
21:32 Speaker 00 Detectives Yanush and Guthrie changed tact. They took Tom out for a drive to get coffee to lower his defences. Afterwards, they told Tom they were taking him to a train station to check the surveillance videos for any sign of his father. Instead, they drove around Fontana on the lookout for any place that Tom might have used to dump his father's body. If they came close to a key site, perhaps they could trigger him into talking.
22:05 Speaker 00 Referring to Thomas Senior as Daddy, the detectives asked Tom to show them where Daddy was. The detectives stopped at the goodwill donation box where Tom said he had discarded some of his father's clothing. They circled around housing estates where Tom said he had been looking to buy before reaching the golf course near the Perez home. Tom maintained that he had no knowledge of his father's whereabouts, but as they passed by a pond on the golf course, he randomly asked if bodies floated. The bizarre question piqued the detectives' interest and they kept driving, waiting for Tom to say more.
22:50 Speaker 00 They eventually came to a remote dirt field near the edge of Fontana where they stopped the car.
22:58 Speaker 00 Tom became visibly nervous and refused to get out. This indicated to the detectives that the otherwise banal side held importance. Yet, no matter what, Tom refused to entertain the thought that his father was dead.
23:18 Speaker 00 Tom had already informed police that he suffered from various afflictions, including high blood pressure, asthma, depression and stress. As the pressure mounted, he said that he was starting to feel unwell and asked for his medication from home. The detectives assured Tom that he would receive his medication soon, but in their eyes, he was perfectly fine. While he was clearly tired and anguished, he was still fully functioning, cognizant and coherent.
23:52 Speaker 00 Despite this, Tom kept requesting medical attention. To the detectives, it seemed like he was trying to weasel his way out as they inched closer to uncovering the truth. They told him that going to the hospital wasn't going to help him, as it was the easy way out. Tom muttered, "But I need, I needed attention." Detective Yarnosh put his foot down. "No, you don't," he said, making it abundantly clear that Tom's attempts to derail the interrogation weren't going to work.
24:33 Speaker 00 After their long drive, the detectives took Tom back to the station and resumed their questioning. As the hours passed, they relentlessly bombarded him with accusations while his emotions spiraled in all directions. One moment, Tom confidently professed his innocence and acted bewildered at the allegations against him, while the next, he sobbed into tissues, repeatedly asking, "Where's dad? Where's dad? Where's dad?"
25:06 Speaker 00 The detectives remained convinced that the remote dirt field near the edge of Fontana held significance. They drove Tom back there in an attempt to elicit a reaction, but he gave them nothing. Back at the station, Tom's distress heightened as time wore on.
25:26 Speaker 00 Detectives sensed he was reaching a breaking point that could lead to a confession. They wondered if Tom would open up to someone he knew and trusted. He'd asked to speak with a close friend and business partner of his named Carl Perez, which gave detectives an idea. Carl was summoned to the station, where detectives revealed they had overwhelming evidence to indicate that Tom had killed Thomas Senior. They said blood was found everywhere throughout the Perez home, and that they had a video footage of Tom dumping bloodied clothing. They told Carl they were zeroing in on a site where they believed Thomas Senior's
26:11 Speaker 00 body had been buried, but they needed Carl's help in getting a confession from Tom and determining the exact location of the grave. Carl was stunned. He couldn't believe that his friend was capable of murdering his own father. As far as Carl was aware, the two had a loving relationship, and he'd never had any indication that Tom was violent towards Thomas Senior. Nevertheless, Carl agreed to help the police. He was permitted to enter the interrogation room to be alone with Tom, while the pair were secretly monitored.
26:52 Speaker 00 Carl gave Tom a warm embrace, and then sat across from him to discuss the predicament. "They got you on murder," Carl said.
27:03 Speaker 00 Tom shrugged his shoulders and replied: "Impossible."
27:09 Speaker 00 Carl explained that the police had enough evidence to charge him, and asked point-blank: "Tom, could it have happened?" Tom outright rejected the suggestion.
27:24 Speaker 00 The detectives resumed their interrogation, warning Tom that if he didn't help locate his father, he would owe the city up to a million dollars in restitution. They also warned that he risked going to jail for the rest of his life.
27:41 Speaker 00 Tom didn't budge. He maintained that his father was simply missing, to which Detective Guthrie remarked: "He's missing because you killed him." An emotional and exasperated Tom continued to deny it.
27:59 Speaker 00 On multiple occasions, Tom requested to terminate the interview and go home. The police were incredulous. Did he honestly believe they would let him go back to an active crime scene where he could tamper with potential evidence?
28:17 Speaker 00 With their ploy involving Carl Perez having failed, it was time for the detectives to come up with another plan.
28:29 Speaker 00 The Perez family's dog, Margot, was brought to the Fontana Police Department and led into Tom's interrogation room. She entered eagerly, her black-and-white tail wagging with excitement as she rushed over to her owner. Tom immediately lit up in her presence. After he had showered Margot with affection, she came to rest quietly on the floor near his feet.
28:56 Speaker 00 Meanwhile, the interrogation continued. Detective Janusz put it bluntly to Tom:
29:04 Speaker 00 "You murdered your dad," he stated. Tom's mood dropped again, his voice cracking as he responded: "No, I did not." The detective pressed on: "Your daddy's dead because of you. Not only that, but poor Margot had witnessed it." At the mention of this, Tom leant back in his chair, a perplexed expression on his face. Finally, he said: "No," before wiping his eyes with a tissue.
29:40 Speaker 00 It did happen, the detective said. You killed him and his dad. You know you killed him. You're not being honest with yourself. How can you sit there and say you don't know what happened? And your dog is sitting there looking at you, knowing that you killed your dad? Look at your dog. She knows, because she was walking through all the blood.
30:06 Speaker 00 The detectives informed Tom that blood had been found on Margot's paws, and she was so traumatized after witnessing the murder that she needed to be euthanized. Tom looked at Margot, who was lying contently on her belly. The detectives said they'd give him a moment alone with her to say goodbye.
30:29 Speaker 00 After they exited the room, Tom dropped to the floor and snuggled up against Margot, patting her gently while weeping.
30:39 Speaker 00 Afterwards, Margot was taken to an animal shelter in a neighboring county to be put down.
30:46 Speaker 00 The detectives told Tom. Your dog's now gone. Forget about it.
30:53 Speaker 00 By this point, Tom snapped. He wailed loudly, punching himself in the head multiple times, and began ripping out his hair. He tore his shirt open before falling back into his chair, utterly drained. In the eyes of the police, his conduct was further proof of his guilt. Yet Tom remained in denial.
31:19 Speaker 00 Hoping it would compel him to start talking, detectives divulged a major development in the case. They told Tom that the police had found Thomas Senior's body, and it was in the morgue, riddled with stab marks.
31:36 Speaker 00 Tom sat with his arms crossed over his chest and barely reacted. Frustrated, Detective Guthrie said, "We just told you we found your dead dad and you don't give a fuck."
31:51 Speaker 00 Tom kept his eyes cast down and continued to gently deny that he'd killed his father.
31:59 Speaker 00 "You did," the detectives said. Tom stuttered.
32:05 Speaker 00 "I don't have any idea," to which the detectives repeated, "you do, you do."
32:16 Speaker 00 The detectives continuously reminded Tom that the police had evidence that he killed his father, and he should therefore just admit it. They told him that the human mind often tries to suppress troubling memories, and suggested that he might have attacked his father while under the influence of his prescription psychiatric medication.
32:38 Speaker 00 The longer Tom was questioned, the less resolute his protests of innocence became. Eventually, he became despondent and lost in thought.
32:50 Speaker 00 The detectives asked Tom to explain what he thought could have happened between him and his father. They suggested possible scenarios in order to jog Tom's memory.
33:03 Speaker 00 Tom offered his own suggestions and provided insight into how they could have played out, but stopped short of confessing. Detectives pressed on, building a narrative based on their interpretation of the crime scene. They wondered if there had been a fight involving a stick or broken beer bottles. Maybe it could have been a knife or scissors. "Did you stab him?" they asked Tom.
33:34 Speaker 00 Tom appeared contemplative, as though he was trying to remember something he couldn't quite figure out. He then said coolly, "It's plausible. I think that I did."
33:49 Speaker 00 The detectives pushed for more information, asking, "What did you do? Where would you have stabbed him?" Tom replied blankly, "Maybe in the belly."
34:05 Speaker 00 Eventually, after seventeen hours of interrogation, police pieced together enough details to get a rough idea of what transpired. In his investigation report, Detective Yanush wrote:
34:20 Speaker 00 "Tom said he grabbed a pair of scissors and went over to the couch and stabbed his dad. He said if he was enraged, he probably stabbed him a lot. Tom said after his dad was stabbed, his dad went upstairs to the bathroom. Tom heard him fall, so he went up there and saw his dad lying on the ground of the bathroom, not waking up. He said he slapped him in the face a few times, but he still wouldn't wake.
34:52 Speaker 00 Tom's dog came in the bathroom, and so he tried getting the dog out of the bathroom because there was blood everywhere. Once he got the dog out, he then wrapped up his dad's body in the green shower curtain and transported his body down the stairs and into the garage. He then put his dad's body in the back of his truck."
35:16 Speaker 00 The detectives pried Tom to reveal more details about the murder, but he simply replied: "I don't know," before vomiting into a trash can.
35:28 Speaker 00 Tom believed he must have killed his father while in a blackout-like state, which explained why he couldn't vividly remember the attack. Tom was clearly racked with guilt, remarking: "I'm sorry dad, I had no idea. I love you." He had a message for his sister too, saying: "I didn't mean to take your daddy away. I have no idea. I still don't understand."
36:02 Speaker 00 Tom was momentarily left alone in the interrogation room, at which point detectives noticed he'd removed a leather shoelace from his shoe and was trying to take his own life. They rushed in to rescue him, before promptly restraining him and placing him under arrest. Given Tom's fragile state, he was placed on a 5150 hold. This provision allows an adult experiencing a mental health crisis to be involuntarily detained for a 72-hour psychiatric evaluation. Tom was kept in a hospital over the weekend, where staff were given strict orders not to let him have any contact with any outsiders.
36:47 Speaker 00 Then, days after Tom's confession, a young nurse came to his bedside. She broke protocol to tell him:
36:57 Speaker 00 "I know it says in your file not to speak to anybody, but your dad's on the phone."
37:12 Speaker 00 Case file will be back shortly. Thank you for supporting us by listening to this episode's sponsors.
37:20 Speaker 00 This episode is sponsored by Vinted. We all hold on to things we know we're never going to wear again. I've got band t-shirts and hoodies tucked away in my wardrobe that no longer fit, and I know that some of them haven't seen the light of day in a very long time. It's a shame to have perfectly good clothes sitting there when someone else could get plenty of wear out of them, and if you can make a bit of extra money in the process, even better. Thankfully, there's an easy way to pass those clothes on. Vinted is a secondhand marketplace app that makes it easy to sell the clothes you no longer wear, find great deals, and give quality items a second life. All you need to do is add some photos, a description, and a price.
38:04 Speaker 00 When something sells, Vinted creates a prepaid shipping label for you, so there's no complicated postage process. Plus, there are no seller fees, so you keep what you earn from every sale. Whether you're clearing out your wardrobe or making room for something new, Vinted makes it easy to turn those unworn clothes into extra cash, and the app is free to download. Give your clothes a second life with Vinted. Download the Vinted app for free to start selling with no seller fees, so you keep everything you earn. I've always liked the feeling of travelling and finding a small local store that has things you haven't seen everywhere else. You always remember those places.
38:49 Speaker 00 Maybe they have a really unique selection of vinyl records, art, or local products you wouldn't find at a big-name store. I think what a small business chooses to stock can say a lot about the local community. Sometimes you'll find something that becomes a little memento of a place, something you take home, remember the trip by, or come back looking for the next time you visit. FAIRE is a wholesale marketplace that connects independent retailers with more than 100,000 brands from around the world. Instead of spending hours trying to find new products and suppliers, businesses can browse everything from homewares and beauty to food, apparel, gifts, and more, all in one place. And with the holiday season coming up,
39:33 Speaker 00 it's a useful way for small retailers to find something a little different for their shelves. Sign up today and get 50% off your first wholesale order, up to $100, at faire.com/casfile. That's faire.com/casfile. Terms may apply.
40:00 Speaker 00 Thank you for listening to this episode's ads. By supporting our sponsors, you support Casefile to continue to deliver quality content.
40:16 Speaker 00 On the night of Tuesday, August 7, 2018, 71-year-old Thomas Perez Sr. left his home to collect the mail at the end of his street. But his plans didn't stop there. He walked onwards to the Fontana train station, where he boarded a train to visit his brother. From there, he caught a bus to a friend's place to stay the night.
40:41 Speaker 00 The next day, Thomas Sr. travelled to Los Angeles International Airport as he'd booked a flight to visit his daughter in Oakland.
40:50 Speaker 00 Thomas Senior hadn't mentioned any of this to his son Tom, as they didn't typically keep one another in the loop of their plans. Thomas Senior had also absentmindedly left his cellphone at home, preventing him from contacting Tom while on his journey. Unbeknown to the older man, as he went about his travels, police believed he'd been murdered and his son was being relentlessly interrogated as the prime suspect.
41:20 Speaker 00 Early on in the investigation, Tom Perez Junior had told the detectives that his father might have gone to Oakland. He even gave them his sister's details so they could check with her. Instead of doing so, the detectives remained fully focused on building a homicide case against Tom. By 8:45pm on Thursday, August 9, over thirty hours had passed since he'd reported his father to be missing. While Tom was still being interrogated, Detective Robert Miller finally spoke with Tom's sister over the phone.
41:59 Speaker 00 To his shock, she revealed that Thomas Senior was very much alive and well, waiting for a flight to Oakland at Los Angeles International Airport. Officers rushed to the departure gate where they found Thomas Senior, perplexed by all the attention. Even though he wasn't suspected of any crime, the 71-year-old was promptly detained and read his rights. He was placed in the backseat of a police car and driven back to Fontana, unsure of what was going on.
42:34 Speaker 00 By the time Tom Perez Junior was attempting to take his own life at the Fontana Police Department, two hours had passed since detectives had confirmed that Thomas Senior was alive. Instead of informing Tom, they placed him under arrest and sent him for psychiatric evaluation. In the meantime, Thomas Senior was taken to the same interrogation room that his son had been held in. A flimsy yellow blanket lay bunched on the floor, the same blanket that his son had used during breaks in questioning to try and get some rest on the ground.
43:13 Speaker 00 The police didn't give Thomas Senior any information about what had happened to his son, nor did they reveal the allegations that were being levelled against him. They simply told Thomas Senior that his house was being investigated as a crime scene. Detectives quizzed him about his relationship with Tom and asked whether he'd ever gotten violent. Eventually, Thomas Senior was permitted to return home. He broke through the crime scene tape that encircled the property and headed inside, finding the place to be trashed. In their search for evidence, the police had sliced open the Perez's leather sofa,
43:54 Speaker 00 emptied the contents of their drawers and closets, moved their hot tub and damaged its motor. Even then, Thomas Senior had no idea where his son was or what he was being accused of. When Thomas Senior finally learned that his son was in hospital, he wasn't allowed in, as the police had placed Tom in lockdown. Thomas Senior tried to call instead, but he was consistently denied the opportunity to speak with Tom. Days passed before a nurse finally broke protocol and handed Tom the phone. The moment Tom heard his father's voice on the other line, he dropped to the floor
44:37 Speaker 00 in tears. Tom was released from his 51/50 hold later that day and allowed to return home. When the father and son were reunited for the first time since Thomas Senior had left home almost a week earlier, a bewildered Tom asked: "Dad, is that really you?" Thomas Senior replied kindly: "Yes, it's me." "They told me you were dead," Tom explained. "No, no, I'm here," his father responded, as the pair embraced with tears in their eyes.
45:17 Speaker 00 Shortly after, the Perezas got a call from the animal shelter where their dog Margot had been taken. The police had erroneously classified Margot as a stray, which meant she was permitted to be euthanized. Luckily, Tom had Margot implanted with a microchip, which allowed staff at the shelter to identify her owners, thus halting her euthanization.
45:43 Speaker 00 When the Perezas went to collect Margot, they were pained to see that she couldn't walk properly.
45:50 Speaker 00 During her time in police custody, Margot had sustained an injury to the cruciate ligament in her right hind limb, which required corrective surgery. Other possessions that had been seized from the Perezas' home were also returned in a damaged and unusable state.
46:09 Speaker 00 Even though Thomas Senior had been found alive and well, the police remained convinced that Tom must have assaulted and killed someone at their home.
46:19 Speaker 00 They obtained a third warrant to search the premises and received permission to put a tracking device on Tom's truck.
46:27 Speaker 00 Ultimately, their investigations led nowhere and the case was officially closed without Tom being charged with any crime.
46:38 Speaker 00 In hindsight, Tom felt his treatment went far beyond a misguided misunderstanding. When he'd reported his father missing, he spoke with a Fontana Police Lieutenant named Ronald Koval. Tom had a poor relationship with Lieutenant Koval due to previous interactions on a separate matter. While it was apparent to Tom that Lieutenant Koval disliked him personally, he nevertheless went ahead with filing a missing persons report. At the time, Tom remained calm, clinging to the reasonable belief that his father was likely fine.
47:17 Speaker 00 When Officer Joanna Pigna and Corporal Sheila Foley arrived at Tom's home to investigate the matter, Tom felt that they were immediately hostile towards him. They said they'd been summoned to the house by Lieutenant Cavall, which sparked a degree of apprehension on Tom's part, as he sensed that the police were treating his father's case as suspicious from the outset. Tom was dismayed when the officers barged into his home and began pointing out purported evidence of foul play. He remained composed and cooperated while offering plausible and honest explanations to all of their suggestions. The so-called "evidence of homicide" found at the Perez home was not as concrete as
48:02 Speaker 00 investigators accepted. The cadaver dog that had picked up a scent in Thomas Senior's bedroom wasn't an official police canine, but belonged to a volunteer within the Sheriff's Department. Then there was the matter of the dried blood. Police had an image of a door in the Perez home that appeared to have dried blood smeared on it. Tom agreed that it looked like his door, but maintained there had been no red marks on it when police officers showed up. Footage taken from the body-worn cameras of the first responding officers confirmed this. In their search for evidence, police had used a liquid known as Blue Star, which is
48:47 Speaker 00 considered to be the first-line method of picking up bloodstains that aren't visible to the human eye. Police claimed that Blue Star conclusively found large amounts of blood in the Perez home. However, Blue Star is known to give false positives for other substances, including minerals found in paint. Tom had been painting the house as part of his renovations, and no lab ever confirmed what the substance was. Furthermore, no officer would later testify to seeing any visible blood in the Perez home.
49:25 Speaker 00 Samples of the alleged blood were taken, but no positive identification was ever made. The Perez's were just told that they were identified as coming from a male. One police expert asserted: "No reasonably well-trained police officer would have believed that they had a probable cause to obtain a search warrant in these circumstances."
49:54 Speaker 00 When Tom had first agreed to go to the police station, he was informed it was in his best interest to do so. He didn't want to submit to an interrogation as he felt he had nothing to prove, but he ultimately complied, albeit under protest. He was placed in a tiny interrogation room he referred to as "the police's little box of horrors."
50:19 Speaker 00 During the lengthy interrogation sequences that followed, Tom repeatedly, specifically, and consistently denied all accusations levelled against him. He even voluntarily submitted a DNA swab and let officers take photographs of his naked body, despite his discomfort. On multiple occasions, Tom asked that the interrogation come to an end.
50:45 Speaker 00 He also asked to speak with his lawyer, to be given his medication, to see his doctor, and to be taken to the hospital. Detectives refused every request. Reflecting back on his experience with the police, Tom said: "I felt like they were my captors, and I had nothing. There was nothing I could do."
51:12 Speaker 00 When threatened with the possibility of going to jail for the rest of his life, Tom was terrified, because under the circumstances, it seemed like a real possibility. He had refused to get out of the police car at the dirt field near the edge of Fontana because he felt the situation was getting out of control, and he feared the detectives were about to either beat or kill him.
51:38 Speaker 00 Tom had no idea the police were lying when they told him that his father's body had been found riddled with stab wounds, or that blood had been found on Margot's paws. Tom was left devastated at the thought that his father was dead and Margot had been put down as a result. By the early evening of Thursday, August 9, almost thirty hours had passed since Tom Perez first called the police about his missing father, and he'd been interrogated almost non-stop for seventeen hours. During that time, he'd barely eaten or slept, and had remained deprived of his medication.
52:19 Speaker 00 Exhausted, confused, and grief-stricken, Tom reached his breaking point. He later told CNN: "I no longer could see in colour. I was seeing everybody in black and white, and then I felt physical pain, like an electric shock, and it went from head to toe." As detectives suggested possible scenarios in which Tom lashed out at his father, he started to absorb a false belief and accept it as truth. Unable to provide his own version of events, he simply went along with what the detectives told him. If they said, "Well, you stabbed him," Tom would reply:
53:04 Speaker 00 "Okay, I stabbed him." In Detective David Yanusha's report, he stated that Tom had admitted to stabbing his father with a pair of scissors while he sat on the couch, before wrapping his body in a shower curtain and putting it in the back of his truck. However, Tom never directly confessed to any of these things. They were Detective Yanusha's words. Eventually, Tom became fully convinced that he had murdered his father, and attempted to take his own life as a result. He later recalled to CNN:
53:42 Speaker 00 "They attacked me right at the very thing that I loved most: my fur baby and my father. And it didn't seem like there's anything left. I couldn't see the reason to continue with more pain."
53:59 Speaker 00 By the time Tom was placed under arrest and read his rights for the first time, including his right to remain silent, the police already knew that Thomas Senior was still alive. They admitted Tom to the hospital for psychiatric evaluation regardless, securing him in excessively tight handcuffs that caused extreme pain and discomfort.
54:23 Speaker 00 Tom asked for them to be loosened, but his requests were ignored. He was subsequently kept in hospital for three days, where he endured continual mental anguish. As Tom's attorney Gerry Steering explained,
54:40 Speaker 00 "They didn't have the nerve to look Tom in the face. They didn't have the nerve to tell him his dad was okay."
54:50 Speaker 00 A year after the events, Tom Perez Junior sought accountability for what he endured. He filed a federal lawsuit against the city of Fontana, naming a total of fifteen Fontana Police Department employees that played a role. He accused the group of false imprisonment and due process violations, among other offenses. As a direct result of his ordeal, Tom suffered substantial damages, including lost income, damage to his personal property, medical and psychological bills, and emotional and mental distress. In the direct aftermath of his ordeal, Tom feared answering the phone or leaving his
55:32 Speaker 00 home, even to collect the mail at the end of the street. According to the lawsuit, the amount of damages amounted to in excess of ten million dollars. Additionally, Tom had paid approximately twelve thousand dollars towards Margot's ongoing medical needs as a result of the injuries she sustained while in police custody.
55:56 Speaker 00 In their depositions, the police members involved maintained that they had reason to believe Tom was lying to them. In turn, they deceived him in order to get information. They maintained that they didn’t cause Tom’s emotional distress and rejected his assertions that the trained officers should have been able to detect his sincerity and swiftly terminate the interview. They regarded Tom as a “startlingly odd human being who lived a life filled with unexplainably bad decisions”, given he had a history with the police. They criticised his character, claiming “Who admits to murdering their father when
56:40 Speaker 00 a murder never happened?”, Tom was accused of creating a money-motivated falsehood and deemed undeserving of winning anything in the litigation. Fontana city officials were fiercely defensive of the police officers and vigorously denied that they had violated any state or federal law during the investigation. They maintained that the police had good legal cause to suspect Tom Perez of serious criminal activity. They claimed that Tom voluntarily agreed to be questioned in relation to his father’s disappearance and denied claims that he was interrogated for 17 hours straight or deprived
57:23 Speaker 00 of food and his medication. They asserted that Tom was voluntarily undergoing questioning and therefore “free to leave at any time”. A US District Court judge disagreed. In a summary judgement, she wrote that “circumstances suggested to Tom Perez that he was not free to leave”. She also maintained several claims on his behalf stemming from allegations that the officers had falsely imprisoned Tom and inflicted emotional distress. However, after reviewing hours of the interrogation tapes, the judge sided with the police on
58:06 Speaker 00 some issues. She also ruled in their favour when it came to Tom’s claims that the police had unlawfully searched his home and used excessive force.
58:18 Speaker 00 The judge allowed the lawsuit to proceed, stating: "A reasonable juror could conclude that the detectives inflicted unconstitutional psychological torture on Tom Perez.
58:32 Speaker 00 Their tactics indisputedly led to Tom's subjective confusion and disorientation, to the point he falsely confessed to killing his father and tried to take his own life. He was sleep deprived, mentally ill, and significantly undergoing symptoms of withdrawal from his psychiatric medications. There is no legitimate government interest that would justify treating Tom in this manner while he was in medical distress, since the Fontana Police Department already had two warrants to search his person and property, and he was already essentially in custody and unable to flee or tamper with any evidence."
59:16 Speaker 00 As soon as the case was permitted to go to trial, Fontana city officials entered settlement talks. In 2024, Tom Perez agreed to settle the lawsuit rather than take the case to trial. He held concerns that a jury award could be overturned on appeal on grounds of qualified immunity. Qualified immunity protects law enforcement officers from lawsuits involving much of what they do in the scope of their jobs. In the US, it is illegal for police to lie to adult suspects during questioning. They are trained in how to use falsehoods to elicit confessions, a tactic that is broadly protected by the courts.
1:00:01 Speaker 00 The detectives who interrogated Tom asserted that they were only following their training. One explained: "We had been with Tom all day, and we were running out of things to say to him to try to get the answer. We used a ruse to elicit certain information, and that is perfectly legal under the law, and it is perfectly legal under the policies and procedures of the Fontana Police Department."
1:00:29 Speaker 00 According to Tom's attorney Gerry Steering, the decision to settle was based on the Court of Appeals' history of tossing out police misconduct lawsuits. As part of his settlement, Tom received $898,000 in damages. A statement on the Fontana City website read:
1:00:51 Speaker 00 "The settlement in this case was a business decision which was recommended by a federal court mediator to save the city further time, effort, and expense. The party's written settlement agreement contains no admission of wrongdoing by anyone, and Tom Perez specifically agreed to settlement on these terms. Had he requested an admission of wrongdoing, the case would have never settled."
1:01:19 Speaker 00 Tom Perez's case is an example of how lying to suspects during police interrogations can lead to false statements, or, worse still, false confessions. Advocates are working to have detectives retrained with newer methods that will no longer allow them to lie or trick suspects into confessing. As one advocate explained: "The Fontana case is an extreme one, but it fundamentally begins with a mistaken belief about the use of deception in the interview room. A community caretaker doesn't lie or deceive the community it serves, at least not for very long, without the community questioning:
1:02:02 Speaker 00 'Are you really my caretaker?' or something else.'"
1:02:09 Speaker 00 Following Tom's ordeal, there were no indications that there was an internal review within Fontana Police, and those involved faced no internal repercussions or discipline. On the contrary, several detectives involved were promoted to the position of sergeant, while one was named 2019 Employee of the Year.
1:02:31 Speaker 00 City officials have since claimed that law enforcement leaders have developed many service enhancements to deal with 'mentally challenged individuals', though they have not publicly elaborated on what those enhancements are or what they entail.
1:02:48 Speaker 00 Tom Perez's interrogation video has been described by those who've seen it as both fascinating and disturbing. Although several media publications got a hold of it and showed snippets in news reports, they have since had to return it to the city of Fontana unaired, as it is subject to a protective order and cannot be published.
1:03:14 Speaker 00 Carl Perez, Tom's close friend and business partner, who had been recruited by police to elicit a confession, has expressed remorse for his involvement. He was led to believe that Tom had killed Thomas Senior, but even after speaking with Tom face to face, he couldn't understand how the crime had allegedly occurred. It wasn't until after he participated in the interrogation that Carl learned the evidence he had originally been told was overwhelming was in fact circumstantial. Carl felt duped. He wanted to go back into the interrogation room to inform Tom, but wasn't permitted to talk to him again.
1:03:59 Speaker 00 Since the ordeal, Carl could tell that Tom was struggling to cope.
1:04:05 Speaker 00 Carl wrote in court documents: "There's sadness there. I can tell by the way Tom acts, even sometimes the way he walks or stands. He's not the same."
1:04:20 Speaker 00 No one involved in the case has apologised to Tom or Thomas Senior. Feelings from the ordeal remain raw between the pair and they haven't reached the point where they're able to openly talk to one another about what happened. Tom wrote in court documents that while it was difficult to hold back, it was difficult to talk about anything because they didn't know what to do or say.
1:04:46 Speaker 00 The father and son still live together, though Tom remained traumatised by his experience for a long time afterwards. In an exclusive interview with CNN, Tom explained that his father helped him by making sure his necessities were met, which allowed him to work through his trauma. He still carries one lesson from his ordeal: "Don't call the cops."
1:05:15 Speaker 00 The pair's beloved dog, Margot, died in February 2023, leaving a permanent hole in both their lives. Tom believes the reason he confessed to a murder he didn't commit was because he'd been brainwashed by the interviewing detectives.
1:05:34 Speaker 00 "I just allowed the belief of others to dominate me," he explained. "I never want to be in that kind of place again mentally. I didn't know anybody could be in that kind of place. I didn't know that such a place existed."
1:05:53 Speaker 00 To this day, Tom feels he still doesn't have a clear explanation for why he was treated so badly. But the Perez's told CNN they are grateful to still have each other, as they have helped each other heal.
1:06:08 Speaker 00 Tom's attorney, Gerry Steering, called Tom's treatment "the worst act of deliberate cruelty that he had seen in his 40 years of suing the police."
1:06:20 Speaker 00 "Mentally torturing a false confession out of Tom Perez, concealing from him that his father was alive and well, and confining him in the psych ward because they made him suicidal. I never thought that it was easy, maybe even possible, to get a completely innocent person confessed to something like that."
1:06:43 Speaker 00 Gerry said that Tom's ordeal laid bare the way in which police officers can force people to make false confessions, explaining: "This case shows that if the police are skilled enough and they grill you hard enough, they can get anybody to confess to anything."
1:07:33 Speaker 03 Hi, this is Nikayla Matthews-Acole from Side Hustle Pro. This holiday, the difference between buyers just checking things out and checking out comes down to the last few clicks. PayPal Checkout is a trusted conversion engine fueled by 400 million active PayPal and Venmo accounts. Add Pay Later and turn holiday shoppers into regulars. 96% of Pay Later shoppers are repeat users. PayPal is built for all business. Get started at paypal.com/business. Disclaimer: PayPal Pay Later data, eight markets, March 2025 to February 2026. Repeat users, more than one Pay Later purchase in the past year.
1:08:10 Speaker 04 Hey, I'm Pablo Torre, host of Pablo Torre Finds Out. And I have chased down a lot of strange stories. But nothing quite like what's inside a McDonald's Quarter Pounder with cheese. 100% fresh beef, cooked right when you order it. Hand-topped onions, plus cheese and pickles in every bite. And right now, you can get one with medium fries and a drink for just $8. Only at McDonald's. For a limited time only, prices and participation may vary. Prices may be higher in Hawaii, Alaska, and California. And for a delivery, fresh beef not available in Alaska and Hawaii. Offer not valid for delivery.
Previous Case 316: Gilbert Bogle & Margaret Chandler Next Case 318: Tay Chow Lyang & Tony Tan Poh Chuan Page updated November 3, 2026 · transcript and summary are machine-generated