The Grondalski family murders by the Hells Angels occurred on October 5, 1986, in Mendocino County, California, in the United States.
[1] He married Patricia "Patty" Kast, a receptionist at a beauty salon who had a teenage son, Jeremy, from a previous marriage.
[3] Grondalski had maintained ties with Dalton and was selling drugs on the territories of other Angels, which led him to fear that he likewise might be beaten or worse.
[5] After the witnessing the beatings, Billy Grondalski told his estranged wife that he wished to leave the Angels, which led to a reconciliation.
[10] Another Hells Angel present at the run was Charlie Haas, who just returned from Germany where he had served eight years in prison for stabbing a man to death.
[3] At 10:23 am on October 5, 1986, Billy purchased some fishing gear and light bulbs from a Payless store and then returned home.
[16] As Dallas Grondalski held on to her favorite toy, a Matchbox car, and screamed, Diaz pulled out a knife and stabbed her.
[16] He grabbed Dallas by her ponytail and stabbed her in the ear, her cheek, her neck and finally severed her spinal cord.
[18] Sammie Lester and Tankersley were ordered to burn down the Grondalski house, but could not bear to see the sight of the murdered family and aborted their mission.
[18] Lester soaked his hands and arms in coffee brewed by Mary Anne Roach to remove gunpowder residue.
[17] Another Hells Angels, Charles Haas, who just been released from a prison in Germany, was sent to Fort Bragg to burn down the Grondalski house.
[17] On October 6, 1986, Detective Sergeant Philp Pintane of the Mendocino County police department received a phone call that a house in Fort Bragg had been burned down and the family inside had been the victims of homicide.
[22] Facing 30 years in prison, Haas had his sister contact the Mendocino police to say he had some information about "a murder", which he was willing to trade for a reduced sentence.
"[22] Intrigued, Pintane spoke with Susan Massini, the district attorney of Mendocino county, who agreed that if Haas turned state's evidence, she would press the Arizona authorities to reduce his sentence.
[23] Pintane learned that Lester and Diaz had borrowed a truck on October 5, 1986, to go to Fort Bragg, which was tentative evidence in support of Haas's statement.
[24] He also noted that the fishing gear and the boxes of light bulbs that Billy Grondalski had purchased on the morning of Sunday, October 5, 1986, was found still in the back of his car on the next day, which he suggested he never had a chance to take the fishing gear and lightbulbs into his house, which supported the date of October 5, 1986 as the time of the murders.
[25] On 8 May 1995, David Eyster, the county's supervising deputy district attorney told the media: 'It would be fair to say members of the Hell's Angels have been less than candid and cooperative with us.
[28] Through the phone records of Tankersley's girlfriend, Pintane tracked him down to the small town in rural Arkansas where he had fled to.
[29] Pintane then revealed to him that the lawyers for the Hells Angels were accusing him of killing the Grondalski family, which shocked Tankersley to such an extent that he agreed to turn's state's evidence.
[29] In July 1996, a judge dismissed Massini's motion to try both men together for the murders of the family, and insisted on separate trials.
[30] Massini at first was willing to accept the mistrial, but finally decided to prosecute Lester herself after Pintane had shown her photographs of Dallas's corpse.
[30] At the second trial for Lester, which began later in May 1997, Massini made much about the way that Hells Angels had frequently burned off or ripped off the tattoos of former members who had refused to remove them.
[31] Massini noted that one juror, an young woman wore T-shirts with Harley-Davidson motorcycles, which she thought indicated sympathy for the Hells Angels.
[34] Pintane took up a legal loophole under a California law under which a state prosecutor is allowed to take over a case if there is a perceived conflict of interest between the county district attorney and the accused.
[35] O'Reilly argued that since Vroman had been the lawyer for Diaz, there was a perceived conflict of interest and his motion for the state to take over the case was granted.
[35] The defense filed for a mistrial on the first day of the trial because relatives of Patty Grondalski had shown up in court wearing T-shirts reading "Justice for Dallas".
[37] Tim McKinley, a retired FBI agent, testified as an expert witness, that the Hells Angels cannot stand the thought of someone not a member of their club wearing one of their tattoos and will use extreme violence in such cases.
[37] Towards the end of the trial, O'Reilly showed the jury photographs of Dallas's corpse, which shocked the courtroom into silence.
[39] She was in the courtroom that day and as she looked at the photograph of the corpse of Dallas Grondalski: "All those years that I missed with Phil, it was made up for right then and there.
[39] Pintane told Sher and Marsden that he was well pleased that not only were Diaz and Lester brought to justice, but that the case had exposed the Hells Angels as a criminal organization that posed as a motorcycle club.