True Crime On This Day February 10th

Last Updated on September 21, 2022 by Ben Oakley

February 10th

On February 10th in true crime, the poisoner of Monserrat, Hilton arson, robbery, cold case murder in Sarina, missing person in California.

1978

In the Queensland town of Sarina, the brutalised body of 21-year-old Australian Margaret Kirstenfeldt was discovered by a teenage motorcyclist. Kirstenfeldt had been raped and stabbed to death.

The investigation turned up no evidence of a culplrit and there were even bizarre suggestions that Kirstenfeldt had caused the wounds herself.

After a few years had passed, her death was listed as a murder and the investigation reopened. As of 2022, the case remains unsolved and is an active cold case in Australia.

1979

In Monserrat, Argentina, Maria de Murano (Yira Murano), AKA: The Poisoner of Monserrat, claimed her first victim. Nilda Gamba was a neighbour of Murano when she was killed by cyanide over a debt dispute.

Murano would kill two more people in 1979 including her friend, Leila de Ayala, and her own cousin, Carmen de Venturini. Murano was arrested on April 27^th 1979 and sentenced to life.

Due to her age, she was released after 16 years and sent to an elderly care facility where she died of natural causes in 2014.

1980

In Galveston County, Texas, career criminal Warren Eugene Bridge and accomplice Robert Joseph Costa, entered a convenience store with the intention of robbing it.

During the robbery, Bridge shot 63-year-old shop worker, Walter Rose. Bridge and Costa had eloped with just $24 (USD). Rose had been shot four times and died of his wounds two weeks later.

Four days before his death, Bridge and Costa were captured during a raid on their motel room. Costa was sentenced to 13 years for aggravated robbery.

Bridge was sentenced to death and executed by lethal injection in Texas on November 22^nd 1994.

1981

In Winchester, Nevada, a fire broke out at the Las Vegas Hilton hotel that left eight people dead and over 350 injured, including singer Natalie Cole.

The fire had been started deliberately by hotel busboy Philip Bruce Cline. Under the influence of drugs, he set fire to a curtain in an elevator lobby on the eighth floor.

Within 25 minutes, the fire had travelled to the top of the building, cutting off a number of floors. The casino and hotel partially reopened nine days later, while repairs were carried out on the damaged rooms at a cost of $10million (USD).

Cline was arrested shortly after and charged with arson and murder. In 1982, he was convicted and sentenced to life in prison.

1982

In Chicago, Illinois, 34-year-old Patrolman William P. Fahey and 33-year-old Patrolman Richard J. O’Brien were shot and killed during a traffic stop.

Only hours earlier, they had attending the funeral of Patrolman James Doyle, who had been shot dead five days earlier. While approaching a vehicle they had stopped after running a red light, both Fahey and O’Brien were shot dead at point blank range by the driver and passenger of the car.

A passer-by grabbed the patrol car’s radio and called for help. Both killers were arrested shortly after and sentenced to death.

On January 10^th 2003, Republican Governor George Ryan commuted the sentences of 164 death row inmates to life in prison, including the killers of Fahey and O’Brien. The death penalty was abolished in Illinois in 2011.

1983

In San Francisco, California, 28-year-old John Scott Holt disappeared from his home. He has never been heard from again and no trace of him has ever been found, dead or alive.

He had a scar on his forehead and was last seen wearing a gold chain with gold cross.

Due to the fact he left his vehicle and personal belongings behind, he is listed as endangered missing and is a suspected victim of foul play.

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