TAMPA, Fla. — A guy arrested previously this month in California has been returned to Florida to experience prices in the 1984 killing of a girl, authorities said.
Donald Santini, 65, was booked into a Florida jail Wednesday morning on a demand of very first-degree murder, according to a Hillsborough County Sheriff’s Workplace assertion. Florida detectives had traveled to San Diego, California, subsequent Santini’s June 7 arrest, and he was later extradited to Tampa, Florida.
“The arrest of Donald Santini delivers closure to a very long-standing cold circumstance and provides justice for the sufferer and her family members after practically four many years of waiting around,” Hillsborough County Sheriff Chad Chronister mentioned in a statement. “Let’s not overlook the tireless operate that has long gone into this circumstance in excess of the a long time, the sources, and abilities to go after justice for Cynthia Wooden.”
Santini experienced been on the operate since June 1984, when Florida authorities acquired an arrest warrant linking him to the strangling loss of life of Wood, a 33-calendar year-aged Bradenton girl.
Wood’s body was found in a watery ditch 3 times soon after she went lacking on June 6 of that year. Santini was the final individual seen with Wood. The arrest warrant stated a health-related examiner identified she experienced been strangled, and Santini’s fingerprints had been observed on her physique.
Santini appeared many instances on the television demonstrate “America’s Most Wanted” in 1990, 2005 and 2013. Around the decades, officers explained Florida detectives sent guide requests to Texas, California and even as considerably as Thailand, but Santini was never ever situated. He utilised at least 13 aliases although on the operate, in accordance to an arrest warrant from the Hillsborough Sheriff’s Place of work cited by Usa Now.
Santini was arrested even though living for decades underneath the title of Wellman Simmonds in San Diego County, in which he was president of a nearby h2o board in Campo, a very small suburb of San Diego. He frequently appeared at community board conferences.
“The reason I have been capable to operate so lengthy is to reside a loving respectful existence,” Santini instructed ABC 10News in a handwritten 16-webpage letter despatched from jail, the San Diego station documented before this 7 days.
Santini wrote that he volunteered with the Rotary Club, owned a Thai cafe and ran an condominium block, the Tv set station documented.
Santini formerly served time in prison for raping a lady whilst stationed in Germany, officers explained. He was also wished in Texas for aggravated robbery.
Santini was remaining represented by the general public defender’s place of work, which did not straight away answer to an following-hrs phone information looking for remark.
