Emotional day at Santa Anita for those who knew Santa slaying victims

One of the victims in the Christmas Eve slayings in Covina owned a race horse, which won its race today at Santa Anita. Friends and family were there to watch, cheer and cry. Frank C. Girardot in the San Gabriel Valley Tribune reports:

Tears freely flowed Thursday at Santa Anita when Return of the King stepped into the Winner's Circle. Friends and family members of Joseph, James and Charles Ortega had come to see their 7-year-old chestnut gelding race for perhaps the last time from the barn of trainer David Bernstein. The three Ortegas were among nine family members slain at a Covina home on Christmas Eve by Bruce Pardo, the estranged husband of Joseph's daughter Sylvia. "This was special," Bernstein said. "It was hard to keep from crying from the moment he left the paddock."

Photo: Paul Trozzi and Steven Richardson kneel in prayer outside the Ortega home. Credit: Francine Orr / Los Angeles Times

Comments

[Happy4LA]

What a great story! But it's going to take a lot of time to overcome the evil that Bruce Pardo inflicted. I seriously hope there is a hell, because it's scum like this who deserve to pay for eternity for what he did to the living and the dead.