Departments Article |
Mystery: Trashed
By Dan P. Lee
By 9 a.m. on the 26th, John still hadn’t returned. His father called campus police, who said a parent needed to come sign paperwork. He called his wife Susan, who was closer to Ewing, and told her what was happening. Hysterical, she made her way up I-95 to campus. Trying to reassure her, campus cops noted it wasn’t all that unusual for a college student to temporarily disappear, but nevertheless began a search. Susan drove back to Cherry Hill for her daughter’s pageant, shaken. But the Fioccos received some reassurance when another friend called, swearing he’d seen John from a distance in the cafeteria. Though no one else could confirm that, the Fioccos heaped all their hope onto it. Later, together, they applauded as their daughter was crowned Miss New Jersey Star.
Back on campus, police made little headway. By 3 a.m. Monday, 48 hours after John had last been seen, there was still no official sign of him.
Around nine that morning, in the rear of Wolfe Hall, a Building Services worker opened the double black exterior doors that lead to the compactor room and disconnected the green rectangular container, about as big as a medium-size SUV, that attached to both the dorm’s trash chute and its compactor. As he wheeled it outside to be emptied, his co-worker, Carl Walker, noticed red liquid leaking out. “Don’t step on that blood,” he joked.
IN THE AFTERNOON, the campus police called the state police, who apparently had informally offered assistance earlier that weekend but were refused, and handed off the case. Officers fanned out, interviewing Fiocco’s dormmates, exploring the nearby woods, climbing onto rooftops.
The next day, on Tuesday, around 1 p.m., they discovered what appeared to be a significant volume of blood inside and beneath the emptied trash container. They also found something else inside: a necklace that belonged to John. While the blood was analyzed, William Scull, a 42-year-old detective sergeant and 20-year veteran of the state police — a calm, plainspoken, compact man with blond hair, a red face and exceedingly blue eyes — commenced a massive investigation.
Officers sealed John’s room, evacuating Wolfe Hall and an adjoining dorm, displacing virtually the entire freshman class. Cadaver-sniffing dogs roamed the grounds; boats plowed the campus’s lakes. Police began interviewing more than 1,000 students, plus Jessie’s boyfriend, a student at Montclair State University whose alibi quickly disqualified him as a potential suspect. Indeed, despite repeated questioning of John’s acquaintances — authorities conducted interviews even at his funeral — police at no point identified a single person of interest.
On Thursday, investigators focused on Wolfe’s trash-chute system. They inspected the 13-inch-by-13-inch spring-loaded doors on every floor. They threaded fiber-optic cameras through the chute, searching for any evidence — torn clothing, dried blood, skin, tissue. The dimensions themselves seemed impossible — Fiocco was five-foot-seven, 175 pounds and muscular. What’s more, students told police the trash chute was notoriously noisy, yet no one had heard anything Friday night. In spite of media reports to the contrary, it appeared to investigators that Fiocco’s body had never been inside the chute.
On Friday, the blood found in the container was confirmed to be John’s. Investigators headed to Tullytown.
The investigation had begun with three possibilities: John Fiocco had taken his own life; he had been killed, either by mistake — in a prank gone horribly wrong — or by malevolence, and his body disposed of in the compactor; or he’d succumbed to something as ordinary as an accident. Police could disqualify none. The pieces of evidence could be assembled to create many different puzzles. All the authorities knew was that around 3 a.m., John Fiocco was sleeping in a dorm room. Within the next three hours, police suspect, he was not. He was seen neither coming nor going. He was, simply, gone.
More than a year passed.
Back on campus, police made little headway. By 3 a.m. Monday, 48 hours after John had last been seen, there was still no official sign of him.
Around nine that morning, in the rear of Wolfe Hall, a Building Services worker opened the double black exterior doors that lead to the compactor room and disconnected the green rectangular container, about as big as a medium-size SUV, that attached to both the dorm’s trash chute and its compactor. As he wheeled it outside to be emptied, his co-worker, Carl Walker, noticed red liquid leaking out. “Don’t step on that blood,” he joked.
IN THE AFTERNOON, the campus police called the state police, who apparently had informally offered assistance earlier that weekend but were refused, and handed off the case. Officers fanned out, interviewing Fiocco’s dormmates, exploring the nearby woods, climbing onto rooftops.
The next day, on Tuesday, around 1 p.m., they discovered what appeared to be a significant volume of blood inside and beneath the emptied trash container. They also found something else inside: a necklace that belonged to John. While the blood was analyzed, William Scull, a 42-year-old detective sergeant and 20-year veteran of the state police — a calm, plainspoken, compact man with blond hair, a red face and exceedingly blue eyes — commenced a massive investigation.
Officers sealed John’s room, evacuating Wolfe Hall and an adjoining dorm, displacing virtually the entire freshman class. Cadaver-sniffing dogs roamed the grounds; boats plowed the campus’s lakes. Police began interviewing more than 1,000 students, plus Jessie’s boyfriend, a student at Montclair State University whose alibi quickly disqualified him as a potential suspect. Indeed, despite repeated questioning of John’s acquaintances — authorities conducted interviews even at his funeral — police at no point identified a single person of interest.
On Thursday, investigators focused on Wolfe’s trash-chute system. They inspected the 13-inch-by-13-inch spring-loaded doors on every floor. They threaded fiber-optic cameras through the chute, searching for any evidence — torn clothing, dried blood, skin, tissue. The dimensions themselves seemed impossible — Fiocco was five-foot-seven, 175 pounds and muscular. What’s more, students told police the trash chute was notoriously noisy, yet no one had heard anything Friday night. In spite of media reports to the contrary, it appeared to investigators that Fiocco’s body had never been inside the chute.
On Friday, the blood found in the container was confirmed to be John’s. Investigators headed to Tullytown.
The investigation had begun with three possibilities: John Fiocco had taken his own life; he had been killed, either by mistake — in a prank gone horribly wrong — or by malevolence, and his body disposed of in the compactor; or he’d succumbed to something as ordinary as an accident. Police could disqualify none. The pieces of evidence could be assembled to create many different puzzles. All the authorities knew was that around 3 a.m., John Fiocco was sleeping in a dorm room. Within the next three hours, police suspect, he was not. He was seen neither coming nor going. He was, simply, gone.
More than a year passed.
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