Under the Knife Read online

  Dear Reader:

  The book you are about to read is the latest bestseller from the St. Martin’s True Crime Library, the imprint The New York Times calls “the leader in true crime!” Each month, we offer you a fascinating account of the latest, most sensational crime that has captured the national attention. St. Martin’s is the publisher of bestselling true crime author and crime journalist Kieran Crowley, who explores the dark, deadly links between a prominent Manhattan surgeon and the disappearance of his wife fifteen years earlier in THE SURGEON’S WIFE. Suzy Spencer’s BREAKING POINT guides readers through the tortuous twists and turns in the case of Andrea Yates, the Houston mother who drowned her five young children in the family’s bathtub. In Edgar Award-nominated DARK DREAMS, legendary FBI profiler Roy Hazelwood and bestselling crime author Stephen G. Michaud shine light on the inner workings of America’s most violent and depraved murderers. In the book you now hold, UNDER THE KNIFE, acclaimed author Diane Fanning uncovers the terrifying tale of a man who posed as a doctor even though he had no training, leading to a tragic consequence for a woman in his care.

  St. Martin’s True Crime Library gives you the stories behind the headlines. Our authors take you right to the scene of the crime and into the minds of the most notorious murderers to show you what really makes them tick. St. Martin’s True Crime Library paperbacks are better than the most terrifying thriller, because it’s all true! The next time you want a crackling good read, make sure it’s got the St. Martin’s True Crime Library logo on the spine—you’ll be up all night!

  Charles E. Spicer, Jr.

  Executive Editor, St. Martin’s True Crime Library

  St. Martin’s True Crime Library

  Titles by Diane Fanning

  BABY BE MINE

  GONE FOREVER

  THROUGH THE WINDOW

  INTO THE WATER

  WRITTEN IN BLOOD

  UNDER

  THE

  KNIFE

  A Beautiful Woman,

  a Phony Doctor,

  and a Shocking Homicide

  DIANE FANNING

  NOTE: If you purchased this book without a cover you should be aware that this book is stolen property. It was reported as “unsold and destroyed” to the publisher, and neither the author nor the publisher has received any payment for this “stripped book.”

  The names of certain people connected to this story have been changed.

  UNDER THE KNIFE

  Copyright © 2007 by Diane Fanning.

  Cover photo of knife courtesy Corbis Royalty Free. Cover photo of Maria Cruz courtesy Polaris. Cover photo of Dean Faiello courtesy Matthew McDermott/Polaris.

  All rights reserved. No part of this book may be used or reproduced in any manner whatsoever without written permission except in the case of brief quotations embodied in critical articles or reviews. For information address St. Martin’s Press, 175 Fifth Avenue, New York, NY 10010.

  ISBN: 0-312-93952-3

  EAN: 9780312-93952-6

  Printed in the United States of America

  St. Martin’s Paperbacks edition / April 2007

  St. Martin’s Paperbacks are published by St. Martin’s Press, 175 Fifth Avenue, New York, NY 10010.

  10 9 8 7 6 5 4 3 2 1

  This book is dedicated to Maria Cruz

  and to her indomitable spirit in pursuit of the

  American Dream

  ACKNOWLEDGMENTS

  Reference librarians are an often-unheralded gift from the heavens. They know where to look and how to find the tidbits of information that elude the rest of us.

  I owe an enormous debt of gratitude to Sharon Hoyt, reference librarian at the Burlington County public library in New Jersey. Not only did she doggedly pursue questions presented through official channels, but she became so intrigued with the story that she hunted down other documents for me on her personal time. Thank you, Sharon. Thanks, too, to reference librarian Brad Small at the Newark Public Library and to Doug Eldredge of the Newark Preservation Society.

  There were a number of medical professionals who provided pieces of Dean Faiello’s story or who helped expand my knowledge base with important background information: Dr. Elizabeth Harris and Mary Jo Cunningham at the Center for Cosmetic Surgery in San Antonio; anesthesiologist Dr. David Purchase in New Braunfels, Texas; and Dr. Laurie Polis, Dr. Roy Geronemus, Dr. Ernest Isaacson, and Dr. David Goldschmitt in New York.

  I owe a huge debt of appreciation to Dan Kelleher of the Office of Professional Development at the New York City Department of Education, to Barbara Nevins Taylor at New York’s Channel 9, to freelance writer Bryon Burrough and to Jeane MacIntosh and Brad Hamilton at the New York Post.

  Thanks, too, to Barbara Thompson and Edison Alban at the New York County District Attorney’s Office in Manhattan, to Mary Price in the correspondence unit of the Manhattan Court Clerks Office—no one can ever sing enough praises for the hard-working folks in clerks’ offices everywhere—and to Sister Marguerita Smith, archivist at the Archdiocese of New York.

  I offer a standing ovation to Jerry Mitchell and Bart Opsahl, and to Peter Borzotta of Broadway Cares/Equity Fights AIDS.

  Thanks to Jenny Kennedy, Rolando Divina, Arthur Mayer, Allie Cramer, criminal profiler Pat Brown, attorneys Kerry Brian Flowers, Margaret Shalley and Ellen Bank, Christopher Giglio of Rubenstein Associates, Steve Baltz of the Osteopathic Medical Board of California. Patrick Merla, Charles Flowers of the Lambda Literary Foundation, Pauline Park of the New York Association for Gender Rights Advocacy and Kim Brinster of the Oscar Wilde Bookshop.

  I’d be remiss if I did not offer a whispered thanks to the people who shared their stories with me but requested anonymity. You all were a great help.

  I extend a special thank you to Lynette and May Ann at Curves in New Braunfels for quickly conjuring up a pen and paper and a desktop for my use when returned phone calls arrived in the middle of my workout.

  I’ve thanked Joe Cleemann for his excellent editing of other books in the St. Martin’s True Crime Library, but this time, I need to acknowledge his assistance in educating me about the intricacies of navigating New York and directing me to the ethnic restaurants on Ninth Avenue where I scored an excellent lunch. For the editing of this book, I extend my appreciation to my new editor, Yaniv Soha.

  As always, my deep and abiding gratitude goes to my wonderful agent Jane Dystel and to executive editor Charles Spicer for their continued faith in me.

  And I send an ocean of gratitude to Wayne, a specialist in the care and feeding of a writer, who puts up with my nuttiness and keeps coming back for more.

  CHAPTER ONE

  A PERFECT SPRING DAY DAWNED OVER MANHATTAN ON PALM Sunday, April 13, 2003. Low morning temperatures rose into the 60s and there wasn’t a cloud in the sunny blue sky. The tall buildings blocked direct light from most of the sidewalks until the sun reached its pinnacle at noon.

  Maria Pilar Cruz emerged from her luxury high rise on West 50th Street to greet the glorious morning. She was a small Filipina—only 4′11″ weighing just 90 pounds—but she was large in energy and ambition. Workouts at Crunch gym and jogs in Central Park made her as fit as a 35-year-old woman could be.

  Her drive to succeed led her out of the Philippines eleven years earlier, eventually taking her to New York City in 1998, where she earned an MBA in finance and international banking as well as U.S. citizenship. By 2003, she was a highly regarded financial analyst for Barclays, bringing in an annual salary that approached $200,000.

  That year was full of promise for Maria. She planned to go back to school to study for an additional advanced degree. She conspired with family members to plan a fabulous celebration for her parents’ fiftieth anniversary. And she anticipated a Christmas visit to the Philippines
—her first trip home since arriving in America.

  She did not have work or exercise on her mind when she left her apartment building that morning. Her thoughts were on a higher plane. It was time to pay homage to God for the many blessings in her life. She walked a couple of blocks to St. Malachy’s Church for 11 A.M. mass.

  After the service she stopped by a Duane Reed pharmacy near the corner of 50th and Broadway. She then headed across town past the flapping flags at Rockefeller Center, across Fifth Avenue, then turned right onto Park Avenue heading south. Directly in front of her, the elaborate Helmsley Building blocked the forward progress of the avenue.

  When she reached the Helmsley, she took the pedestrian tunnel to the other side to reach the MetLife Building at 200 Park Avenue. She took the elevator and entered the offices of the Barclays Capital asset management group at 1 that afternoon. She went to her desk to retrieve a few files she needed for a team meeting on Monday morning.

  At 1:30 she left, stopping in the upscale lobby mall to withdraw $400 from an ATM machine. She would need a big part of that for an appointment later that day. Her medical provider asked her to bring cash.

  Maria used her credit card at Grand Central Terminal and walked back home. At her apartment, she spread out her files on the dining table and immersed herself in preparation for the next day. Engrossed in her work, she lost track of time and had to hurry off, leaving her home in greater disarray than usual.

  She headed down to Chelsea for her appointment, arriving sooner than she’d anticipated. With time to kill, she stopped to shop at Loehmann’s on Seventh Avenue at 16th Street. At 5, she bought a new blouse—size 2—and a pair of size 6 shoes.

  She walked a couple of blocks down 16th Street to her appointment with Dean Faiello. It was not in a conventional medical office—Dean worked out of a friend’s apartment. There he had a laser machine to treat a recurring growth in Maria’s mouth called black hairy tongue syndrome. She’d paid visits to a number of other doctors and endured numerous scrapings before finding Dean on the Internet early in 2003. She was impressed with his meticulousness and his professional bedside manner. She was also beguiled by his charm.

  That day, prior to the removal process, Dean administered a lidocaine injection into Maria’s tongue. Like all local anesthetics, this drug had a small tolerance spectrum. Too low a dose and it would not provide the numbness needed. Too high a dose could result in serious complications. The site of the injection amplified the necessity for accuracy. The tongue is a vascular structure—spongy, absorbent matter criss-crossed with an amazing network of capillaries that rush any substance throughout the body at lightning speed.

  Reclining on the treatment table waiting for the drug to take effect, Maria heard a ringing in her ears. It was annoying, but did not cause immediate concern. Then she became light-headed. She closed her eyes to stop the room from spinning. It was an unpleasant sensation, but she thought it would pass.

  She tasted something acrid and metallic as if she’d bitten down on a piece of aluminum foil stuck to a morsel of barbecued food. An uncomfortable heat surged through her body from head to toe as a bright red flush radiated across her face. The treatments had never made her feel like this before—she didn’t like it, but she didn’t complain.

  At this point—without a word from Maria—a trained anesthesiologist would have known that the patient was in trouble. Either Dean did not notice the coloration in her face or he did not understand its significance.

  He didn’t know there was a problem until the seizures began. Maria was no longer aware of her surroundings. Without volition, her body tensed and shook. Dean knew that he had to do something, but had no idea what.

  An injection of Pentothal, Versed or diazepam could have readjusted the electrical potential in her brain and stopped the manic motion in her muscles. But Dean did not have the education to know. He did not have the drugs he needed. All he knew was that Maria was convulsing again and again as he stood helpless by her side.

  He grabbed his phone and called his friend Patty Rosado. She would have the number of the emergency room director at New York University Downtown Hospital, Dr. David Goldschmitt, who lived just a block away from Dean’s home in Newark. Patty called David and asked if it was okay to give Dean his home phone number. Then she called Dean back, and gave it to him. Dean wasted no time making the call. He explained the nature of his emergency to David, claiming that the convulsing woman was his friend and asking what he should do.

  The doctor was blunt. “Call an ambulance and get her to the hospital,” he said.

  “She’s regaining consciousness now,” Dean said. “I’ll ask her if she wants to go to the hospital.”

  “Don’t ask her,” Dr. Goldschmitt insisted. “Just take her. The seizures will start again. This time they could kill her. Get her to the hospital now.”

  Without response, Dean hung up the phone. He’d been pushing the boundaries of acceptable behavior for years, but now he stood on the precipice—gazing at a line he should not cross. This was the most pivotal moment of Dean Faiello’s life. It was the ultimate test of his character. The right course of action blazoned before him, as clear and obvious as the lights on a runway. At this point, he faltered and he failed—he failed Maria Cruz and failed himself.

  Call the authorities and face the consequence of his actions? He was too scared to follow Goldschmitt’s advice. He had to ride this out. He could not afford to take her to the hospital. He was in trouble already. Taking Maria in for help would make everything so much worse. As soon as she survived the crisis, they would ask her who did this to her. The moment she uttered his name he was doomed.

  David wanted to call for an ambulance himself, but all he knew was that Dean and this woman were in an apartment in Manhattan. He punched star-69 into his phone to reconnect with Dean, but the number was blocked. David was concerned—he didn’t think he’d convinced Dean of the situation’s urgency.

  He felt helpless and frustrated. His career as a physician was founded on saving lives—he worked to that end every day in the emergency room. In the aftermath of 9-11, David had been in the eye of the storm, working unending hours at a hospital close to ground zero. And now he feared a woman was dying and there was nothing he could do. The thought brought back visions of the dead and the dying on that dreadful day less than two years earlier.

  Meanwhile, in the makeshift office, Maria’s seizures ceased. Dean sighed out his relief, thinking he had weathered the crisis—until he realized that her chest was not rising and falling as it should. She was not breathing. He put his fingers to her wrist, to her throat. She had no pulse. He checked for a heartbeat. He heard not a sound.

  He stabbed the number of his accountant, financial advisor and friend Martin Mannert into the telephone. “She had a reaction to lidocaine,” he said. “There are no vital signs. No respiration. No pulse. I don’t know what to do.”

  “I’ll call 9-1-1,” the friend offered.

  “No. No, don’t do that. I’ll take her to St. Vincent’s right away.” There was a trauma center at St. Vincent’s hospital and it was only four and a half blocks away from Dean’s makeshift office.

  Maria never arrived there. Dean never made the effort.

  He panicked at the thought of the cost he would pay—the repercussions that he would suffer—if he did the right thing. He thought of life behind bars. He knew his 6-month plea-bargained sentence on an earlier charge would vanish into thin air if the authorities knew he was still treating patients. Consumed with his own personal peril, he did not spare a moment’s concern for the woman who would pay the highest price of all.

  He pulled a carry-on suitcase from a closet. It was too small to hold most adults, but Maria was a tiny woman. Now that her natural vivacity was extinguished, she looked smaller than ever. Dean had little trouble folding her stillpliable body into the bag and zipping it shut.

  The little wheels whirred smoothly down the hall as Dean eased the suitcase into the elevator. He
descended, then jarred the contents as he exited the lift, pulling the beloved daughter of Rudolfo and Irenea Cruz over the gap.

  He rolled the suitcase outside to his green SUV. Even with Maria inside, it still weighed less than 100 pounds. For a strong guy like Dean, heaving it into the back of his ’96 Jeep Cherokee barely raised a sweat.

  He drove through the Holland Tunnel to Newark, New Jersey, taking the tiny Filipina’s body to his elegant old home, the former residence of opera diva Madame Maria Jeritza.

  Maria Cruz would not rest in peace.

  CHAPTER TWO

  THAT MONDAY AT BARCLAYS, CONCERN RIPPLED THROUGH the office. Maria did not come to work. She did not call. People in the office called her apartment throughout the day. No one answered the phone. This was so unlike Maria. She was prompt. She was reliable. She never missed work without an explanation.

  The next day, still no Maria. Co-worker Martin Davey went to St. Joseph’s Home, the boarding house on West 44th Street. He was surprised to discover Maria had moved out a few months earlier. He returned to the office and checked with the human resources department for a new address.

  Another co-worker, Mike Reagan, lived closest to Maria’s apartment. He agreed to check on her on his way into work on Wednesday morning. He stood outside of her unit with dismay. Stacked before the door were three issues of The Wall Street Journal. He rang the bell. He knocked till his knuckles hurt. No Maria.

  Back at Barclays, Maria’s unexplained absence rattled her supervisor, Hans Christensen. He pulled Maria’s file, looked up her emergency contact information and placed a call to her aunt, Rebecca de los Angeles, who lived on the other side of the Upper New York Bay in Jersey City.

  The red flags flew immediately for Rebecca. Her niece had a strong work ethic, an unshakeable sense of responsibility. Something was wrong. She called her nephew Orlando Castillo. Orlando rounded up his brothers, Rafael and Emanuel, and they made their way to West 50th Street.