- AP/Seminole County Fire DeptThis photo provided by the Seminole County Fire Department shows firefighter Jerry Perdomo of Orange City, Fla. Maine State Police suspect some kind of crime connected to the disappearance of Perdomo, who has been missing since Feb. 16, and they want to talk more with a Bangor man as the investigation intensifies.
A Maine man accused of killing a
Florida firefighter owed $3,000 to the victim in what police suspect was
a drug dispute gone bad, court records show.
Daniel Porter, 24, is scheduled to make an
initial court appearance Thursday in Belfast, Maine, to face a murder
charge. He told police the firefighter, Jerry Perdomo, threatened him
and his family during a game of pool, according to an arrest warrant.
Perdomo, a 31-year-old married father of
two, disappeared in Maine on Feb. 16. A police investigation began three
days later, after a woman described as Perdomo's girlfriend told police
in Bangor that she last saw him with a handgun and that he told her he
was going to meet someone who owed him money.
- In this Tuesday, Feb. 28 photo provided by the Waldo County Sheriff Department, State police say they charged 24-year-old Daniel Porter, pictured here at the Waldo County Jail, in the death of Jerry Perdomo of Seminole County, Florida, who has been missing since Feb. 16.
Maine State Police said they found Perdomo's
body Wednesday after a search with police dogs on property owned by
Porter's relatives in woods in rural Newburgh. The Maine medical
examiner identified the body as Perdomo's, but investigators did not say
how he died. An autopsy will not begin until Friday at the earliest.
Police on Tuesday charged Porter with
murdering Perdomo. Stephen McCausland, spokesman for the Maine Public
Safety Department, said authorities think Perdomo was killed in a drug
dispute.
Porter was arrested at a relative's house
where crime scene technicians found evidence of blood and what appears
to be a piece of skull or bone, sources told Fox News. There were new
carpets on the floor covering an area that tested presumptive positive
for blood, sources said..
In addition to being a Florida firefighter
and EMT, Perdomo served in combat in Iraq as a Marine. Upon release, he
was diagnosed with post-traumatic stress disorder and took prescription
pills for neck, back and knee injuries.
A friend of Perdomo's told ABC affiliate
WFTV that Perdomo traveled 1,600 miles to Bangor to sell prescription
pills, and that he'd mentioned someone named "Daniel" previously. But
Perdomo's family says the firefighter had never been involved with
drugs, and his wife said she believes he went to Maine to see another
woman.
"I love him. He is my only love, he is my only love," Tonya Perdomo said at a news conference Monday. "I just want to talk to him. I just feel like I need to talk to him. I do."
"I love him. He is my only love, he is my only love," Tonya Perdomo said at a news conference Monday. "I just want to talk to him. I just feel like I need to talk to him. I do."
Porter, 24, was arrested at a home rented by his father in Jackson, a small, rural town in central Maine.
Perdomo's brother-in-law, Chris Lerch, said relatives are devastated.
"All we know now is we just need to bring
Jerry home and heal as a family," Lerch told the Orlando Sentinel from
Bangor, where he has been helping distribute fliers seeking clues in
Perdomo's disappearance.
Porter had been identified earlier as a
person of interest in the case as some of Perdomo's friends put up
posters around the Bangor area hoping for his return. Perdomo was a
firefighter for Seminole County, Fla.
A car Perdomo had rented was found in the
parking lot of a Bangor Wal-Mart. Police also seized a car that had been
owned by Porter and was left behind at a dealership in Oakland, about
70 miles south of Bangor, and a new car bought by Porter and his
25-year-old girlfriend, Cheyanne Nowak. The girlfriend was not charged
in the case.
"We believe Porter is the one responsible for Perdomo's death," McCausland said.
In an interview Monday, Tonya Perdomo
described her husband, the father of two children ages 3 and 10, as a
dedicated man who "helped people a lot."
Fox News' Steve Harrigan and The Associated Press contributed to this report
No comments:
Post a Comment