Mexican police have names of suspects; Seeking 3^rd suspect in double slaying Expert rules out ‘organized crime hit’

By Dale Brazao
Toronto Star, Feb. 24, 2006 page A4

Mexican police say they have the names and photos of two Canadian suspects in the double slaying of a Woodbridge couple at a resort and are now hunting for a third.

In an interview last night, prosecutor Bello Melchor Rodriguez wouldn't describe the origins of the photos, nor say any more about the suspects he has said carried out a professional, premeditated hit.

Earlier in the week, he said incomplete paperwork at the resort was thwarting the probe into the deaths of realtor Domenic Ianiero, 59, and his wife, Nancy, 55, who were in Mexico for the wedding of their daughter Lily to Marco Careri. The couple were to have been married in a sunset ceremony on the beach today.

Police don't have a name or photo for the third suspect, the prosecutor said. An extradition request for the suspects will be launched once police finish their probe. He declined to say where in Canada the suspects are, but stated earlier they fled the country Monday.

Rodriguez said Mexican police are in contact with Canadian police through Interpol, although the Royal Canadian Mounted Police continue to stay mum, even refusing to confirm they're involved in the investigation.

That has led to speculation Mexican police, under pressure from tourism or government officials, might have been in a rush to shift the blame to Canadian killers to allay fears about locals preying on vacationers at the height of the winter tourist season - a suggestion angrily denied by the prosecutor.

"No, no. Don't worry about that. This is a safe place. It was a completely isolated incident. This is the most secure area in Mexico. We are not inventing anything."

Foreign Affairs Minister Peter MacKay, though, expressed concern about the theory that the killers were Canadians bent on murder and posing as tourists on a vacation package.

"(It's) extremely troubling every time you see that type of random violence," MacKay told reporters in London, where he was meeting with his British counterpart, Jack Straw.

The Ianieros were slain at the Barcelo Maya Beach Resort, near Playa del Carmen, as they were beginning a two-week vacation, to be highlighted by the wedding. Their bodies were discovered in their room early Monday; their throats had been slashed.

The Ianieros had been joined by 16 friends and family who had flown to Mexico for the wedding.

At least one family member is willing to consider the possibility the slayings were premeditated.

"I think someone went after him (my brother-in-law). That's what it points out to," Tomasina DaCosta, 58, Nancy Ianiero's older sister, said yesterday. "Maybe there was a deal that went bad, who knows?

"We were told by the family (down in Mexico) nothing was stolen. There was no struggle. This is from what I heard from the family. It couldn't have been for money."

Not everyone was willing to accept that the couple was targeted.

Vince Carere, owner of Home Life Pine-West Realty, where Domenic Ianiero had worked for five years as a realtor, said the notion of a planned hit was "absolutely mind-boggling."

"Impossible, impossible," Carere said.

"There's no damn way. I would have known or gotten wind if he'd been involved in a different business or something funny."

Canadian organized-crime expert Antonio Nicaso said the Ianeiro killings appear to have had "a message attached."

"Why in Mexico, why several days before a wedding?" are the questions authorities should be asking, he said in an interview.

"I think it was a professional hit," continued Nicaso, a senior partner with Soave Strategy Group, a risk consulting company. "It's up to the authorities to interpret the message," he said, adding he excludes the theory it was an "organized crime hit."

"There were no red flags in the victims' past. People familiar with the investigation told me they (the victims) were clean," said Nicaso.