Journal & Topics Media Group

‘Hollywood Ripper’s’ Criminal History In Glenview

Suspect In 1993 Murder Here Was Also Arrested For Burglary

Michael Gargiulo from the 1993 Glenbrook South High School year book.

Alleged serial killer and former Glenview resident Michael Gargiulo, whose murder trial recently made national headlines, has a criminal history in the village dating back to the 1990s.

Glenview Police Dept. records obtained by the Journal & Topics through a Freedom of Information Act request show that Gargiulo was arrested in Glenview in 1996 and 1997.

Police documents also indicate Gargiulo was involved in a battery incident at Glenbrook South High School shortly before his 1997 arrest.

According to a March 12, 1996 arrest report, Gargiulo was taken into custody by Glenview police after he came to the police station “to complain that he has been followed repeatedly by what he believes are various police agencies.”

After an officer recognized Gargiulo as a subject wanted by Libertyville police for a Feb. 2, 1996 offense, he was arrested and held for pickup. Libertyville police responded to a Journal & Topics FOIA request for information related to Gargiulo with almost completely redacted documents.

In a written statement dated May 31, 1997, Gargiulo confessed to going through unlocked cars in Glenview and taking a cell phone as well as “a bag out of a van” with another individual whose name was redacted.

According to an investigative supplementary report from Glenview police, witnesses saw Gargiulo fleeing the area with the bag, which contained a video camera.

He posted bond for the crime in 1997, pled guilty and was found guilty of the burglary charge in 2000, leading to an 18-month probation and a $200 fine, according to a court disposition.

Redacted Glenview police reports included in the 38-page response to the Journal’s FOIA request for any records pertaining to Gargiulo include a general case report for a May 15, 1997 battery incident in the parking lot of Glenbrook South High School.

Also known as the “Hollywood Ripper”, Gargiulo is currently on trial in Los Angeles for the 2001 murder of 22-year-old Ashley Ellerin, the 2005 murder of 32-year-old Maria Bruno and the attempted murder of Michelle Murphy in 2008. When actor Ashton Kutcher testified in the trial last month, he said he had unknowingly witnessed the scene of Ellerin’s murder through a window of her home shortly after she was killed.

In 2011, former Cook County State’s Attorney Anita Alvarez announced that Gargiulo had been charged in the 1993 murder of 18-year-old Tricia Pacaccio, a resident of unincorporated Glenview. Though he was not charged with the crime in 1993, Alvarez said DNA evidence and witnesses who claimed Gargiulo confessed to the murder led to him being charged while he was already imprisoned in California.

Gargiulo’s Illinois trial is expected to begin after his trial in California — where prosecutors are seeking the death penalty — has concluded.

“She was such an outgoing, beautiful, wonderful child,” said Beverly Balgenorth, the wife of John Balgenorth, one of Pacaccio’s teachers at Glenbrook South. She said they would often see Pacaccio, who she said was a dedicated student, athlete and member of the debate team, with her friends on weekends at the now shuttered Lake Avenue TGI Friday’s. The couple saw Pacaccio there on Aug. 13, 1993, just hours before she was killed.

“She came over and spoke with John and I,” Balgenorth told the Journal & Topics. “She was doing some sort of treasure hunt” in the neighborhood. At around 8 a.m. the next day, the Balgenorths heard about the crime.

“It was horrendous,” Balgenorth said. “The rumors were wild…and everything kept leading back to this guy, I don’t know why,” she said referring to Gargiulo.

Neither Balgenorth nor her husband knew Gargiulo personally, she told the Journal. However, she said other teachers and students described him as “a little off the wall.”

Born Michael Thomas Gargiulo on Feb. 15, 1976 in Chicago, he resided at 803 Wedel Lane in Glenview as of 1996, near the Pacaccio family home on Huber Lane. He attended Glenbrook South High School where he was one year behind Tricia Pacaccio.

He is not mentioned in the 1993-1994 Glenbrook South yearbook, although that would have been his senior year of high school. In previous yearbooks, he was pictured as a member of the sophomore and varsity football teams alongside Tricia’s brother, Doug Pacaccio.

According to Balgenorth, Pacaccio’s family was upset about how her case was handled. As it occurred in unincorporated Cook County, Cook County Sheriff’s Police handled the case rather than Glenview police.

Gargiulo pled not guilty in the California murder cases and has not yet entered a plea for the Pacaccio case.

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