The Murder of Susan Ambrosino
You have often heard me speak of very old cases, such as my last blog, and how difficult determining facts are. I run into a few things that are confusing on more modern cases, and I also state those things, but I am unsure that I have ever come across such a case that has taken place in the last twenty years which so many conflicting facts and information! Everything from what day Susan was killed, when she was found, to even the relationship between the fathers of her children seem to be at odds.
What I can tell you is that in February 2005 twenty-six year old Long Island New York resident Susan Ambrosino went missing and her brother made the report to law enforcement. Her purse was found in Queens and law enforcement decided to make a perimeter to search for Susan's car, that was also missing. The car was soon found. The front passenger seat had been covered up with a sheet or a towel but was found to be covered in blood. The body of Susan was found in the trunk of her own vehicle. It was determined that she had died the previous day when she was shot, presumably in her own car, in the left side of her head, just behind her ear.
Some reports say she was murdered on February 24th; some say it was the 21st. Based on that the date her car was found also changes. I attempted to dig a little deeper to try and resolve this. Findagrave.com shows a date of the 28th but they do admit this may be the date she was buried and a picture I found of her ex-husband and daughter seem to confirm that it was the day of her funeral. I even pulled up a February 2005 calendar. One article said that her car was found on Tuesday which would have been the 22nd, making her death on the 21st; another said the 25th; even a third with a picture indicated the car was found on “Monday” evening which was the 21th, making her death the 20th. So how do I try and determine which days are right? Well, I have to make an educated guess. I found an article that stated that Susan's brother reported her missing “early Tuesday” (the 22nd) and that later that day her purse was found and then a while later after that her car was found. I also found an article written on Thursday, which was the 24th that spoke about the fact that a suspect had been arrested the day before. So with putting all of that together and looking at how often, or not often things were said I believe that the most accurate seems to be that she was murdered on February 21st, her vehicle with her body inside was found on the 22nd, a suspect that you will hear about later was arrested on the 23rd although not for murder just yet and she was laid to rest on the 28th.
She how did she get there and what happened? As I said earlier Susan was twenty-six years old. Her daughter was said to be eight at the time of her death but then there were reports of nine a few days later. Regardless that means Susan was fairly young when she had her first child who's father was Keith Ambrosino. There was not a lot of information about when the couple got married or for how long they were married. To be fair it's not even completely clear whether Susan and Keith were officially divorced at the time of her death or just separated, but apparently they were attempting to rekindle their relationship. Some reports called Keith her ex-husband while others called him her estranged husband. There was one thing that stated they divorced in 2002 but I cannot say that was completely true either. What we do know, that seems consistent, is that the night that she died Susan called Keith. She told him that she had something very serious to talk to him about and he said she was very upset. It appears that he was awaiting to hear back from her to set up a time or place but he never did.
Keith would later learn not just what Susan had wanted to tell him but that the fact she wanted to tell him was allegedly, at least in part, the motive of her murder.
As I stated earlier it was not completely clear what the legal relationship was between Susan and Keith at the time of her murder. He would later say that he believed that part of the reason for the break up was that they had been very young at the time they got together. Keith was in the military for a time and at some point he was deployed. Initially he was supposed to be gone for up to a year but reports stated that he suffered a back injury and returned home after a few months. It was said that Keith had stated that Susan was definitely not looking forward to him being gone and it just being her and their daughter but that he had reassured her that his half brother Steven Schiovone (some reports say step-brother which is always an issue it seems but it appears that the two men shared a mother) and his girlfriend would be looking after her. After Keith came home he claimed things were very different and that it appeared his brother had gotten very comfortable in the home, with his child and especially his wife. Apparently Keith and Susan argued over it when Keith had asked Steven not to spend so much time at his house and this was allegedly the reason for the failure of their marriage.
The timing of this is something I have a question about. As I said earlier I found a report that the couple divorced in 2002, so nearly three years prior to Susan's murder but the reason I wonder about this is because in 2005 it is apparent that Susan and Steven were having or had had an ongoing affair and both Susan and Steven's girlfriend, the same girlfriend he had prior to Keith being deployed, were pregnant by him. I just find it odd that they could have had the relationship going on for that long with few people knowing about it or catching on. What I can tell you is that in February of 2005, at the time of her murder, Susan was between three and four months pregnant. Her family would later tell law enforcement that she was pregnant and that Steven was the father so they knew but it is not clear for how long they had known. This has been said that it was this “secret” that Susan had planned to tell Keith. Keith claims that he knew nothing about a relationship between Susan and Steven until after her murder.
I cannot say for a fact that at the time of her murder Susan and Steven were still involved. Her family would say that Steven had encouraged her to have an abortion and Susan had refused. In fact, apparently she knew she was carrying a boy and had given him a name. But, law enforcement were quickly made aware of the relationship and it almost appears as if they zeroed in on him fairly quickly. Experience tells us that both Keith and Steven would have been on the radar of law enforcement but the fact that on Wednesday, the day after her body was found that they arrested Steven (although not for murder just yet, there was not even an autopsy done as of yet) that they had pretty much eliminated Keith as a suspect.
Steven was initially arrested on charges of driving without a seat belt and driving with a suspended license and registration. It would be a few days before they gathered enough to file murder charges on him and in fact, it was the actions of one of Steven's friends that gave them what they needed. The crime scene had pretty much determined that Susan had been shot behind her left ear in the passenger seat of her car and then her body was moved to the trunk. An autopsy revealed that the gun had been a .380. They searched Steven's home, the one he shared with his pregnant girlfriend, and while they found manuals and other things connecting him to a .380, they did not find the gun. And then his friend came forward. Steven had asked the friend to hold a gun for him, it just so happened to be a .380, and had asked the friend to lie and provide him an alibi The friend refused and contacted law enforcement giving them the gun. It would be the murder weapon. He was officially charged with second degree murder, criminal possession of a weapon and tampering with evidence.
Have you ever noticed that after someone is arrested and the “story” is told in the newspaper and then they go to court for the first time and plead “not guilty” how often people get upset at that plea? I am not one of them. One hearing does not drag a case out and cost the community “so much money” as people will claim, for one, for two in a lot of the cases a judge will already enter a not guilty plea for a defendant in the initially hearing. While officially a plea has to be entered into the record, the initial hearing is really where the judge reads the charges and officially charges the person and tells them if and how much jail time they could face. It is also at this hearing where the defendant is told of their LEGAL right to representation. It is not unheard of for a defendant to enter the courtroom with an attorney but those who cannot afford one have the right to be represented by law and the initial hearing is when that happens. There is generally so much that goes into preparing a case and later possibly offering a plea deal that the average defendant does not understand and needs counsel. With that being said, you do not always here an attorney make a statement right away. It is not unheard of however and that was the case here. Steven's attorney very early on stated that he was innocent of the charges and stated “there's a lot more to this story than has been told.”
That all changed when in early 2007 Steven Schiovone pleaded guilty to second degree murder and in May of that year he was sentenced to thirty years in prison.
In 2010 Susan's mother began an event where every February diapers and newborn items were collected for mothers and donated in Susan's honor. It is called a Remembrance Baby Shower. Her mother died in July of 2016 and had been the main organizer of the event The following February Susan's sister took over the reigns but that year was a bit different that one year where they collected just diapers and at a much lower level than past years. Her sister explained that this was due to her mother's passing and vowed to continue the event every year and back to normal operations by 2018.
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