Maddening Coincidences Led Famalaro to His Victim

It’s impossible for me to sit at a murder trial, especially one where a stranger kills another stranger, and not dwell on the intersecting of people’s lives. No matter what the attorneys and witnesses and judges say, the most compelling point to me always is this: How many unlikely scenarios had to pile atop each other to bring everyone to this point, where someone is dead, the parents and relatives sit 10 feet from the killer and 12 jurors weigh the death penalty?

In cases where the victim knew the killer, it’s a little different. We all understand where those motives can come from.

But when someone kills someone he’s never met? When the fates bring two people together whose paths otherwise never would have crossed and murder results?

In the Orange County trial for the man who admits killing Denise Huber, the fates were maddening beyond normal bounds.

The case got attention because of Ms. Huber’s three-year disappearance and the subsequent discovery of her body, kept frozen all that time by John J. Famalaro, the man who killed her and could never let her go. Those details alone were gruesome enough to etch Ms. Huber in the collective Orange County consciousness and to secure Famalaro’s place in the local rogues’ gallery, but what lingers in my mind are the odds of it happening the way it did that night of June 3, 1991.

What were the chances of Denise Huber’s car getting a flat that night? A thousand to one?

What were the chances of it happening on a lonely stretch of the Costa Mesa Freeway at 2:15 in the morning, instead of on a city street minutes later? Another thousand to one?

What were the chances of Famalaro being on that stretch of highway at that hour? Thousand to one? Ten thousand to one?

Of all the people who could have stopped at that moment in time, what were the chances that the one person who did would have a homicidal bent? A million to one?

Much was made during closing arguments this week about whether Ms. Huber would have willingly gotten into Famalaro’s car. The defense suggested she did, presuming that Famalaro might help her; the prosecution insisted she wouldn’t have. The evidence led only to inferences, not certainties.

If Ms. Huber did accept a ride willingly, who could fault her? Is it so unreasonable at 2:15 in the morning to play the odds that the Samaritan wouldn’t be a killer?

That he was a killer makes a civilized society want to scream. It makes you wonder how the Huber family could sit through the trial. They were close enough to see the lint on Famalaro’s sweater as he sat at the defense table, and yet, during breaks outside the courtroom, they were cordial and accessible to reporters.

“It hasn’t been nearly as hard as I thought,” said Jeff Huber, Denise’s 27-year-old younger brother and a professional guitar player who lives in Long Beach. “The fact that we’ve waited so long has kind of helped. I remember thinking at the time, there’s no way I could ever sit in the same room with that guy [Famalaro].”

While listening to closing arguments, I was struck by what seemed like a potentially disquieting irony for the Huber family, which worked with the prosecution and wants the strongest possible punishment for Famalaro.

In a case where neither side can say with certainty what preceded Famalaro killing Ms. Huber, it is the prosecution’s version that’s the most lurid and disturbing in depicting her final minutes or hours.

The defense, on the other hand, offered the scenario that she was knocked out from a single blow to the head and never regained consciousness as Famalaro repeatedly struck her to ensure her death. Nor was she conscious, the defense asserted, when Famalaro bound, gagged and blindfolded her. The defense also disputed that she was sexually assaulted.

Given that some doubt exists, I asked Jeff Huber if there is a temptation to want to believe the defense’s version, if only because being unconscious would have meant less suffering for his sister.

Other than saying Denise wouldn’t have gone willingly with Famalaro, Huber said the precise details matter little at this point. “The bottom line is I look at the outcome. What he did.”

I asked if he needed a death-penalty verdict to feel that justice had been served.

“I think he should have to pay,” Huber said. “He took her life, he should have his taken. Especially because of the way he went about doing it.”

Yet, he has no obsession with Famalaro’s execution. He won’t lose sleep, he said, if Famalaro is spared the death penalty. “But if I knew someday he’d be out walking around, I’d have a serious problem with that.”

The nightmare, or at least the public phase of it, is almost over for the Huber family, a point not lost on Jeff Huber. “It’s almost like a sense of relief that it’s here and we appear to be making progress.”

I asked him if the six-year ordeal since his sister disappeared had left him with anything.

“It gives you a sense of reality as to how messed-up people can be,” he said. “It makes you realize, you just never know.”

Dana Parsons’ column appears Wednesday, Friday and Sunday. Readers may reach Parsons by writing to him at the Times Orange County Edition, 1375 Sunflower Ave., Costa Mesa, CA 92626, or calling (714) 966-7821.