Pod Insights True Crime All The Time Jose Herran About this episode Jose Herran moved to Pennsylvania in the fall of 2015 to live in a property owned by an old friend. He went missing weeks later. The case went cold, but a year later, a police informant in an arson case claimed he knew exactly what happened to Jose.
Join Mike and Gibby as they discuss the murder of Jose Herran. Roberto Torner and David Alzugaray came under law enforcement scrutiny. The investigation revealed an extensive drug operation, a possible cover-up by the Chief of Police, undercover informants, and murder.
You can help support the show at patreon.com/truecrimeallthetime
Visit the show's website at truecrimeallthetime.com for contact, merchandise, and donation information
An Emash Digital production
See Privacy Policy at https://art19.com/privacy and California Privacy Notice at https://art19.com/privacy#do-not-sell-my-info.
Transcript 10,610 words · 3 speakers
0:39 Speaker 00 Hello everyone and welcome to episode 458 of the True Crime All the Time Podcast. I'm Mike Ferguson and with me as always is my partner in true crime, Mike Gibson. Gibby, how are you?
0:49 Speaker 01 Good. How about you?
0:50 Speaker 00 I'm doing great.
0:51 Speaker 01 Yeah.
0:51 Speaker 00 You know, we talked about it on our Patreon weekly minisode.
0:56 Speaker 01 Yeah.
0:57 Speaker 00 We talked about your Mensa cup.
0:59 Speaker 01 Very nice. Plastic.
1:01 Speaker 00 Yeah.
1:01 Speaker 01 Yeah.
1:02 Speaker 00 Very nice. We talked about the perfect neighbor, which is a very interesting watch.
1:07 Speaker 01 You did.
1:08 Speaker 00 And kind of what we else we've been watching, what's up with us? So.
1:12 Speaker 01 You know what we didn't talk about?
1:13 Speaker 00 What's up?
1:13 Speaker 01 The fact that you have this like smoking jacket on with no shirt underneath it.
1:18 Speaker 00 Mm hmm.
1:19 Speaker 01 It's kind of disturbing.
1:21 Speaker 00 Yeah. Well, that's why I do that kind of stuff.
1:24 Speaker 01 It's definitely.
1:25 Speaker 00 I want to keep you on your toes, keep you a little uncomfortable.
1:28 Speaker 01 I'm uncomfortable.
1:29 Speaker 00 Let's go ahead and give our Patreon shout outs. We had Frozen Ghost.
1:32 Speaker 01 What's going on Ghost?
1:33 Speaker 00 Blake Miller.
1:34 Speaker 01 Hey Blake.
1:35 Speaker 00 Leslie.
1:36 Speaker 01 Oh, thanks Leslie.
1:36 Speaker 00 Max.
1:37 Speaker 01 There's Max.
1:38 Speaker 00 Noni X2.
1:40 Speaker 01 Ooh, X2.
1:42 Speaker 00 Angelique Dupine.
1:43 Speaker 01 Hey Dupine.
1:44 Speaker 00 Lady Mags.
1:45 Speaker 01 What's going on lady?
1:46 Speaker 00 Melanie Dion.
1:47 Speaker 01 Hey Melanie.
1:48 Speaker 00 Janelle Meadows.
1:49 Speaker 01 Thanks Janelle.
1:50 Speaker 00 Ryoko Lu.
1:51 Speaker 01 Oh Ryoko.
1:52 Speaker 00 Mrs. Mays.
1:53 Speaker 01 Thanks Mrs.
1:54 Speaker 00 Laura.
1:55 Speaker 01 And there's good old Laura.
1:56 Speaker 00 And last but not least, Alicia Low.
1:59 Speaker 01 Hey Alicia.
2:00 Speaker 00 And then if we go back into the vault.
2:03 Speaker 00 This week we selected Eileen.
2:05 Speaker 01 You lean, we lean, we all Eileen.
2:08 Speaker 00 I don't think that's how the saying goes.
2:10 Speaker 01 Oh.
2:12 Speaker 00 Oh, we have an episode out right now, Gibby, on True Crime All Time Unsolved, where we're talking about three women who went missing in Florida in the 70s and 80s. They didn't know each other, but they all had one connection. And it was to a man named Cleveland Hill Jr. Police learned that they all went missing after they ended their relationships with this guy.
2:37 Speaker 01 Interesting.
2:38 Speaker 00 Yeah, it's an interesting episode. Make sure you check it out.
2:41 Speaker 01 Hey, if you haven't signed up to go out to CrimeCon in Las Vegas, now's a good time to do it and make sure you use our code. What is that code, Mike?
2:51 Speaker 00 TCAT.
2:52 Speaker 01 TCAT.
2:52 Speaker 00 T C A T T.
2:53 Speaker 01 Yeah.
2:54 Speaker 00 Yeah, you save a little bit of money off your standard badges. All right, buddy, are you ready to get into this episode of True Crime All The Time?
3:02 Speaker 01 I am excited.
3:03 Speaker 00 We're talking about Jose Hora. Jose Hora moved to Pennsylvania in the fall of 2015 to live in a property owned by an old friend. He went missing weeks later. The case went cold, but later, a police informant in an arson case claimed that he knew exactly what happened to Jose. So a little mystery here.
3:26 Speaker 01 Yeah.
3:27 Speaker 00 Jose Pepe Hora was born in Cuba. He was 56 years old at the time he went missing. Jose was from New Jersey, but in the fall of 2015, he moved to Pennsylvania because his friend Roberto Toner offered him a place to stay. Roberto owned a three-story boarding house in Freeland, Pennsylvania, known as the Cottage. And Roberto was, you know, he was well-known in the area. He was friends with Freeland Police Chief Anthony Harris. He was involved in local government and purchased multiple properties for renovation, which I know a lot of people are into, right? Buying houses, fixing them up. You can make quite a bit of money doing that.
4:10 Speaker 01 If you're good at it.
4:11 Speaker 00 Now, I know a lot of people got hurt, like in 2008, when the economy tanked and the... The property market tanked.
4:21 Speaker 01 Values dropped and people were like, oh, now what?
4:24 Speaker 00 Yeah, I have these properties that I bought thinking I was gonna make a profit on it. No, I'm not. Jose had only been living in the cottage for a couple of weeks when he went missing in the late fall of 2015. November 17th, 2015 was Jose's mother's birthday and Jose always called her on her birthday, no matter what. Virginia Rodriguez was worried when she didn't hear from him. She called him repeatedly, but received no answer. And you and I talk a lot about patterns, right? Patterns are important.
4:57 Speaker 01 They are.
4:57 Speaker 00 And, and some of these cases, okay, is it unusual maybe to go X amount of days or even weeks without talking to someone? No, it might not be, but when your birthday rolls around and your son doesn't even reach out to you and he has a pattern of doing it every single year, no matter what, that's going to be concerning to a mother.
5:26 Speaker 01 And it's gonna make you wonder, why haven't I heard from him?
5:29 Speaker 00 Jose's daughter hadn't heard from him either. He also hadn't been in contact with his parole officer. Okay, so you know, it's, it's one thing, you don't call your mom on, on her birthday. You don't talk to your daughter, but then you don't contact your parole officer.
5:45 Speaker 01 Yeah, you're not gonna want to miss that, right? It's a check in and if you don't check in, that could be some big problems for you.
5:51 Speaker 00 You could be going back.
5:52 Speaker 01 Yeah.
5:53 Speaker 00 So Jose was reported missing. Virginia told the police that the last time she talked to Jose was November 13th, 2015. Law enforcement learned about Jose's move to the cottage and his association with Roberto Toner. Since June 2015, the Luzern County Drug Task Force had been investigating Roberto for heroin trafficking and possible gun crimes.
6:20 Speaker 01 The same guy that had a friendly relationship with the local police chief?
6:25 Speaker 00 Yeah, yep. And was also involved in local government. The investigation into Jose's disappearance stalled. Basically, police didn't have any leads. Meanwhile, Roberto Turner gained ownership of a home in nearby Weatherly, Pennsylvania, through nefarious actions, per the ATF.
6:48 Speaker 01 Nefarious. I like that.
6:50 Speaker 00 Yeah, obviously, it's not good, but it's still a little vague, right? As to, to what the actions were. In the early hours of August 6, 2016, the Weatherly PD responded to a large house fire on Third Street. The fire also spread to neighboring houses, but all residents escaped without serious injuries. And to me, fire is always scary, but you know, when you live in, in a community where houses are pretty close together.
7:21 Speaker 01 Yeah.
7:22 Speaker 00 A fire in one, I mean, that's scary in the fact that not only is it going to damage that one, but it could jump pretty easily and, and affect a bunch of houses around. An accelerant sniffing dog hit several areas and the fire was ruled an arson.
7:39 Speaker 01 You know, we talked about arson last week.
7:43 Speaker 00 Yeah.
7:43 Speaker 01 And learn a few things, right? And, um,
7:46 Speaker 00 As we always do.
7:47 Speaker 01 As we always do. Here we have these dogs that specialize in sniffing out this kind of stuff.
7:55 Speaker 00 Well, there's a dog for everything. You think about the cases that we do, right? There's cadaver dogs, there's drug dogs, there's accelerant sniffing dogs. Basically, dogs are so amazing, you can train them to do anything.
8:13 Speaker 01 That's really true.
8:14 Speaker 00 You know, here, smell Gibby's underwear and now go find him. And, and they can do that.
8:21 Speaker 01 Strangely very fast.
8:22 Speaker 00 That one didn't want to at all. He's like, I, I get the smell, but I don't want to find out who belongs to that smell. The morning after the fire, police learned Roberto Turner owned the property. He was asked if he had anything to do with the fire, but he denied it. The Weatherly police brought in the ATF due to the size and destruction of the fire. Officers checked houses and businesses on the street for surveillance footage. There was a camera a couple of blocks away from the house. They captured a distinctive white Mitsubishi Eclipse with a large spoiler on the back. The ATF executed search warrants on all of Roberto's properties, including the cottage in Freeland.
9:07 Speaker 00 Police noticed that residents of the cottage were reluctant to talk, but one individual told investigators they needed to talk to a tenant, who was not on their radar, a guy by the name of Donald Warren. Warren had been living at the cottage since the fall of 2015. According to Donald, late one night in December 2016, he received a call from a blocked number. It was a police sergeant who told Donald he was parked across the street from the cottage. He wanted Donald to go with him so that they could talk. Donald agreed and they went to the Weatherly Police Station.
9:46 Speaker 01 How eager would you be to jump into a police car? You know, you get that phone call, they say, hey, you got some time, wouldn't mind talking to you.
9:55 Speaker 00 About as eager as I am to run on the treadmill?
9:57 Speaker 01 Yeah.
9:58 Speaker 00 Zero, zero eagerness? But no, you know, seriously, you're going to be a little worried, I think.
10:05 Speaker 01 I think so.
10:07 Speaker 00 Anytime somebody gets a call from the police or a federal agency and they say, hey, we'd like to talk to you, nobody wants that.
10:15 Speaker 01 No. Because typically it's not good news, right?
10:19 Speaker 00 Well, obviously if you've done something, you don't want it, but I, even if you haven't, you really just don't want that because it's going to be stressful no matter what. Donald was brought into a room of federal agents. He admitted he knew about the fire and was present. He tried to convey that he was not a willing participant, but authorities didn't believe him. He also claimed he knew what happened to Jose Hora. Authorities doubted he was telling the truth until Donald said he drove a white Mitsubishi Eclipse that night, the same vehicle that was captured on surveillance before the fire. So he's saying, not only did he know about the fire, he was present.
11:03 Speaker 00 Oh, and by the way, I know what happened to this guy, Jose, who you've been trying to, you know, figure out, right? What happened to him? Donald explained that he and his girlfriend split up in 2014. He needed a place to live and got a room at the cottage. There were people in and out constantly. A woman named Alba was the one who dealt with the elderly residents. A family lived down the hall from Donald. He eventually met Jose Herran, who moved in in 2015. Donald learned that Jose and Roberto had known each other for years. Okay, this seems like a strange living situation to me.
11:45 Speaker 01 Must be at one, a pretty, pretty large home.
11:48 Speaker 00 Or you just have a lot of people packed in more than maybe you should have.
11:53 Speaker 01 Yeah.
11:53 Speaker 00 Jose was only at the cottage for about two weeks before he disappeared. Roberto knew Donald needed money, so he offered him some painting jobs around the property. On November 13th, 2015, Donald was told he needed to go to Roberto's property on Buck Mountain Road in nearby Foster Township and paint over a floor with a very specific type of paint. He was instructed to apply as many coats as he could. Now, Donald thought this was strange because he was painting a subfloor that was going to have carpet installed over top of it. But once he got there, he found a large blood stain.
12:37 Speaker 01 Yeah, that would be weird until you saw the blood stain. You're thinking, you're gonna put carpet over it. Why do you even need to paint it? You know, maybe one coat to kind of seal it up so you don't get any old odors coming out of the, the subfloor.
12:51 Speaker 00 Okay, so it's not weird when you discovered the blood stain?
12:54 Speaker 01 That's weird.
12:55 Speaker 00 I think that's weird. You said it would be weird until you discovered the blood stain.
13:01 Speaker 01 Yeah, I mean, like, so when you get there, then you're like, oh, this is why they want.
13:05 Speaker 00 Yeah, like you realize why they, they need this thing painted. But then it also becomes, okay, why is there a huge blood stain here?
13:15 Speaker 01 Different level of weirdness.
13:17 Speaker 00 Donald became fearful for his life. The next day, a bag of weapons was put in his room. The bag contained a 45 caliber gun, a nine millimeter, a 22, and an AK-47. That's quite the arsenal.
13:33 Speaker 01 It is.
13:34 Speaker 00 Donald was told to clean the guns with bleach and ammonia to ensure there was no DNA or fingerprints left behind. He was also asked to get rid of the serial numbers and file the barrel of the 45 caliber.
13:50 Speaker 01 I think at that point I would be really nervous. Like, I know I said I would do odd jobs.
13:57 Speaker 00 These are too odd.
13:58 Speaker 01 Yeah.
13:59 Speaker 00 And also maybe incriminating.
14:02 Speaker 01 Yeah. And if I don't do it, what could happen to me? And the fact that I am going to do it, or they want me to do it, does that put me at risk later too?
14:12 Speaker 00 What could happen to me? Yeah. I mean, so obviously that's why he was fearful for his life. You have the, the blood stain. Now you're being asked to do a bunch of stuff to these weapons. It all seems very suspicious, but there was a, a kind of a no point of return, right? For Donald, because he knew what the weapons were used for. He did his best to make it appear that he cleaned the guns without erasing all potential evidence. Donald claimed that Jose was killed by Roberto Torner and David Alzugaray, Roberto's right-hand
14:51 Speaker 00 man and a resident of the cottage. According to court documents, Roberto asked Donald to participate in the murder at least 25 times.
15:03 Speaker 01 That's a lot of, uh, requests.
15:05 Speaker 00 Yeah. I mean, you know, I guess points for stick-to-it-iveness, but I mean, how many times are you going to ask? Hey, will you help us kill this guy? Hey, will you help us kill this guy? I mean, at a certain point. Number one, you're putting a lot of trust in this guy Donald that he's not going to talk. And obviously, he must have trusted Donald because he sent him over to paint over this bloodstain.
15:35 Speaker 01 Right.
15:35 Speaker 00 He asked him to do all this stuff with the guns.
15:37 Speaker 01 I mean, you pretty much showed him all the evidence the police would need to arrest somebody. Here's the bloodstain where the murder happened. Here's the weapons that were used. And you did ask me to participate in the murder.
15:53 Speaker 00 Well, and again, back to why he was probably fearful for his life, right? He knew a lot. The night Jose disappeared, Roberto was driving a van with David in the passenger seat. Roberto told Donald, we're going to do this right now. It's now or never. Roberto smiled and showed him a 22 caliber revolver in his waistband. Donald was ill at the time and refused to join them. Jose got in the van and Roberto drove away. Later that night, Roberto and David returned to the cottage without Jose. They were wearing different clothes and smelled like fuel oil and smoke.
16:34 Speaker 00 That same night, the two men told Donald details about the murder. Again, very trusting of this guy Donald. But according to Donald, Roberto and David took Jose to the property on Buck Mountain Road. David pulled out a 22 caliber revolver and started shooting at Jose. Jose tried shooting back, but couldn't because he had dummy rounds in his gun. David pursued and fired repeatedly. Jose was shot at least five times. Roberto then walked up to Jose and finished by shooting him in the back of the head. And let's not forget, these two guys were friends.
17:12 Speaker 01 Well, that's what I was thinking. You know, your friend, you invited him to come stay with you and two weeks later, this is what happens?
17:21 Speaker 00 You decide that he has to be killed and there's no doubt there was some planning involved, right? Somebody had to put dummy rounds in Jose's gun.
17:31 Speaker 01 Yeah, foreseeing that this was going to happen, right?
17:33 Speaker 00 Well, if you're gonna be in a shootout, it's good to know, I guess, that the other person doesn't have real bullets.
17:40 Speaker 01 But how can you do that to your friend?
17:42 Speaker 00 Jose was then dismembered into small pieces. The remains were burned and put into buckets. Donald claimed the men were laughing and joking. Most disturbingly, he claimed he saw Jose's head in a bucket in the back of their van.
17:58 Speaker 01 Well, that's just messed up.
18:00 Speaker 00 It's, it's gonna cause some nightmares, I think, for many people. Roberto also showed Donald a collection of butcher knives, cleavers and a machete he said were used in the dismemberment. This guy is just, it's almost like he's bragging.
18:16 Speaker 01 Yeah.
18:17 Speaker 00 Because he's telling Donald all these details. He's showing him all the guns, all the knives and telling him basically, yeah, this is how it happened.
18:28 Speaker 01 But he's also probably putting the fear of you know what into Donald.
18:34 Speaker 00 Well, just from the mere fact that he knows so much.
18:37 Speaker 01 Yeah.
18:38 Speaker 00 He has to be somewhat fearful.
18:41 Speaker 00 Authorities suspected jealousy was the motive. Jose was described as a good-looking man who received attention from women. Roberto wanted someone who could be easily controlled, but that wasn't the case with Jose. In his December 2016 interview, Donald was asked why he never went to the police. He claimed he approached Anthony Harris, the Freeland Borough Chief of Police. And we mentioned it, right? Harris was friends with Roberto Torner. Donald claimed he walked up to Harris and said he had some information, but was fearful and didn't know what to do. After telling Harris what he knew,
19:22 Speaker 00 the chief allegedly told him, well, your best bet is just to mind your own business.
19:28 Speaker 01 That's terrible advice from the local police chief.
19:32 Speaker 00 But why do you think he's giving that advice?
19:35 Speaker 01 Well, obviously he, or I feel like he's on the hook.
19:40 Speaker 00 Is that like on the take?
19:41 Speaker 01 Yeah.
19:42 Speaker 00 Okay. Well, I, yeah, I'm, I think it has something to do with his friendship, right? With Roberto. But Donald also claimed the chief said that could just as easily happen to you.
19:55 Speaker 01 And there is the threat.
19:57 Speaker 00 Well, and if Donald wasn't thinking that, obviously he would start thinking it at that point, but I don't know how he couldn't been thinking it already. Donald returned to the cottage that evening and saw Chief Harris leaving the house. Everyone got quiet when he walked in. Someone hit him and then according to him, like a pack of hyenas, he was attacked. Someone put a gun under his chin and threatened to kill him. Donald said the chief misunderstood him and convinced them to let him go.
20:29 Speaker 01 A lucky night for him.
20:31 Speaker 00 Yeah, because he, he could have easily been killed there. After this, Donald lived every day in fear. He knew if he drew any attention to himself, he could die.
20:42 Speaker 01 I think I would try to find a way to slowly, or not even slowly, quickly disappear from that area.
20:49 Speaker 00 Try to extricate yourself from that situation. But I don't think this is hyperbole, right? Living every day in fear, knowing that you could die.
21:00 Speaker 00 I think that's a very real thing. Now, the police were aware of the rumors about Roberto's friendship with the police chief. Donald provided some insight about Roberto's friendship with David Alzugaray. According to Donald, Dave was Roberto's personal automaton. He did whatever Roberto told him to do. David once did something that angered Rock. And in order to pay penance, he beat himself in the face with a stone until he bled. He claimed that David had items in his room related to Santeria and black magic. You ever beat yourself in the face with a stone?
21:44 Speaker 01 No, I've never done that. I've been beaten in the face with a stone, but I've never beat myself with a stone in my face.
21:51 Speaker 00 Hmm. This did kind of remind me a little bit. Remember that movie The Da Vinci Code?
21:56 Speaker 01 Yeah.
21:57 Speaker 00 Was it The Da Vinci Code or the second one? I don't know, but you had that that one actor, he's kind of a big actor, but he would hurt himself on his legs.
22:07 Speaker 01 Oh, yeah, yeah, yeah. Paul.
22:10 Speaker 00 Yeah, I can't think of his name, but yeah, he's a big actor. He's been in a lot of things. It kind of reminded me of that, like he was doing penance almost. Donald also provided information about weapons and where authorities could find explosives. Investigators found C4 explosives that were stolen from an army base in Kentucky. Roberto was released on bail in advance of his federal trial, but while on release, he planted stolen US military C4 plastic explosives at the residence of his co-defendant, David Alzugaray, per the US Attorney's Office. I mean, this guy's not messing around. No, right? If he thinks that you've done him
22:53 Speaker 00 wrong, or are about to do him wrong, he's gonna kill you. I think he killed Jose without a second thought, and he was set to blow up his friend David Alzugaray.
23:09 Speaker 01 With some C4.
23:11 Speaker 00 On November 7, 2017, Roberto Turner, his fiancee.
23:16 Speaker 00 Liza Robles and David Alzugar were charged with drug trafficking and firearms offenses. According to the charges, the three conspired to distribute heroin in Luzern County in June 2015. Roberto and Liza were charged with conspiring from May 2012 to August 2017 to provide firearms and ammo to a convicted felon and to possess firearms and ammo as a convicted felon.
23:49 Speaker 01 Not good charges to have.
23:50 Speaker 00 Liza purchased six firearms and gave them to Roberto, a convicted felon. Turner also purchased a gun from an unnamed individual. And you know why he needed so many guns? Because when you're in the heroin distribution trade, things can get a little hairy sometimes.
24:10 Speaker 01 Yeah, I think he probably needed for security protection and.
24:14 Speaker 00 Taking TCB in?
24:16 Speaker 01 Yeah.
24:16 Speaker 00 In February 2018, Special Agent Larry Whitehead interviewed Roberto about the disappearance of Jose Herran. During his interview, Roberto spoke in hypotheticals about a missing item, which he believed was chopped up into little pieces.
24:35 Speaker 01 It's a weird thing to do, to bring that up and talk hypothetically about it.
24:41 Speaker 00 It's also weird to try to say hypothetically when it's outside of your repertoire.
24:48 Speaker 01 Well, you can say hypothetically, it probably.
24:52 Speaker 00 No, you said it right that time, but that is weird. You're right. If the police are interviewing you about the disappearance of this guy, you know what you did. But instead of just saying, hey, I didn't have anything to do with it. I don't know what you're talking about. Let's deal in hypotheticals, right? There's a missing item and I believe it was chopped up into little pieces. On May 1st, 2018, prison officials received word that David Alzugaray wanted to talk to law enforcement. David confessed to shooting Jose with a 22 caliber pistol, burning his clothes,
25:32 Speaker 00 dismembering his body, and throwing the remains in the Lehigh River. He insisted Roberto was not involved at all. He claimed they went to the Buck Mountain Road property and got into an argument. Police believe David was jealous of Jose because he and Roberto got along so well. David told police that he cut the remains into such small pieces, they likely wouldn't be found. But to investigators, it seemed like David was trying too hard to make sure that he took all the blame. And that's, you know, that's something to me. It goes back to, you know, maybe the hold that Roberto had over this guy?
26:14 Speaker 01 Could be.
26:15 Speaker 00 That even after they were caught, he was willing to step up and basically say, hey, I did all of this. Roberto didn't have anything to do with it.
26:24 Speaker 01 It sounds like the police feel like he's overselling it.
26:27 Speaker 00 Yeah, and I'm sure they might even have some evidence at that point that's kind of pointing to Roberto. So maybe that's part of why they don't believe him. Police searched the burn pit on the property and found fragments of human bones. In May 2018, police searched the Buck Mountain Road property and they found two burn pits, one of which contained bone fragments. Investigators determined the fragments were pieces of a male skull, but they couldn't prove the bones were Jose Herran's remains because there was no DNA.
27:01 Speaker 01 One thing I never understood when people burn things like that, like they shouldn't burn, but they do it to try to get rid of the evidence. But they don't go back and scoop up all that, dig all that up and dispose of it somewhere else.
27:16 Speaker 00 And they don't realize that it's not going to completely burn up.
27:19 Speaker 01 Yeah.
27:20 Speaker 00 It's really hard to create a fire that's hot enough to burn an entire body completely, like a crematorium furnace.
27:31 Speaker 01 And that's why in that one series, they always went to the crematorium.
27:35 Speaker 00 Oh, Ozarks?
27:36 Speaker 01 Ozarks.
27:37 Speaker 00 Yeah.
27:37 Speaker 01 Yeah.
27:38 Speaker 00 Hey, if you need to get rid of some bodies, you buy a funeral home.
27:42 Speaker 01 That's right.
27:43 Speaker 00 That has an oven. Police did an extensive search of the Lehigh River, but found nothing. Months later, Roberto did another interview with law enforcement. This time, he claimed he knew about the murder of Jose Herran. On November 13th, 2015, he instructed David and Jose to take construction debris to the Buck Mountain Road property and burn it. He was worried because there was animosity between the two men. He got a bad feeling and decided to go check on them. Roberto got out of his vehicle and yelled Jose's name. David came out of the chicken coop and waved to him. And that's when Roberto learned he had killed Jose.
28:26 Speaker 00 So this is Roberto's story, right? Kind of dovetailing off of David taking the entire blame. David claimed that Jose attacked him. As David was running away, he shot over his shoulder. A bullet struck Jose in the head and killed him.
28:47 Speaker 01 It's a pretty lucky shot.
28:49 Speaker 00 Yeah, I would say, you know, not one in a million, but I don't know what the, the odds would be of running, not looking and just kind of firing a gun over your shoulder and hitting someone in the head. The police also spoke to Roberto's associate, Alba Vares, who was put into witness protection. And we mentioned it earlier, but Alba previously lived in the cottage. She watched Roberto's children. By the time of the interview, she was no longer living there and was able to get away from Roberto's control. Police asked what she knew about Jose Herran.
29:32 Speaker 00 Alba said that in 2015, Roberto instructed her to clean cutting instruments and told her where to hide them. She admitted that she had a romantic relationship with Roberto. Roberto questioned her loyalty. About a week before Jose went missing, they drove out to the Buck Mountain Road property with Jose. Roberto handed Alba a gun and told her, I want you to shoot Pepe. She held the gun up, but couldn't do it. So, I mean, you mentioned it, right? These guys are friends. And like two weeks after, you know, Jose comes, Roberto wants him dead. Well, now we find out, maybe it was more like a week after he got there.
30:16 Speaker 01 Right, pretty quick. Hey, good friend, glad you came down to stay with me. Week later.
30:22 Speaker 00 He's trying to get his girlfriend to shoot and kill him.
30:25 Speaker 01 Yeah.
30:25 Speaker 00 The other thing that's really jumping out at me, Gibbs, is the control that this guy had on virtually everyone, you know, kind of in his circle or in his life.
30:38 Speaker 01 Yeah, I mean, if he can get Alba to pull that trigger, he, he'll own her. Now I have something on you. You killed him.
30:45 Speaker 00 And it seems like he had major control over David before David even participated in the murder.
30:51 Speaker 01 Yeah.
30:52 Speaker 00 Now, I think when it came to Donald, yeah, there was some control there, but I think it was mostly fear. Right? He was just scared that he, you know, he was gonna mess up and Roberto was gonna try to kill him.
31:04 Speaker 01 Well, that's a one, that's another way to control somebody.
31:07 Speaker 00 Yeah.
31:07 Speaker 01 Just put the, all that fear into him.
31:10 Speaker 00 There's a lot of different ways to control people and fear is one. On November 12th, 2015, Alba heard noises coming from the basement of the cottage. She went down to investigate and found Roberto and David manipulating ammunition. They created dummy rounds and capable firing and gave them to Jose.
31:32 Speaker 01 Well, that's premeditation, right? Or could be.
31:35 Speaker 00 I think it's part of it. Yeah, no doubt. Now, how would you create a dummy round? I was kind of thinking about this during the research of the case. And my thought is there's a number of ways to do it. You could take an old fired casing and insert a new bullet in it without the powder and leave the old primer in the casing. And essentially, nothing would happen, right? When the firing pin or the hammer struck that primer, it's not going to have the powder to propel. And it's not even going to have a new primer to create the ignition.
32:18 Speaker 01 So it would just be a dud.
32:20 Speaker 00 It just wouldn't do anything. But it would most likely feel like, you know, like a real bullet. It would feel and look like one unless you looked at the primer, which a lot of people don't. And depending on what round it is, there's not that much powder in a lot of the pistol rounds, four grams sometimes. I don't know that it's going to make a huge difference when you're, when you have some rounds in your hand.
32:50 Speaker 01 Yeah, I don't know how much time people are spending inspecting their ammo before they load their gun.
32:58 Speaker 00 And maybe they gave him the gun already loaded, which would be even less of a chance that that he would notice.
33:06 Speaker 01 Yeah.
33:07 Speaker 00 Police went to the cottage and searched the attic where they found cleavers, knives, machetes and ammo hidden under the insulation. Alba also showed the police two guns hidden in a hollow cavity of a railing near the altar. In January 2019, Roberto and others were charged with arson, solicitation, conspiracy, endangering persons, insurance fraud, and risking catastrophe, which is a charge I do not believe I've ever heard of. Risking catastrophe.
33:41 Speaker 01 Yeah, you could cause a catastrophic event.
33:45 Speaker 00 Yeah, no, I understand what it means. I just don't think I've ever heard of it. Well, this is a lot of charges. It is a lot of charges. Now, what you don't hear in there is murder. It wasn't until February 10th, 2020, that the Luzern County DA's office announced homicide charges against David Alzugaray and Roberto Torn. David was charged with criminal homicide, conspiracy to commit homicide, and abuse of a corpse. Roberto was charged with homicide, conspiracy to commit homicide, and two counts of solicitation to commit homicide. And I'm assuming one of those counts was directly related to the 25 times
34:29 Speaker 00 he had asked Donald to participate in killing Jose Hora. I'm going to agree with you on that.
34:38 Speaker 00 After Roberto was arrested, he told reporters, "You should ask the chief of police," referring to Chief Anthony Harris. Oh, pulling him into this. Which I think if you're the chief, you're not thrilled about, right? Now, it did sound like maybe he was not on the up and up, just based on his relationship with Roberto, what Donald said that he said to him when he tried to confide in him about, you know, what had happened. Two days later, on February 12th, Roberto was sentenced to 22 and a half years in federal prison for conspiring to distribute heroin,
35:21 Speaker 00 distributing heroin, possessing and conspiring to possess firearms as a multi-convicted felon. So, we haven't even gotten to the homicide charges yet, and he's already facing 22 and a half years for these other things. It's a healthy stint. Yeah, no doubt. Now, you shouldn't do any of that, right? You shouldn't make heroin, distribute heroin, you shouldn't use heroin.
35:51 Speaker 00 You're also not supposed to possess firearms as a convicted felon.
35:57 Speaker 01 And boy, did he possess some firearms.
35:59 Speaker 00 He had a bunch of them. His fiance, Liza Robles, and David Alzugaray were convicted of heroin trafficking offenses. And Liza was convicted of firearm offenses. David was sentenced to 27 months and Liza was sentenced to 36 months in prison. Now, 27 months doesn't seem like a lot.
36:22 Speaker 01 It doesn't.
36:22 Speaker 00 For trafficking heroin. I mean, Liza got more than that for buying guns and giving them to a convicted felon. Which I'm not saying is a good thing. Don't get me wrong. But heroin trafficking, you know, that seems like a, like it should be a very serious charge and come with a much
36:44 Speaker 01 Stiffer?
36:45 Speaker 00 Stiffer penalty. Yeah. Roberto's murder trial started on May 9, 2023. The state spent most of the first day of trial proving Jose Herran had not been seen since 2015. His body hadn't been found, but based on the investigation, prosecutors believed he was killed and dismembered inside a trailer owned by Roberto Torn. And I think that's important for the prosecution, right? In a no body case, you have to try to demonstrate that this person is most likely deceased. Because you know, the defense is going to argue, well, how do you know? That the person was even killed is even dead.
37:31 Speaker 01 It's a good point. And you want to put it back on the prosecution to prove that.
37:37 Speaker 00 Or at the very least, you want to plant that, that seed of doubt, right? In the, in a jury's mind. The jury also learned that Jose was a confidential source for the FBI. FBI Special Agent Thomas D'Amico's testimony suggested that Jose was killed for providing information about drug and firearm trafficking in the Philadelphia region.
38:03 Speaker 01 Well, that could get you killed if you're mixed in with the wrong group of people.
38:07 Speaker 00 Which he was. Now, does it also maybe shed a little more light? About him going to live with his good friend Roberto, who was a heroin trafficker. Yeah. State Police Corporal Jesse Bachman testified that they searched three burn pits in a bedroom at Roberto's property. Information gathered indicated Jose was shot and dismembered in that bedroom. The subfloor under the carpet looked like it had been haphazardly painted. The floor tested positive for blood. And I think that, you know, fits right in line, right? With Donald's story. I was told to go paint the subfloor.
38:51 Speaker 00 I saw a big blood stain and I painted over it. Dr. Conrad Quentin, an anthropologist, testified that five of 18 bone fragments recovered from a burn pit on Roberto's property were part of a male skull. The 13 other bones were too small or did not have features to make a conclusion. Senior forensic analyst Lisa Sansom testified that authorities were unable to recover DNA from bone fragments found in a burn pit. I mean, you found pieces of a skull. Just seems very alarming. Well, it seems incriminating, right?
39:33 Speaker 00 But I think a lot of times juries, especially in this day and age, they expect to be wowed by DNA. Yeah. A lot of them probably do, right? So you found these bones. Why can you not tell us conclusively that they're the bones or they're the remains of Jose Hora? But authorities weren't able to do that. There just wasn't enough there. The state called on Richard Di Stefano, who testified about Roberto's past in New Jersey. Di Stefano testified, Roberto told me on occasion that when he was younger, that his uncles and I guess other gang lords in the town or whatever happened,
40:17 Speaker 00 that he was present when they would chop up bodies and put them in a drain, basically. Di Stefano also testified, he said that he used to also participate in cutting up the bodies. I just don't know how people have the stomach for that. It cannot be the easiest thing in the world. Now, if you're dead inside, right? If you have no emotion, no empathy, then maybe that's how you get through it and it doesn't matter to you. Just another job? Yeah, like building a birdhouse. Yeah. Maybe to some people. Di Stefano claimed that Roberto asked him to build an incinerator. Turner said that they had an opportunity to make a lot of money, but they would need to get rid of the body and they needed an incinerator.
41:03 Speaker 00 Di Stefano said he didn't take the question seriously. And I think it would be a tough question to take seriously for most people. Hey, can you help me build an incinerator? First of all, no, I don't know how to build an incinerator. And even if I did, I don't want to be involved in you getting rid of a body. Yeah, because you're probably gonna give it a test run with me, the guy that built it. Or somewhere down the road, I'm gonna end up in the incinerator somehow. Right. Informant Donald Warren identified meat cleavers and knives in court and told the jury each one had notches on the wooden handles
41:44 Speaker 00 that were quote unquote scorecards for the number of bodies Roberto claimed to have chopped up. Right? If true, that's a very scary thought. I mean, how many notches are on these handles? How many bodies has this guy, you know, cut up and disposed of? While living at the cottage, Donald got to know Jose Herran and David Alzugaray. He believed Roberto and Jose were best friends until the fall of 2015, when Roberto solicited his help in killing Jose. Yeah, I think at that point, you no longer believe that these two guys are best friends. Right. Because most people don't want to kill their best friends.
42:28 Speaker 00 Now, they might from time to time, but you know. Not gonna be typical. No, I mean, you and I might get into it and I might have a fleeting thought that I could strangle you from behind, but I would never do it. Yeah, yeah, I understand. Believe me, there's times I grasp my K bar and then think better of it.
42:52 Speaker 01 No.
42:52 Speaker 00 Think you think better of it.
42:53 Speaker 01 Yeah.
42:54 Speaker 00 First of all, we don't want to mess up the studio.
42:57 Speaker 01 Well, I'm okay with that.
42:58 Speaker 00 Oh, because you're leaving right after.
43:00 Speaker 01 Yeah.
43:01 Speaker 00 Well, I don't want to mess up the studio because I gotta live here.
43:04 Speaker 01 Just for the record, I would haunt your ass.
43:07 Speaker 00 Yeah.
43:08 Speaker 01 To the point that you would move.
43:10 Speaker 00 So that's one of the reasons. The other reason is it's going to be really hard to explain your disappearance.
43:15 Speaker 01 Yeah.
43:16 Speaker 00 When you're not on the podcast next week.
43:19 Speaker 01 That's right. Our listeners will come through for me. We think we know who did it.
43:24 Speaker 00 Well, in my, you just ate dinner with my wife and family. So, uh, I'm, my alibi is not going to be great. At the same time, Donald claimed Roberto was soliciting him to assist in killing David Alzugaray. I mean, I just think Gibbs that Roberto, he wanted everyone gone who was around him. And again, talking about Donald living in fear. So if he participates in these two killings, he has to know he's going to be next on the list.
43:56 Speaker 01 Yeah. Why wouldn't he be? He's a prime witness at that point.
43:59 Speaker 00 Donald testified that he spent several weeks in the hospital. One day after he was released, he was standing outside smoking when Roberto and David approached him. He was unable to give an exact date, but it was cold outside. Donald testified Roberto and David got into the van and they were telling me to get into the van saying, we're gonna do this tonight now. When Jose came outside, the conversation abruptly changed and they drove off towards Roberto's trailer on North Buck Mountain Route in Foster Township. Donald testified, I knew what was coming. I couldn't look at Pepe. Two hours later, Roberto and David returned soaking wet, wearing T-shirts and swimming trunks.
44:44 Speaker 00 When they opened the van door, he was hit with a diesel smoke. Later that night, Donald was summoned from his room to Roberto's room where they were bragging about the murder. David claimed he cut off Jose's face and wore it as Leatherface from the Texas Chainsaw Massacre movie.
45:04 Speaker 01 A little Ed Gein stuff going on.
45:06 Speaker 00 That is extremely sick. You think about Ed Gein, you think about the scene from Silence of the Lambs.
45:17 Speaker 00 Where, you know, Lecter kills that guard.
45:20 Speaker 01 Yeah.
45:20 Speaker 00 And then essentially uses his face to be transported out of the, um, the place where he's been held prisoner.
45:30 Speaker 01 Yeah. Freaky.
45:32 Speaker 00 And then you think of Jim Carrey using a police, using a piece of baloney on his face and saying silence of the land. And then, you know, that's kind of more funny than freaky.
45:44 Speaker 01 Yeah, yeah, a little, uh, lighten it up a little bit.
45:48 Speaker 00 Donald testified that he was told to clean the guns investigators found inside the church. He cleaned them, but he didn't file the inside of the 45 caliber as he was told to do. And why would they have wanted him to file down the inside of the barrel?
46:03 Speaker 01 Well, they don't want him traced back to anybody.
46:04 Speaker 00 Right. They want to throw off ballistics, right? That's the only thing I can think of. Roberto's fiance, Liza Robles testified that he admitted to killing and dismembering Jose Herran. She last saw Jose going with Roberto to burn trash at the Buck Mountain Road property. She never saw him again. Roberto later told her that he and David shot Jose in the head and cut up his body. She testified the bones he had smashed in the chicken feed bags. The flesh was dumped in the Lehigh River. She admitted that she soaked butcher knives in five gallon buckets of bleach and water at the cottage.
46:45 Speaker 00 The day after Jose was killed, she woke up and saw Roberto and David cooking meat in a pan. She wanted what she thought was a piece of steak. Roberto told her not to eat it, saying, no, that's Pepe.
47:00 Speaker 01 Okay, that's just sick.
47:01 Speaker 00 Yeah, I mean, we've gone from drugs and murder to dismemberment, cannibalism, Texas Chainsaw Massacre. I mean, there's a lot of stuff to this murder.
47:16 Speaker 01 Yeah, but now you're putting some of the meat in the frying pan.
47:19 Speaker 00 Liza testified David kept some of the meat for a religious ritual he wanted to do.
47:26 Speaker 01 I don't know any religious rituals that say, take human flesh and cook it up.
47:32 Speaker 00 Well, we did say that he was involved in Sanaria.
47:36 Speaker 01 Yeah.
47:36 Speaker 00 Black magic. In a later interview, Donald Warren claimed he heard that the two used Jose's remains to make sandwiches and invited people over. Roberto allegedly bragged about a special recipe.
47:51 Speaker 01 Hey, I made some really good sandwiches, guys. You're gonna really enjoy this. Grab a sandwich and sit down and watch the game, okay?
47:58 Speaker 00 I'm telling you, this is another reason that I don't like to eat things at like family gatherings when I don't know exactly who made it.
48:10 Speaker 01 Who made it.
48:10 Speaker 00 And sometimes when I do know who made it, I don't like to eat things.
48:15 Speaker 01 I remember we used to have these, they called them carry, carry ins at the office.
48:19 Speaker 00 Oh, yeah, yeah, yeah.
48:20 Speaker 01 And I know we, we would look at the, um, the table with all the food on it and we would laugh because we knew.
48:28 Speaker 00 Who made what?
48:29 Speaker 01 And we were staying away from certain items on.
48:32 Speaker 00 Yeah. And I mean, not to say anything bad about people, but it's just like, okay, I don't know if I want to eat that.
48:40 Speaker 01 Yeah.
48:41 Speaker 00 You know?
48:42 Speaker 01 Stayed clear.
48:43 Speaker 00 Will I be okay without it? Yes, absolutely. Do I think this person is a serial killer? Not necessarily, but I don't know for sure what people do in their spare time.
48:55 Speaker 01 Did you ever put some on your plate like you were going to eat it and then when you got to your office, like tossed it in the trash?
49:00 Speaker 00 No, why would I do that? It's just wasteful. Donald said it was one of the most ghoulish things I've ever witnessed in my entire life. And not so much the act, but the attitude, the laughter. They were treating it like it was a birthday party.
49:15 Speaker 01 Yeah, I mean, they seemed fairly, uh, relaxed and.
49:18 Speaker 00 Almost giddy.
49:19 Speaker 01 Yeah.
49:20 Speaker 00 That they murdered this guy. Liza testified that Roberto continued to earn $12,000 to $18,000 from rental properties he owned in the Freeland area. Per Roberto's instruction, she deposited $300 a month into David's prison account. The prosecution suggested the money was for David to take the fall for Roberto. And remember, they were already going to prison, right? For these drug charges. They weren't getting out of those.
49:50 Speaker 01 I mean, 300 bucks a month, I'm guessing kind of goes kind of far.
49:54 Speaker 00 I would think you could live fairly large at the commissary on 300 bucks a month. I don't know that for a fact because I've never been in prison.
50:03 Speaker 01 Seems like a lot of Twinkies.
50:04 Speaker 00 And ramen. Liza also testified that Roberto and David manipulated several 9mm bullets that went to Jose's 9mm Glock. They removed the gunpowder because they didn't want the gun to discharge rounds. So, you know, they could have even left the primers in. It just wouldn't have been gunpowder in there to, you know, ignite and cause the bullet to come flying out.
50:30 Speaker 01 Yeah.
50:31 Speaker 00 During cross-examination, the defense said Liza had an immunity deal in exchange for her testimony. They suggested that each time she told the story, she added new details. Liza maintained that added details were the result of additional questions being asked of her.
50:49 Speaker 01 Well, sometimes when the police say, "Tell me everything you know about the night of or about the murder of," they're expecting you to go ahead and lay it all out there and not for them to have to keep digging and pulling information out of you.
51:04 Speaker 00 Yeah, but how often does someone have every detail the first time out? Now, if you have wrong details, that would be different. But if you just don't offer up every detail because you're not thinking about it, all right, that would make some sense. But you can't blame the defense for making a big deal about it.
51:23 Speaker 01 No.
51:24 Speaker 00 Anytime somebody gets immunity, they're going to make a big deal about that. A state police firearms and tool mark examiner testified that 10 9mm bullets he examined were missing gunpowder. The bullets were recovered when state police found three firearms at the church. The shell casings had tool markings, possibly from pliers or a vice to remove the bullets and gunpowder.
51:49 Speaker 01 It's not that hard to do.
51:51 Speaker 00 No, it's, it's really not. And they make special bullet pullers, but obviously maybe these guys didn't have one of those. They're not expensive at all. Retired state police corporal and county detective Sean Williams testified that the investigation intensified when David Alzugaray came forward in 2018. Williams interviewed Roberto, who gave his own story and made inconsistent statements about locations where Jose's remains were dismembered and discarded. During a third and fourth interview, Roberto placed blame on Freeland Police Chief Anthony Harris. Earlier, state police corporal Richard Imra testified
52:33 Speaker 00 that investigators grew suspicious that former Freeland Police Chief Anthony Harris knew more about Jose's disappearance than he was letting on. Harris died of suicide on September 7th, 2020, just after police contacted him to discuss the case.
52:52 Speaker 01 I wondered up until that point, how much he was sweating day after day, knowing the clock was probably just ticking.
52:58 Speaker 00 Yeah, I'm sure it was something that was weighing on him heavily if he really was involved in, in some way. During cross-examination, Williams admitted several witnesses provided different versions of events, but the version given by David and Roberto had many inconsistencies. For example, David claimed Jose's body was dismembered in the chicken coop, while Roberto said he was dismembered in the basement of the cottage and in a detached garage behind the cottage. Investigators searched for a large circular blood stain on the garage floor that Roberto said would be there, but there was no trace of blood. David Alzugaray
53:41 Speaker 00 testified that while Jose's body was being dismembered inside a chicken coop, Roberto showed up and became angry and sad. Roberto had nothing to do with the murder. Once again, David said he killed Jose in self-defense. And decided to dismember the body out of fear of assassins.
54:01 Speaker 01 Assassins?
54:02 Speaker 00 Yeah.
54:03 Speaker 01 You gotta watch those assassins.
54:05 Speaker 00 You do. They're nasty. David testified that Jose and Roberto were brothers. And David considered himself Roberto's brother. He didn't consider Jose a friend or an enemy, but he knew Jose was an assassin who hung out with other assassins. Where are all these assassins?
54:24 Speaker 01 They're at the assassin cafe.
54:27 Speaker 00 It's like a bar like in Deadpool?
54:29 Speaker 01 Yeah.
54:30 Speaker 00 Just a bunch of assassins hanging out?
54:31 Speaker 01 That's exactly right. They like their matcha during the afternoon and, you know.
54:37 Speaker 00 Assassins like a good matcha?
54:38 Speaker 01 Yeah.
54:39 Speaker 00 He shot Jose in self-defense while they were unloading a truck of debris to burn at Roberto's property. Jose threatened him with a 22 caliber revolver that dropped to the ground during a fistfight. David picked up the gun and started running. Jose chased him with the machete. As he was running, David shot under his arm and it hit Jose in the head. Again, we talked about this, right? You're running away from someone, you're not even looking at them.
55:10 Speaker 01 Yeah.
55:11 Speaker 00 And you, you kind of point the gun backwards. Now he's saying, kind of through his arm, under his armpit, and he just fires the gun and just miraculously happens to hit Jose square in the head with it.
55:26 Speaker 01 That'd also be the day you would want to go play the lottery.
55:28 Speaker 00 Yeah, because that is an amazing Bill Cody,
55:35 Speaker 00 wow, Bill Hickok type trick shot.
55:38 Speaker 01 Yeah. I mean, could it happen?
55:41 Speaker 00 Yeah, technically.
55:42 Speaker 01 Yeah.
55:42 Speaker 00 Yeah, but is it likely to happen? And I would say no. He said he feared assassins were going to come after him. So he dragged Jose's body to a chicken coop and began the dismemberment. Roberto left the property after he discovered what he was doing. David claimed that he placed the remains in buckets and took them to the basement of the cottage. Roberto didn't give him any instructions about what to do with the body. And he disposed of the remains in the Lehigh River. So he is really covering for Roberto.
56:16 Speaker 01 Oh, big time.
56:17 Speaker 00 Roberto decided to testify in his own defense. He said he had absolutely nothing to do with any of it. He testified that he moved from New Jersey to Freeland, Pennsylvania, where he started buying rental properties. He was renovating another building to open a restaurant. Roberto described Jose as his counselor, mentor, and brother. They had known each other since the mid 80s. When Jose reached out to him in 2015, Roberto told him to come to Freeland and he would help him open a bakery. This made sense to Roberto from a business perspective because his restaurant could be one of Jose's customers.
56:57 Speaker 00 He claimed that all he wanted to do was help Freeland thrive by opening up closed storefronts. So he's an angel investor, you know, he's a do-gooder.
57:09 Speaker 01 Yeah, he's just trying to improve the community.
57:12 Speaker 00 He's not a heroin distributor, trafficker, murderer.
57:17 Speaker 01 No, he's a, what do you call those guys of the, a pillar?
57:22 Speaker 00 A pillar of the community.
57:23 Speaker 01 Yes.
57:23 Speaker 00 That's a perfect word. On the day Jose was killed, Roberto drove up to his property where David and Jose were supposed to burn wood and debris. He pulled up and saw smoke and flames. He called out to Jose and David, but didn't see them. He then saw Jose's body on the floor of the chicken coop. Roberto left the property and reported what he saw to Police Chief Anthony Harris, then went to the cottage to wait for investigators who never came. Roberto said the testimony of Liza Robles, Donald Warren, and other witnesses who said Roberto and David wanted Jose killed was untruthful.
58:05 Speaker 01 They're all liars.
58:06 Speaker 00 They're all liars. And hey, man, I told the police chief, but for some reason, no one ever showed up to my house to talk about it.
58:16 Speaker 01 And he's not here to tell me why.
58:19 Speaker 00 Yes, he can't defend himself or implicate himself either way.
58:24 Speaker 01 There's no reason for me to lie about it. You know, that's what I did with him.
58:27 Speaker 00 He denied that he planned the murder or was involved in any way. During each interview with investigators, he wanted protection from prosecution. Roberto testified per the Times leader, "I knew I wasn't going to tell everything that I knew until I was represented and treated the right way." He didn't have a response when asked why he didn't call 911. He denied hiding the guns inside the church and denied telling his fiancee to hide meat cleavers and knives. He claimed he purchased the meat cleavers and knives at an auction in 2016, months after the murder. He planned on using them as Halloween props.
59:07 Speaker 01 Because you know what makes good props?
59:09 Speaker 00 Real cleavers and knives?
59:12 Speaker 01 Yeah.
59:12 Speaker 00 Yeah, they do. He's fighting, right? He's going down swinging.
59:17 Speaker 01 Oh, for sure.
59:18 Speaker 00 But to do so, he basically has to make the jury think that everybody is out to get him and everybody who's testifying against him is lying.
59:28 Speaker 01 Yeah, his best friend, his fiancee, everybody.
59:32 Speaker 00 In closing arguments, the prosecutor described Jose as an invited guest at the cottage, adding, "This was a case, quite simply, quite plainly, of this town not being big enough for the both of them."
59:47 Speaker 01 Oh, we've had that problem here.
59:49 Speaker 00 But I don't understand that at all. Even in a small town, okay, there's two people.
59:55 Speaker 01 Yeah.
59:56 Speaker 00 The town's not big enough for these two people?
59:58 Speaker 01 Can't share it?
1:00:01 Speaker 00 The prosecutor called David Alzugaray's story the silliest self-defense claim that I've ever heard in my entire life. The defense alleged that the key witnesses had their own legal troubles and fabricated contradictory stories to save themselves. Witnesses provided new sensational details at trial, such as the claim that Roberto distracted Jose by pointing at an eagle in the sky so David could shoot him from behind. The defense pointed out that DNA testing on the bone fragments and weapons found no DNA, blood, or incriminating evidence. And you know, this, this idea, because I thought we did talk about early on, David,
1:00:45 Speaker 00 Jose being shot in the back of the head. Well, then, you know, you kind of look even closer at David's story. If he's running away from Jose, who's chasing him with a meat cleaver.
1:00:58 Speaker 01 Yeah.
1:00:59 Speaker 00 How is he firing underneath his arm and hitting him in the back of the head? It just, none of it makes any sense. And maybe, and maybe that's why prosecutors called it the silliest self-defense story ever. On May 18th, 2023, Roberto Torner was found guilty of first degree murder, criminal solicitation to commit homicide, and criminal conspiracy to commit homicide. He said after the conviction is quoted by the Times leader, "You win some, you lose some. That's what you get when you go for it."
1:01:34 Speaker 01 There you go. I tried. I tried to win this one. I gave it my best, man.
1:01:39 Speaker 00 I, I get it. It's a baseball game, a basketball game, something like that. You win some, you lose some. You could say it about a murder trial, but I think the stakes are just a little bit higher.
1:01:53 Speaker 01 Yeah.
1:01:54 Speaker 00 He also said, "That's what you get when you go for it. What are you going for?" You're on trial for murder. It's not like you chose that.
1:02:02 Speaker 01 No. It's not like that million dollar game, you know, like if you get the answer, you win a million bucks, but if you get it wrong, you lose it all.
1:02:11 Speaker 00 But you could also stop before that.
1:02:13 Speaker 01 Yeah.
1:02:14 Speaker 00 And take your prize.
1:02:15 Speaker 01 Exactly. Walk away with pretty good money.
1:02:19 Speaker 00 Yeah, but he's saying, you know, I went for it. On August 24th, 2023, Roberto was sentenced to life without parole. He received a second 20 to 40 years for conspiracy and solicitation to run consecutive to his federal sentence. According to the Times leader, Roberto told the judge, "I'm not guilty of this crime. However, it hurts me. It is going to haunt me for a long time that a man called my brother and friend is gone. I'm sorry this happened to him. I wish I could have done something for him. In the deepest corners of my heart, I had nothing to do with this. I'm really sorry for what happened."
1:02:58 Speaker 01 Yeah.
1:02:59 Speaker 00 So that's his story and he's sticking to it.
1:03:01 Speaker 01 Yeah. He also said just not too long ago, "You win some, you lose some, and that's what happens when you go for it." So it doesn't really, well, make a lot of sense.
1:03:12 Speaker 00 If you have like another month to think about things, you know, maybe it's starting to set in now.
1:03:20 Speaker 01 Yeah.
1:03:21 Speaker 00 It's a little bit more than win some, lose some. On October 20th, 2023, David Alzugaray pleaded guilty to third degree murder and conspiracy to commit homicide. He was sentenced to 17 to 45 years in prison. On February 24th, 2025, Roberto pleaded guilty to arson. The 2016 fire caused a million dollars in damage to three homes and endangered the lives of neighbors. He received an additional 10-year prison sentence.
1:03:54 Speaker 01 Well, it's just, uh, pretty much guaranteeing he's staying right where he's at.
1:03:59 Speaker 00 Yeah, he's got a long time, right? He's never most likely getting out. Roberto lost his most recent appeal on July 10th, 2025. Although the case is closed, the remains of Jose Hora have never been found. As we wrap this one up, Gibbs, the motive in this case, it still remains a mystery. Right? Did Roberto want Jose killed because of jealousy, a loss of control? Or possibly because he found out that Jose was an informant? There's a lot of conflicting statements and witnesses who, you know, truthfully had their own legal cases to deal with.
1:04:41 Speaker 00 So authorities may never know exactly what happened to Jose on the night he went missing. And they may never know exactly why he was killed.
1:04:52 Speaker 01 But when I look at it, you know, yeah. Jealousy, could that be a reason? Maybe, but I really doubt it since they knew each other for a long period of time. But if you find out the person that you thought was one of your best friends is an informant.
1:05:09 Speaker 00 Yeah. Cause you think about what could happen within a week of this guy arriving.
1:05:14 Speaker 01 Yeah.
1:05:15 Speaker 00 In a relationship that had spanned decades. And that could be it. The revelation or finding out that Jose was at, working as an informant. That could be enough to have caused Roberto to want him dead. And don't forget, this guy's trafficking heroin. He's doing a lot of illegal stuff.
1:05:36 Speaker 01 And it probably comes down in Roberto's mind, it's either him or me.
1:05:40 Speaker 00 Yeah, he could have had that thought, no doubt about it. But that's it for our episode on Jose Hora. We got a voicemail. Gibbs, you want to check that out?
1:05:50 Speaker 01 Yeah, it's here.
1:05:51 Speaker 02 Hi, my name is Aliyah Peach and I've been a long time listener. I've been listening since I think, uh, 2020 and I'm just a huge fan. I'm Team Gibby. I absolutely love Gibby and he just messaged me back on Instagram, which is really cool, but I'll get to the point. Um, so I'm from Nova Scotia in Canada and in 2020, we had our first like mass shooting and over the point of 12 hours, uh, Gabriel Wartman, who is a denture fitter and who my little sister and my mother actually met, uh, because he does dentures, his, his hands were in my mother's mouth. So that's crazy to think about. Uh, yeah, he killed about
1:06:35 Speaker 02 18 people and it really took a huge toll on my community. I'd love to hear this on the podcast, on True Crime all the time. Uh, I love the show. Keep doing what you're doing. Uh, stay safe and keep your own time ticking. Bye.
1:06:51 Speaker 00 All right. Thank you so much for the voicemail. Uh, I mean, I think I remember when that happened, but I don't remember a lot about it. So it would make for a very interesting case.
1:07:03 Speaker 01 It's got me interested already.
1:07:04 Speaker 00 Well, that says a lot.
1:07:06 Speaker 01 It does.
1:07:07 Speaker 00 Does it? Does it really?
1:07:09 Speaker 01 End up in Nova Scotia. Like how I say that?
1:07:12 Speaker 00 Do I like? It doesn't matter if I like it. What matters is if people in Nova Scotia like it and/or are not offended by it.
1:07:21 Speaker 01 I don't think they'd be offended.
1:07:22 Speaker 00 That's all that matters.
1:07:23 Speaker 01 Offended by it, eh?
1:07:25 Speaker 00 Oh.
1:07:27 Speaker 01 Eh?
1:07:29 Speaker 00 Eh? I just watched a documentary on ESPN about the Montreal Expos.
1:07:35 Speaker 01 Oh, did you?
1:07:36 Speaker 00 And it was great.
1:07:37 Speaker 01 Yeah.
1:07:38 Speaker 00 The only problem with it was it was almost entirely in French.
1:07:42 Speaker 01 Oui.
1:07:43 Speaker 00 And I, I did not realize it would be. Obviously I know a lot of people in Montreal speak French.
1:07:48 Speaker 01 Oui oui.
1:07:49 Speaker 00 But I don't, I didn't realize the documentary. I was, I had to read most of it.
1:07:53 Speaker 01 That's the one thing I've learned since, you know, I go up to Ontario so much is It's the law that everything you see has to be in English.
1:08:04 Speaker 00 And in French.
1:08:04 Speaker 01 And in French.
1:08:05 Speaker 00 Yeah.
1:08:05 Speaker 01 And sometimes like it cracks me up, some of the French words, you know, because I'm thinking, if you just pronounce them, you know, like phonics wise, I don't, you know what I'm saying?
1:08:18 Speaker 00 Uh huh. I do phonetically.
1:08:19 Speaker 01 Phonetically. Yeah.
1:08:20 Speaker 00 Phonics wise.
1:08:22 Speaker 01 It cracks, it cracks me up, you know, like, wow, you know, but uh.
1:08:27 Speaker 00 No, I'm assuming that's not Canada wide.
1:08:31 Speaker 01 No.
1:08:31 Speaker 00 Because not every part of Canada is, is heavily populated with French speaking people, I don't think, right?
1:08:40 Speaker 01 Yeah, you're right. The, the weird thing for me is that, so in Ontario, so you know, it has to be in English and French, except if you're in Montreal or Quebec, it doesn't have to be, it can just, like in Montreal, it can just be in French. They don't have to add the English part.
1:08:56 Speaker 00 Hmm.
1:08:56 Speaker 01 So it's like, wait a minute.
1:08:57 Speaker 00 You would think that would, those would be the most important places.
1:09:00 Speaker 01 Yeah.
1:09:00 Speaker 00 Those are the most populated.
1:09:01 Speaker 01 Exactly. So I don't know.
1:09:03 Speaker 00 All right. Well, we appreciate the voicemail and we'll definitely look into it.
1:09:06 Speaker 01 We do.
1:09:07 Speaker 00 All right, buddy. That is it for another episode of True Crime All The Time. So for Mike.
1:09:11 Speaker 01 And Gibby.
1:09:12 Speaker 00 Stay safe and keep your own time ticking.
Previous The D.C. Arsonist Next Shawn Johnson Page updated November 1, 2026 · transcript and summary are machine-generated