Jimmy Snuka Homicide Investigators Make It Official: ‘We Will Not Present the Matter to the Vidocq Society’
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November 7, 2013League of Denial
November 13, 2013by Irvin Muchnick
As I have reported, the sisters of Nancy Argentino enlisted Philadelphia’s nonprofit Vidocq Society, which specializes in cold-case murder investigations, to offer its services to the Lehigh County district attorney’s office in its revived probe of the evidence against Jimmy “Superfly” Snuka in the 1983 death of Argentino in Snuka’s Whitehall, Pennsylvania, motel room.
In June, district attorney James B. Martin initiated a “fresh look” at the Snuka file, which was never officially closed. Martin designated deputy Charles F. Gallagher III to direct the “fresh look,” which was expected to last over the summer. The action was prompted by the publication of our ebook Justice Denied and by two regional front-page newspaper stories, most notably one in the Allentown Morning Call, focusing on the 30th anniversary of the incident.
With no announcement forthcoming for the resolution of the “fresh look,” nearly two months into autumn, one of the Argentino sisters this week wrote to Martin. The sister pointed out that the Vidocq Society had offered its services, that Gallagher had told her that he thought highlly of the organization’s work, but that the county had not followed up on the Society’s preliminary contact.
Today Martin emailed back to the sister — both definitively declining the offer of assistance and failing to answer the question of whether the “fresh look” had a timeline, or any meaning at all apart from the same open-ended 30-year-old Snuka investigation that has yielded neither an indictment nor the closing of the case. Martin wrote:
“Both Mr. Gallagher and I are in agreement that Mr. Gallagher will continue with his ongoing investigation and that we will not present the matter to the Vidocq Society while we are continuing our investigation. Thank you.”
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JUSTICE DENIED: The Untold Story of Nancy Argentino’s Death in Jimmy “Superfly” Snuka’s Motel Room includes never-before-published photos and documents. It can be purchased for $2.99 at http://amzn.com/B00CPTP6VM. Readers without Amazon Kindle-compatible devices can get a PDF file copy by sending $2.99, via PayPal, to [email protected]. All proceeds benefit the My Sisters’ Place women’s shelter and resource center in White Plains, New York.