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A Maryland man accused of killing three people in a two-day shooting rampage was nabbed in part because he lost his glasses, prosecutors said Monday.
Federal police officer Eulalio Tordil, 62, was arrested in Aspen Hill, about 13 miles from the nation’s capital, after he misplaced the glasses during a struggle with one of his victims, according to court testimony cited by WRC-TV. Prosecutors said he couldn’t flee in his car without the corrective lenses.
A judge ordered Tordil, an employee of the Federal Protective Service, held without bond during his first court appearance Monday on charges including first-degree ***. His public defender admitted it was not realistic to urge for his release.
Police take Eulalio Tordil, 62, a suspect in three fatal shootings in the Washington, D.C., area into custody in Bethesda, Md., Friday.
Investigators said he gunned down his estranged wife Gladys Thursday in a high school parking lot then fired on people Friday in parking lots at a shopping center and mall.
A protective order required him to to turn over any firearms he owned, yet he bought the .40-caliber Glock handgun believed to have been used in the spree before the order and never turned it in to police, Montgomery County State's attorney John McCarthy said in court.
Officials at the Federal Protective Service placed Tordil on administrative leave in March after Gladys Tordil said in filing for the protective order that he threatened to hurt her if she left him. He also used "intense, military-style discipline" on their children, according to the filing, forcing them to do pushups and spend time in a dark closet as punishment.
Friends of the couple couldn't see any problems with their marriage and didn't know about the protective order, they have said. Tordil handed off his badge and service weapon at the time, but he should have turned in the Glock in March as well, McCarthy said.
Montgomery County Police Department
Tordil's charges carry a potential life sentence if he's convicted.
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Police said Claudina Molina, 65, was shot to death by killer Eulalio Tordil in the Westfield Montgomery Mall parking lot as he tried to carjack her.
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Tordil's charges carry a potential life sentence if he's convicted. Police said Claudina Molina, 65, is one of his three victims.
Police said Tordil wounded a bystander, one of three other people injured in the rampage, when he shot his wife Thursday. Investigators believe he moved on Friday to Bethesda's Westfield Montgomery Mall and the shopping center roughly 5 miles away.
Authorities described the second two shootings as botched carjackings. A woman returning to her Toyota RAV4 outside the mall Friday told police an armed man blocked her from getting into the car and demanded to know if the silver SUV belonged to her, according to court documents.
Police said Malcom Winffel, 45, of Maryland was shot to death by killer Eulalio Tordil in the Westfield Montgomery Mall parking lot as he tried to save a woman being carjacked by Tordil on Friday.
"I'm not kidding," she told police he said to her. "I will shoot you." Two men tried to help her when she yelled out, but the gunman shot all three of them, the documents show. Police later identified the man fatally shot by Tordil while trying to help her as Malcolm Winffel, 45.
A police officer who rushed to the shopping center in Aspen Hill about 30 minutes later on reports of shots fired found a different woman slain inside her RAV4, according to the charging documents. Authorities later identified her as Claudina Molina, 65.
Tordil's charges carry up to life behind bars if he's convicted. Maryland ended its death penalty three years ago.
With News Wire Services.