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Though prosecutors are mum, the sealed indictments appear to concern the case of a 78-year-old woman slain for her jewelry in 1997.
By CARY DAVIS
© St. Petersburg Times, published April 26, 2001
NEW PORT RICHEY -- A Pasco grand jury handed up two first-degree murder indictments on Wednesday. A judge immediately ordered the indictments sealed until they are served on the defendants, who already are in custody, prosecutors said.
Prosecutors wouldn't comment on the case or identify the defendants. But Assistant State Attorney Mike Halkitis walked out of the grand jury room carrying a large box labeled "State v. Volpe, Carcione."
Ottavio Volpe and Anthony Carcione already have been convicted in federal court in connection with the September 1997 slaying of 78-year-old Jean Schwarzkopf in her Gulf Harbors home. Halkitis was in a federal courtroom in Tampa when Volpe and Carcione were sentenced in January to life in prison.
After the January hearing, Halkitis told a Times reporter that he intended to seek state murder indictments, which could bring death sentences.
Volpe, 42, an illegal Italian immigrant and onetime owner of La Cosa Nostra Bakery in New Port Richey, coveted Mrs. Schwarzkopf's eight-carat diamond ring and hatched several plots to rob her, according to testimony from Carcione's four-day trial in October.
Carcione, 30, an unemployed Chicago man with a history of violent crime, flew to Florida, then bought duct tape and a bouquet of flowers before knocking on the door of Mrs. Schwarzkopf's home on Topsail Trail. The next day, she was found wrapped head to toe in duct tape with a bundle of red silk flowers stuffed down her throat. Mrs. Schwarzkopf suffered a broken neck and died "drowning in her own blood," a medical examiner said.
Lack of forensic evidence at Mrs. Schwarzkopf's house initially prevented state prosecutors from bringing murder charges.
Stitching together a case from phone records, airline tickets and eyewitness testimony, federal prosecutors convinced a jury that Carcione used interstate commerce to rob Mrs. Schwarzkopf and fence her diamond ring.
Volpe pleaded guilty before the federal trial to a reduced charge of conspiracy and testified against Carcione.
Prosecutors said two other Chicago men, Faris "Freddi" Rafidi and Camillo "Southside Frankie" Gigliotti, recruited Carcione for the jewelry heist.
Rafidi, who fenced the diamond ring for $30,000, was sentenced to five years in federal prison. Gigliotti, who chauffeured Carcione back to Chicago after the murder, received immunity to testify in the case.
- Cary Davis covers courts in west Pasco County. He can be reached in west Pasco at 869-6236 or (800) 333-7505, ext. 6236.