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Murder at the Motel Season 2 Episode 6

Murder at the Motel
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Transcript
00:00A woman was found in room 205.
00:11She's got blood all around her.
00:14There's blood coming out of her nose and mouth.
00:16I went back up and went 205 and opened the door and I could see her foot.
00:24She had a washcloth that was stuffed in her mouth and a shoe print on the side of her face.
00:30From prior incidents at the hotel, we knew there was pretty good surveillance there, a lot of cameras.
00:37We see someone walk into the room and he's in there for 14 minutes.
00:43He leaves the room and leaves the hotel.
00:46You see just this sinister look on his face.
00:50You really didn't know what was behind the eyes.
00:55He's just pure evil in my opinion. He always has been.
00:58He knew exactly what he was doing and the consequences for that.
01:02He's just pure evil in my opinion.
01:05He's just pure evil in my opinion.
01:10He's just pure evil in my opinion.
01:11Venice, Florida, April 20th, 2021.
01:32Police respond to a call about a gravely wounded woman found in the roadway in from an employee
01:37at the hotel and the woman's husband.
01:42An employee from the hotel, Ryan, reported that a woman was found in room 205.
01:50When he was talking to the dispatch, he said that it looks like she fell.
01:58She's got blood all around her.
02:00There's blood coming out of her nose and mouth.
02:02She's got very shallow breathing.
02:04He put his hand on her chest and could feel a heartbeat.
02:07When he found her, he also noticed that there was a towel in her mouth.
02:13He pulled the towel out, just tried to resuscitate her at that point.
02:22We actually had one of our guys parked in the parking lot of the roadway when the call came
02:28out.
02:30My initial thought was likely a drug overdose.
02:35At this period of time, we're having a real problem with fentanyl overdoses, even to the
02:39point where we're carrying Narcan in our vest.
02:45When I first got there, the paramedics and firefighters, they were arriving on scene.
02:51I went up the stairway with him and one of our deputies was already there providing first
02:56aid.
02:57And, you know, as soon as the paramedics got there, they took over first aid.
03:02And I kind of just stood outside the room in the doorway just to maintain the scene.
03:10The victim's husband, Gerald Strader, identifies her to the police as Tina Strader and informs
03:15them that she works as a cleaner in the roadway in.
03:20When they found her, she was half in the closet with her feet sticking out so they could see her
03:25feet from the doorway.
03:26So when they pulled her, there was a trail of blood from the closet to where she was ultimately
03:33bound by first responders.
03:37She had some trauma to her face and to her neck.
03:40What stood out the most is that she had a shoe print on the side of her face.
03:45As far as we knew, she hadn't been down too long because Ryan didn't see her chest rise.
03:50He had been performing CPR.
03:52So any signs of life, our first priority is preservation of life.
03:56So they're going to transport her to the hospital to see if they can save her.
04:01As Tina's rushed to the hospital, detectives pulled Gerald aside and asked him some questions.
04:08We needed to speak with him.
04:10We needed to get more information about some of the things that he saw because he was living
04:14there.
04:14He was on, on scene when this happened.
04:17He was one of our best witnesses to put a timeframe together.
04:24It was 205 on her, on her.
04:27Yeah, a vacant list.
04:28It was on her vacant list.
04:29So she told you she was there at 849.
04:33And I texted her right back.
04:35She texted both those messages at 849 and texted her back at 851 and she didn't text me back.
04:41So what time did you end up going and looking?
04:43Honestly, it must have, it must have been right after 952.
04:46I went to the third floor and I saw Liz with the third floor girl.
04:51I said, have you seen Tina at all?
04:53She said, she's on second floor.
04:55I said, well, she's, she's supposed to be down there, but I don't see her anywhere.
04:58I went back up and went 205 and opened the door and I could see her foot.
05:04He's got some physical disabilities, so he wasn't able to actually go into the room due to his wheelchair, but he called for Ryan.
05:16Her head was right by the water heater and she was kind of laying half in that room and half right there in front of the sink.
05:26And she was in a pool of blood under her head and it was smeared over here on the floor too.
05:33And she had a rag in her mouth, like stuff way down in her mouth.
05:39That was wadded like this and stuck down in her throat.
05:45Something just didn't seem right with the whole circumstance.
05:50She was there alone.
05:51She was an employee.
05:53We knew she was in there cleaning the room.
05:55There was some blood on the floor.
05:56One of our guys on our unit immediately went down to the front office to start checking video to see if there's anything unusual.
06:07From prior incidents at the hotel, we knew there was pretty good surveillance there, a lot of cameras.
06:13He calls me up shortly after, like within minutes.
06:18He told me something's not right here.
06:19What you see in the video is Tina approaches room 205 with her cart.
06:34You see her husband kind of in the background and they look like they're having some type of an exchange, just a verbal exchange.
06:41And she goes into the room and her husband leaves the opposite direction.
06:45Only a minute later, we see someone.
06:51He walks towards the room.
06:53You can see him look inside.
06:55He then walks back towards his room, which was 209, just around the corner.
07:03And then he comes back and you see him walk into the room.
07:13He's in there for 14 minutes.
07:15He leaves the room and leaves the hotel.
07:35What was really scary with that tape is you see just this sinister look on his face.
07:46Both before and after he enters the room, he's smiling and he looks like he's proud of himself.
07:55It was gut-wrenching to watch that.
08:04Investigators speak to the staff at the roadway in to learn more about the man staying in room 209.
08:10I interviewed the motel staff.
08:12I was tasked with speaking to them about any interactions they had had with him during that time.
08:19He was not favorably looked upon as a guest.
08:22Created a lot of issues with some of the other tenants.
08:26The staff themselves were not comfortable being around him.
08:29My wife claimed, I think it was 209 yesterday and said something to the management that something
08:40wasn't right about that guy.
08:42She's like, keep an eye on this guy because there's just something not right about him.
08:46I don't know what it is.
08:47He had a lot of tattoos, which has nothing to do with it.
08:52Tattoos aren't the point.
08:53It doesn't really matter.
08:54It was more his eyes.
08:56He gave me a look.
08:57I don't know.
08:57It was weird.
08:59He had dark eyes.
09:00His eyes were black.
09:01So I called my husband before I went back to the room to give him his towels, and I had
09:06my husband come up.
09:09And then I handed the guy the towels.
09:10He said, thank you.
09:11He went on about his business, and he just sat there with the door open, smoking, listening
09:16to a lot of music, loud music.
09:18Everybody that came in contact with him, he would not let them in.
09:24He was not a nice guy.
09:26He would snap at these people, and he would be that person where you look at him, and he
09:30just start saying things to you in a demeaning manner, and you weren't sure what was going
09:35to happen.
09:37You really didn't know what was behind the eyes.
09:46Investigators conduct a search of both rooms for evidence to see if they can establish a
09:51link between Tina Strader and the man staying in room 209.
09:57Room 205 was where Tina was located.
10:00So in there, we had, again, her clothing.
10:03We had the towel that was stuffed in her mouth, a lanyard that she had been wearing, her hearing
10:07aid, some blood swabs.
10:11At that point, we kind of focused our attention to his room, being that, you know, he's likely
10:17a suspect in whatever happened to Tina in room 205.
10:22So we were outside the room.
10:23We started making announcements for him to come out, and there was no response.
10:27So we thought we were probably going to have to make entry.
10:30Within 209, we located some more narcotics, another towel that was bloodied, and we also
10:38took the pee trap in his sink because we were hoping to find some more evidence that maybe
10:44he had tried to wash himself prior to leaving the hotel.
10:46Police fanned across the hotel property in a desperate search for the suspect from room
10:54209, but he was nowhere to be found.
10:57They knew it was a race against time to apprehend a violent killer who might strike again.
11:03April 20th, 2021.
11:13Police are searching for their prime suspect in the attack on Tina Strader when they catch
11:18a break.
11:19Through interviewing the motel staff, they learn the name of their suspect, Stephen Havrilka.
11:26Stephen Havrilka has an extensive criminal history.
11:35I worked that area he grew up in.
11:37I started my career down there.
11:39He was one of those kids that started with the vehicle burglaries, and we kind of just
11:43dealt with him on that aspect.
11:45And then it became every briefing, he would do something or he'd be a person of interest
11:49in doing something.
11:50He did go to jail for a little bit of time to take us away from there.
11:57If you had a crime committed in that area, he was always a person of interest at the
12:01time if he was out of jail.
12:04As the crime scene is being processed, detectives receive a surprising call about a potential
12:10sighting of their suspect.
12:12There is a gentleman who was acting very erratic down by the region's bank.
12:17He has his arms outstretched, he's proclaiming that he's Jesus, and this is when the 911 calls
12:24start coming in.
12:27We start hearing calls for backup from the deputy that responded to the bank down the
12:33road for the suspicious person.
12:37To be honest, I didn't really pay any attention when the initial call came out because our
12:43circumstance at the hotel.
12:44But then when we start hearing our deputy down the road calling for backup, another deputy
12:50at the hotel told me, hey, I think he's out with, you know, Stephen Havrilka, who's our
12:56suspect here.
12:57At that point, I ran down to my car and I got to him as fast as I could.
13:01We were really fortunate with this case and that we did have all of the community support
13:08that we did because they saw this guy and they said, you know what, he doesn't look right.
13:12There's something off about him.
13:15People thought he was crazy.
13:17They didn't know if he was on something, but he was getting down on his knees, acting
13:22like he was on a cross, not normal behavior for somebody at roughly 11 o'clock in the morning
13:27in front of a bank.
13:30When the callers called, there was one female that said that he was stripping down and maybe
13:35possibly fondling himself.
13:37There was another caller that stated that he was on his hands and knees praying.
13:42When I got there, there was two deputies, they were just placing handcuffs on Havrilka.
13:52He was on his belly, face down.
13:55He was like trying to buck them off.
13:57At that point, I came up and I helped him out.
14:00I tried to hold him down and he just, it felt like superhuman strength.
14:05I remember I was trying to hold his legs and hamstrings down and he was like bucking me
14:10up.
14:12I heard he was saying things like she and her and knowing that he had some involvement,
14:18likely what happened to Tina.
14:19I took out my cell phone.
14:21I started recording just in case he made any like spontaneous statements about what he
14:25did there.
14:28Stop, stop, stop.
14:29Relax, relax, relax.
14:30Relax.
14:31Okay.
14:31I can't do it.
14:32It's okay.
14:33I can't do it.
14:33I can't do it.
14:33I can't do it.
14:34I can't do it.
14:35I can't do it.
14:35I can't do it.
14:35I can't do it.
14:36She told me.
14:38I don't care.
14:39Stop, stop, stop, stop, stop.
14:41Shut up.
14:41Shut up.
14:42Shut up.
14:42I'm back down.
14:43I need you to calm down for me.
14:46Calm down for me.
14:47Calm down.
14:48Calm down.
14:49Calm down.
14:50Calm down.
14:50Calm down.
14:51Calm down.
14:52Relax.
14:53Calm down.
14:54We're going to get an ambulance to check you out, okay man?
14:57he was trying to eat grass he was just delusional he looked like he was definitely under the
15:05influence of drugs stop eating grass man stop eating the grass mommy i wasn't really you i
15:16was dead when you told me some of the deputies that were there knew him from past encounters
15:43so luckily they were able to kind of talk him down a little bit so he didn't end up fighting
15:48them and they were able to take him into custody and ultimately he was transported to the hospital
15:53because he was so influenced by narcotics he was soaking wet he had no shirt on he had jeans that
16:02were they felt like he just got out of a swimming pool he obviously had something going on a mental
16:08situation or drug situation in the hospital they're checking his blood toxicity making sure
16:15that he doesn't have any kind of injuries so he's just there basically for medical clearance at this
16:20point at that point he was pretty sedated we collected his genes and you know put them in a
16:30paper bag for evidence purposes which it was later handed off to our crime scene people
16:35tina she was there at the same hospital as a few rooms down actually
16:43steven have roca is too under the influence of drugs for police to question him about the attack
16:50on tina straighter who remains in critical condition investigators can only wait and hope
16:57that she will wake up and give a statement about what happened in room 205
17:02venice florida april 2021 tina straighter is in critical condition after a brutal attack in the roadway
17:16in a few hours after being rushed to the hospital tina passes away from her injuries
17:24there's no easy way for us to tell someone that their loved one has died and especially in a manner
17:30such as this
17:31we all dreaded it's the worst part of the job
17:36i feel so awful for her and her family and what they've gone through i can't even imagine
17:45the the depth of pain that it must be for them
17:50gerald was what you would expect of a very grieving husband he was very emotional he really described
17:58tina as everything to him with the reason for him to continue living the reason for waking up every
18:05single day and when we were speaking with him you could just see the pain and the hurt that he was
18:11carrying both on the outside and the inside
18:18i think about her every day what she deserves she was the biggest giver the biggest biggest heart the
18:24biggest genuine soul of anybody i've ever known in my entire life
18:29from what i learned from gerald tina just appeared to be a very infectious person somebody that was
18:40willing to help others somebody that was willing to talk to anybody that may be down on their luck
18:46and somebody that was always willing to lend a helping hand
18:49we learned that gerald had met tina at a poultry plant when they were both living in texas and tina
18:58had this bubbly personality and something just really stuck out and caught gerald's attention
19:02gerald and tina were really living out their honeymoon phase here in florida they were making
19:10friends they loved going to the beach gerald did have some health problems but tina was working to
19:15take care of him he used a wheelchair to get around and he was also employed at the motel as well
19:20sort of as a maintenance man so the two of them were really trying to build a life together here in
19:25florida
19:26initially at the hospital some things were not observed that were observed in the
19:45autopsy for instance the severe amount of bruising to her head and a shoe imprint that we found on
19:51her face with everything that's going on in the hospital with all the tubes and everything that
19:57was not necessarily visible at that time we want to know exactly how she died even though we have a lot
20:06of evidence pointing us to a certain cause of death we need a definitive answer we need somebody in a
20:13medical background telling us this is what she actually died of
20:17on the 21st of april 2021 sarasota sheriff's department hold a press conference to inform
20:29the community of the heinous crime that has taken place we knew that this was a big deal because the
20:36sheriff himself sheriff kurt hoffman had called a press conference
20:40you could tell the sense of urgency when we were out there we knew that something very bad had
20:48happened inside that room by all accounts what i'm about to share with you is one of the most
20:56egregious crimes we've seen recently here in sarasota county so we are following up leads today
21:01interviewing people looking at video things of that nature so it is still a very active investigation
21:07we found out it was strangulation not by a cord or a rope but by by crushing force which could only be
21:20done by by somebody's hands not to our surprise havruka was uncooperative when interviewed however
21:30through the investigation detectives have learned that havruka did not know the victim i can only
21:37imagine that he may have spent his days perhaps observing her at the roadway in where she was
21:44employed and he was staying as you can see havruka is extremely familiar with law enforcement he is a
21:51convicted felon with 34 prior felony charges and 19 felony convictions havruka's prior crimes range for
22:00battery domestic battery by strangulation burglary with a battery battery of a detained person
22:08battery of a person 65 years or older and tampering with a witness to name a few there's no other way to
22:14describe mr havruka he is an animal he also has tattoos that depict his certain symbols of white supremacy
22:23the victim in this case was doing her job was certainly terrorized battered and now is deceased as this
22:36investigation continues we are committed to working with the state attorney's office to see that this man
22:41uh is put away for the rest of his life while stephen havruka is in the hospital he talks to the police about what happened that morning and admits to some
22:53howering details of the crime
23:04i did initially attempt to talk to him at the hospital and he would not talk with me
23:12however what was interesting is that we had deputies that had to go with him everywhere that he went as
23:18an inmate and at the hospital we admitted to the offense on several occasions to several of the corrections deputies
23:28i went ahead and uh i got high and i was up for about a week and when i was up for about a week
23:33i just walked out the door and then i took a left and when i took to the left i sensed that there was a
23:40woman right there in that room because there was 20 inmates there but there could have been a guy
23:44and when i went in there i took a left and then when i took the left i went there she was in the room
23:51and i said hey and when she came in the room i hit her and when i hit her she fell on the floor
23:57and she fell on the floor i i started choking her and i stomped on her
24:02steven havroca is released from the hospital and taken straight into custody he refuses to tell
24:16investigators anything else about that morning or why he chose to attack tina straighter so the
24:22investigators have to piece together the events themselves we knew that she had been kicked in
24:28the face because we could see the shoe print and we couldn't find his shoes and we wanted to know
24:34if he had done any additional evidence so we did a canine track we actually did several of them in
24:39order to try to recover any of this potential evidence and that canine track led us to the wooded
24:46area where we located some of his clothing and some narcotics by his own admission he said that he had
24:52ingested methamphetamine in those in those woods immediately after the murder once he's now high
24:59on meth he exits the wooded area and starts walking southbound on tamiami trail which is a very heavily
25:06traveled roadway it was either the day after or two days after we assisted in canvassing the neighborhood
25:14back behind where he walked down gentian trying to locate video surveillance
25:19at one home right behind where the roadway is located on gentian i found someone that did have
25:27video surveillance of him walking down the street
25:32investigators then catch a break when habroka's dna is discovered on tina's lanyard
25:40the only piece of evidence that we had both tina and habroka's dna on was her lanyard which was
25:46great for the case because she had obviously been wearing that at the time of the crime
25:50and then the rest of the items were all just her dna
25:58his room we didn't end up sending anything off for testing at that point we were very confident in the
26:04case that we had and were limited with the florida department of law enforcement on how many pieces of
26:08evidence we can send so we sent what we felt were the most important pieces for them to test
26:13the detectives also interview have roka's family members to gain more insight into his character
26:22they stated he was a good kid when he's on drugs he's not the same person that he normally is
26:28they don't know what happened here but this is not normally who he is
26:35i know they're not a family of well means so i don't know how much they could actually help him out with
26:40him his mother his sister they tried getting him into several different you know out patient
26:48treatment programs none of them succeeded or he didn't qualify for his mom did tell us that around
26:58but she said between 9 and 9 30 the day of the murders that stephen texted her and it was just a
27:03very bizarre text that he was moonwalking and talk of rainbows and she said it made absolutely no sense
27:10and we found out that that was almost immediately after the murder
27:18while the sarasota sheriff's office builds their case against havroka they continue to try to talk to
27:24him detectives have a confession from stephen havroka but still do not know his motive
27:30he flat out refused to talk to us approximately two or three weeks later happened to check my email
27:37and i was told that he wanted to talk to the detectives about this case
27:43so around lunchtime myself and detective patella went to the jail we went to the proper room at that
27:49time mr havroka was brought in by the deputies he was a very subdued state compared to what we had
27:56normally seen him in previously and then he decided he was going to tell us what happened
28:11april 2021 venice florida detectives are interviewing stephen havroka
28:17for the murder of tina strater at the roadway inn motel
28:21we were told that you wanted to speak with us i just want to tell you all what happened okay that's
28:29it i remember i was working out that night and uh i went to go try and have a drink and clear my head
28:36a few up uh places down at this wally's place but it was closed so i went back and said all right that's
28:42fine uh when we got like a four pack of beer or something and just sat in there and and and and was
28:50just uh was kind of getting in my head which i'd been doing for a long time and it's a dangerous place
28:58well i went across the street to checkers and when i went across the street to checkers i you know
29:04it's just uh just the way the world is these days man and there was somebody there who was talking about
29:10drugs and then i started using it and it's just i ended up staying in my hotel room for for a week
29:18i didn't really leave i'd come out i was paranoid and some of it had to do with some drug use but
29:25a lot of it was already there everything inside my head got more vivid and louder because i wasn't i
29:31was that's the only place i was at i had this this voice in my head was telling me that i don't belong
29:39here that i belong i'm meant to go home and i i'm from hell or something they just kept repeating
29:45over and over and over and over and over again to where i would actually believe them
29:50the last thing that i thought that i that this was heaven and that i was uh i was from hell and i don't
29:58belong here and i needed to go home to my family and the only way i could go home to my family is if i
30:03i did what i did and i just went outside and and i just picked the first person that i seen
30:13i didn't i didn't really think about it i went out and looked in i went back in my room a few times
30:19trying to push it off telling myself that this is this is not you don't have to do it and then just
30:27the voices the voices came in my head and said this is the only way you're going to be able to go home
30:33and i just went and picked somebody and i'm right and i don't remember what number of room it was
30:40i ran in went up to the right went in a room and i did what i did and i don't really have the heart to
30:49go into detail to it right now i asked him why he had his shoes off because that was concern when
31:00we saw his shoes off of maybe he had committed a rape against her in there he said no he did not
31:05rape her he did not have any intention of raping her and he said that he took his shoes off because
31:09he didn't want to leave shoe marks on the floor as he was cleaning it in the room where he killed her
31:13we know you were in there for about 14 minutes what was the 14 minutes i mean that's a long time
31:24because she wasn't gone yet i made the mistake when i went in i hit her and then i just grabbed her neck
31:34and i just i was joking her then i started worrying about cleaning whatever up
31:40and i kept having to go back and keep cleaning stuff up because i was sweating really bad and i
31:46kept was stripping on the floor so i kept trying to wipe it up i had to do that like three times
31:57he was ultimately charged with second degree murder had we found out that he had raped her we would have
32:03perhaps gone in a different direction but yes there was definitely discussion about that and about
32:08doing death penalty but we decided that second degree would be the best course
32:15there's some statutory requirements that we thought we would have the best chance of conviction as second
32:22degree but before the trial could take place had roca begins to engage in self-destructive activity within
32:30that we would have the best chance of committing suicide in the jail
32:38several times he actually tried committing suicide in the jail tried drowning himself in the toilet he
32:44tried starving himself he tried hanging himself at one point all of which were unsuccessful
32:50the deputies were able to intervene he was put in segregation because he couldn't be around anybody he
32:57would start fights he was just uncontrollable
33:04from all accounts from his psychological reports he just would not communicate with the psychologist or
33:10the psychiatrist or whomever was evaluating him he would sit off in a dark corner and cover himself with a
33:16blanket and refuse to participate in anything so the medical staff had him evaluated and during that
33:26evaluation they found him incompetent steven avroca is ruled mentally unsound and the trial is postponed
33:35indefinitely detectors are worried that there might never be justice for tina and her family
33:50i really felt that that was not right because he told us in the interview that he knew what he was
33:55doing although he had a different way of thinking he knew exactly what he was doing and the consequences for that
34:05i absolutely think it was a game because he was clearly able to articulate what he did and he
34:12articulated that multiple times to multiple different people he knew what he did was wrong he recognized
34:18that he was not a stupid person by any stretch of the imagination he had been so familiar with the
34:26court system throughout his life he understood what that system looked like and what trial looked like
34:31and how to communicate with his attorneys i know that is a common play that is used especially with him
34:38being a known drug user so i wasn't completely shocked to see that i was more shocked to see that they kept
34:45going back and forth feeling incompetent and then incompetent so really for two years it was a wait and
34:54see period and there's a lot of frustrations from not only tina's husband but also from law enforcement
35:00because this is a man that they want to convict and they want to get behind bars and make sure
35:04that he is never on the streets again
35:09and for gerald it was a very emotional process there was no closure for him
35:14he wanted justice for tina he wanted this man to be put away behind bars
35:21was not unexpected that he would be ruled incompetent but it wasn't what i'd hoped for
35:27he wanted to be in court there's no justice for tina and there's no peace for me i believe in the
35:33court system and i have to because that's what other choice do i have
35:44it is only in november 2023 two and a half years after the brutal murder of tina straighter
35:51that stephen havroka is finally found competent to stand trial they went back and forth for years
35:59on whether or not he was going to be competent to stand trial so when he finally was found competent
36:03i think the third time back in 2023 it was great in preparation for the trial investigators also delve
36:13into havroka's troubled past he tells me all about his issues after prison he said he got out of
36:21prison and he said that he couldn't really find his way he stated that he was looking forward to
36:30getting into weightlifting and exercising and wanted to be a trainer and become a better person but he just
36:40could not follow through with it because of his mental health issues he knew he had mental health
36:47issues he said that he heard voices in his head all the time he said that these voices told him to do
36:55bad things and when he would work out those voices would go away having known him basically since my
37:04career started to see where he was now can't say i was completely shocked by it but yeah it was pretty
37:11up there in far as the realm of craziness
37:19he is covered the top of his head his face neck chest back everything in tattoos mainly he got in prison
37:27a lot of the tattoos are a neo-nazi aryan brotherhood realm of tattoos he thinks that some of the symbols are
37:41religious and belief and not following those ideologies that's his explanation of it
37:51when he was ruled competent to stand trial this was really a big moment for gerald
37:58it was a mix of emotions on one hand there is some relief that this trial is finally going to
38:04continue and going to move forward but on the other hand he continued to carry the grief and the sorrow
38:10of losing tina and that was something that weighed very heavily on his heart you could tell it just in
38:15his voice and talking with him gerald didn't continue to live in the motel last times that i spoke with
38:21him and met with him it was at a small home just a few miles away from where the murder had happened
38:30around gerald's neck he often carried a memory of tina with him he wore a necklace of her thumbprint
38:36and that was something that he said was a part of tina that would always remain with him forever
38:42on the 3rd of february 2025 steven havroka changes his plea to guilty of second-degree murder
38:58we found out just days before his actual sentencing so i was surprised that we were finally going to
39:06be coming to our resolution and i was very happy at the same time i was in the room and he didn't
39:14recognize me but it was very satisfying to finally get him to tell a judge this is what i did just like he told us
39:30he told the judge that he was responsible for her death he didn't really express any type of remorse
39:39i know that the state attorney read a victim impact statement from tina's daughter and yeah he
39:46he didn't offer any type of apologies just admitted that he did it and that was kind of the end of his
39:51story he was sentenced to two life sentences and that included some of the offenses that he had
39:58committed while he was in jail i'd say the stars kind of aligned on this case if we didn't get him
40:08right then like i said that's a very robust residential community who knows if he did a home
40:16invasion what else he had on his mind you had a very evil man commit an extremely evil act for no reason
40:29and you had a victim that was just in the wrong place at the wrong time and there was no other reason
40:35for it other than that we now have an animal that's off of the streets he's not going to be able to
40:43hurt anybody anymore but tina's family will forever be suffering with this
40:53so one of the hard things in all of this story which remains so tragic is gerald wasn't even here for
41:00the sentencing he had ultimately passed away and he wasn't here to receive the justice and to learn
41:06the justice for tina that he had so wanted
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