BY KATHY CHANG
Staff Writer
NEW BRUNSWICK – The jury of 12 women and four men last week were shown phone records and E-ZPass records of William and Melanie McGuire and her parents, Michael and Linda Cappararo, that were analyzed by state Investigator Donald Macciocca.
Phone records show that a phone call was made from William McGuire’s cell phone at 1:10 a.m. on May 2, 2004, to the McGuires’ Woodbridge apartment that lasted one minute.
William McGuire’s 2002 Nissan Maxima was towed from the Flamingo Motel, and the jury learned that Melanie McGuire moved her husband’s car to the Flamingo Motel as a “practical joke” on her husband. Melanie McGuire’s E-ZPass shows that her E-ZPass passed through the Atlantic City Expressway toll plaza at 12:54 a.m. on May 2, 2004.
The prosecution believes that McGuire made that phone call from her husband’s cell phone 15 minutes after she passed the toll plaza.
McGuire, a 34-year-old former fertility nurse, is on trial for killing her husband, William McGuire, in their Woodbridge Center Plaza apartment and later dismembering his body, almost three years ago. McGuire, who resides in Brick Township, has pleaded not guilty to all the charges against her and remains free on $2.1 million bail.
William McGuire made two phone calls to the Elizabethtown Gas Co. on April 28, 2004 – one call from the Woodbridge residence at 5:14 p.m. lasting 27 minutes, and one from his cell phone lasting four minutes, which the jury heard last week. McGuire was canceling his service with the company because the McGuires were set to move out of their Woodbridge apartment into a new home in Asbury located in Warren County, which the couple closed on April 28, 2004. The prosecution has said the call made to the gas company is the last known call made by McGuire.
Phone records show that McGuire made a phone call to his friend Hayes Penn at 5:44 p.m. on April 28, 2004, that lasted 14 minutes and one to another friend, Jonathan Rice, at 5:59 p.m. that lasted 10 minutes.
Macciocca told the jury that investigators learned that Hayes Penn was a personal friend of McGuire. The jury learned from prior testimony that Rice was an old friend from when McGuire was in the Navy stationed in Virginia.
Records show that Peter Burnejko, who was the owner of the Asbury home, called McGuire’s BlackBerry at 7:09 p.m. Burnejko then called the McGuires’ Woodbridge residence at 7:10 p.m. The phone call lasted approximately five minutes. He testified that he talked to Melanie the day of the closing to congratulate the McGuires on their new home and say thank you.
“My lawyer attended the closing for me,” said Burnejko. “I tried to call William McGuire around 6:30 p.m. that night to congratulate them on their new home and say thank you, but I talked to Melanie. I said ‘Congratulations,’ and said ‘You’ll be happy with your new home,’ but Melanie didn’t say anything. There was silence on the other line. Then I just said I’d catch up with Bill a little later.”
Melanie McGuire had told detectives that she and her husband got into an argument about the closing of their new home in the early morning hours of April 29, 2004. She said the fight got physical and he put a dryer sheet in her mouth. She said her youngest son woke up and she took him and locked the bathroom door. She said she heard her husband rummaging through the apartment and then finally leaving. McGuire filed for a restraining order on April 30, 2004.
Phone records show that an e-mail was sent to William McGuire’s bosses Ross Ninger and Tom Terry at 6:17 a.m. on April 29, 2004, from McGuire’s Motorola BlackBerry that read, “I will be out sick today.”
The e-mail was bounced back to the BlackBerry because it was sent to a wrong e-mail address for Tom Terry, which was stored in McGuire’s BlackBerry. A phone call was made from McGuire’s BlackBerry to Jonathan Rice at 5:41 p.m. that lasted a minute on April 30, 2004. No calls were found made on May 1, 2004.
Melanie McGuire and her parents’ E-ZPass records were shown to the jury. Macciocca said he concentrated on the April and May months of the records.
Melanie McGuire’s E-ZPass records show that she did not use her E-ZPass from April 22, 2004, to May 1, 2004. The E-ZPass records for Linda and Michael Cappararo show that the Cappararos did not use their E-ZPass from April 27, 2004, and May 1, 2004.
Two phone calls were made to E-ZPass customer service – one from a woman and one from a man – on June 3, 2004, and June 10, 2004, respectively, disputing that they did not travel through the Atlantic City Expressway toll plaza on May 2, 2004, and May 18, 2004. The calls were for an E-ZPass under the name of William McGuire.
Macciocca said he determined from his analysis that William McGuire was a frequent user of his E-ZPass. Macciocca testified that on Jan. 31, 2004, William McGuire’s E-ZPass had four hits and Melanie McGuire’s had zero hits; in February 2004, William McGuire’s E-ZPass had 32 hits and Melanie McGuire’s had zero hits; in March 2004, William McGuire’s E-ZPass had 131 hits and Melanie McGuire’s had six hits; in April 2004, William McGuire’s E-ZPass had 61 hits and Melanie McGuire’s had six hits; in May 2004, William McGuire’s E-ZPass had zero hits and Melanie McGuire’s had 22 hits.
During Melanie McGuire’s first face-to-face interview on June 2, 2004, with Virginia Beach Detectives Ray Pickell, Tom Shattuck and Joseph Joraskie, a Woodbridge detective sergeant at the time, McGuire told detectives that her husband did not like using his E-ZPass because he did not like the big brother factor of the government watching him.
The defense has argued that detectives and state investigators have not explored looking at all the phone numbers in William McGuire’s BlackBerry and just narrowed their search to April and May 2004.