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Man draws 15 years to life for wife’s stabbing death
‘He deserves to die in prison,’ the victim’s cousin says of the murderer.
YOUNGSTOWN — A 60-year-old man who pleaded guilty in May to killing his wife 41‚Ñ2 years ago is finally headed to state prison.
On Thursday, Judge Maureen A. Sweeney of Mahoning County Common Pleas Court sentenced Joseph P. Nazarini to the mandatory term of 15 years to life in prison in the Feb. 5, 2004, stabbing death of his wife, Denise, 52, in their Oakley Avenue residence in Boardman.
Nazarini, who did not address the judge at his sentencing, will get credit for the 41‚Ñ2 years he’s been in the county jail, so his earliest possible release date would be about 101‚Ñ2 years from now.
No members of the victim’s family made oral statements in court at the sentencing.
But Sheila A. Riczko, of Lakeland, Fla., a cousin of Denise Nazarini, wrote to Judge Sweeney on behalf of the family: “We do not want this man ever to be set free. He brutally murdered our beautiful cousin. ... He deserves to die in prison.”
“This man was too much of a coward to do away with himself. Instead, he took the life of a beautiful, kind and loving woman who never harmed anything or anyone,” Riczko wrote in her letter, which was read into the record by Dawn Cantalamessa, assistant county prosecutor.
Nazarini has “serious mental health issues,” said Nazarini’s lawyer, J. Gerald Ingram. Ingram asked Judge Sweeney to recommend that state prison officials consider those issues in their decision as to where Nazarini should be locked up.
The long delay in ending the case was due to the slowness of psychiatric hospitals, where the defendant had been a patient, to produce records needed for a psychiatric evaluation of the defendant, who had earlier entered an insanity plea, Cantalamessa and Ingram said. That evaluation was never completed.
The case had been before Judge Maureen A. Cronin, who retired last year. Judge Sweeney received the case after Judge Timothy E. Franken removed himself from it because he led the prosecution of it while he was an assistant county prosecutor.
The victim suffered multiple stab wounds and appeared to have been dead for about 24 hours when police found her body in a bedroom, police said.
Nazarini stabbed his wife with kitchen knives, apparently while she slept, and he gave police a confession, Cantalamessa said.
After stabbing her about 8 a.m., Nazarini sat with his wife’s body all day, called police to the residence and surrendered to them there the next morning because he believed his wife’s employer would soon call to inquire about her absence from work, police said.
The motive for the slaying was financial distress, police said.
The couple owed at least $50,000 to $60,000 in credit card debt and was facing bankruptcy, Cantalamessa said.
Nazarini, an unemployed substitute teacher, told police he thought he’d have an easier life in jail than facing so much debt, Cantalamessa said.
The victim’s estate filed a separate civil lawsuit to prevent Nazarini from receiving his wife’s retirement and IRA money. In that case, Judge R. Scott Krichbaum issued a default judgment, declared Nazarini civilly liable for his wife’s death and barred him from reaping any benefits from her death.
The money was used on behalf of the victim’s mother, who was living in a nursing home and died last November.
milliken@vindy.com