He Never Stopped Looking for Mom's Killer
When Kevin Cincotta's mom Andrea used to be brutally murdered in 1998, he never stopped looking for justice. Where is he now? 'Dateline' covers the tale.
Andrea Cincotta was most effective 52 years-old when she was once discovered murdered within the Arlington, Va., house she shared along with her then-fiancé, Chris Johnson, on Aug. 22, 1998. It was her time off and Andrea had plans, but she didn't show up for any of them. Multiple messages left at the couple's answering gadget indicated that this was once strange conduct. A couple of of those messages have been left by means of Johnson, who found her frame of their bed room closet upon coming house from paintings.
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Johnson immediately known as 911 and was once puzzled by police for 28 hours over the direction of three days, reported The Washington Post, prior to in the end being instructed he wasn't a suspect. Cincotta's son Kevin, 24 at the time, was once devastated via the loss of his mom and never stopped looking for her killer. Eventually he would give government the most important clue. Where is Kevin Cincotta now, and did he ever to find justice for his mom? Dateline has the story.
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Where is Kevin Cincotta now? He spent years trying to find his mom's killer.
On Nov. 10, 2022, Kevin Cincotta sat in an Arlington court, gazing his mom's killer obtain his sentence."I don’t think it’ll ever be over in my mind," he informed The Washington Post, "because there was a miscarriage of justice here." Bobby Joe Leonard is the identify of the person who confessed to killing Cincotta many years after the fact, but Kevin suspected it was him from the start.
Leonard was once known as the "computer guy" because Cincotta gave him an previous non-public pc of hers mere weeks sooner than her demise. What she did not know on the time was once, Leonard had been "recently released from prison after convictions for assault and forcible sodomy," per the hole. Leonard worked in the area which is how he knew the couple. By the time police officers known him a few days after the murder, he was in jail for assaulting his wife. But the police cleared him.
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A 12 months after that, Leonard was convicted of raping and choking a 13-year-old girl who survived the attack. He was sentenced to lifestyles in prison, and Kevin was additionally on this court despite the fact that it gave him little aid. Kevin all the time felt the police showed a shocking amount of incompetence when it got here to his mom's case.
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in 2018, Bobby Joe Leonard confessed to killing Andrea Cincotta.
A cold case detective by way of the title of Rosa Ortiz got interested in Cincotta's murder. Leonard persevered to disclaim having any involvement until Ortiz interviewed him in 2018. Evidently he discovered religion and determined to admit. During this confession, Leonard "provided details of the crime scene, and added a new twist: He said a white man who sounded like Cincotta’s fiancé had called him and offered him $5,000 to kill her," in line with the newspaper.
In 2021, each Johnson and Leonard have been indicted for Cincotta's murder. Leonard plead guilty, but Johnson denied knowing anything in regards to the telephone call or Cincotta's dying. He used to be discovered now not responsible after an ordeal that lasted 3 weeks, and Leonard received any other existence sentence to be served consecutively with his previous one. While being sentenced, Leonard endured to insist he was once hired through Johnson.
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Where is Chris Johnson now?
Johnson met his spouse Ginnie Grevett round 2000, when he was once below investigation for Cincotta's homicide. He informed her all in regards to the investigation, which didn't exchange her mind in any respect. "It never occurred to me ever that he might have had anything to do with it whatsoever," she advised ABC's 20/20.
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In 2018 sooner than Leonard confessed to the murder, Kevin reached out to Johnson because he was running with investigators. The two met for lunch sooner or later but unbeknownst to Johnson, Kevin used to be wearing a wire. He knowledgeable Johnson that after seeing the police file on his mom's case, he believed Johnson was once involved. "I was really hurt," Johnson told 20/20, and suspected Kevin was recording the conversation.
Because there used to be no evidence tying Leonard to Johnson, he was once acquitted, however the revel in changed him. "I used to be a lot more trusting," Johnson stated. "I trusted everyone, trusted the police, and now my eyes have been opened."
For more in this tale, tune into Dateline Friday, June 23, 2023, at 9 p.m. EST on NBC.
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