It's wild when you think of all the reasons and motivations behind murder. There's jealousy, rage, revenge, and money. People do some pretty desperate things when it comes to money. In today's case, a couple were brutally attacked as they slept in the comfort of their own home, all because of money. If that isn't crazy enough, the idea that the murderer could have been their own son makes it all that much more disturbing. This is the story of the Porko family Axe Murder.
My name's Ben, I'm Nicole, and you're listening to Wicked and Grim, a true crime podcast.
The following podcast material for a mature audience listener discretion. It's kind of day.
We're both drinking tea. I'm drinking herbal tea, but you're drinking a twisted tea.
No free advertising on the show. Come on, no, it is definitely twisted tea. We should do that, just like you know, instead of free advertising, just reach out to these brands and be like, yo, I'm going to drink a drink on our show. You should sponsor it. If not, we're not going to say your name.
Oh my goodness, I don't know if we've made it quite that big extortion.
No, I'm definitely not going to do that. But I'm just I'm enjoying a tea and this is a case that a drink will sit good on.
Okay, especially now that it's I feel like a nice warm cup of tea though it also helps you know, this kind of stuff.
It definitely can I'm just saying for me, it takes that edge off. Yeah, hey, sometimes a nice cold glass of water takes the edge.
Off too, right, Well, it's supposed to get cold as hell here, so that's actually that doesn't make any sense. Cold as hell doesn't make sense.
Honestly, most of the things when you say it's cold as blank doesn't make sense. Yeah, cold as hell doesn't make sense. Cold as balls doesn't make sense.
Like ball shiver shivery, Wow.
Don't say that. Just just skip over it cold.
I don't know. Just let's move on anyway. It's going to be like minus twenty eight celsius, which is just fucking frutal.
Our balls are going to be cold, is what Nicole's trying to say.
Okay, I am so tired, so just like, don't judge me, just don't judge. For this episode, I have been getting like five hours of sleep a night for a few too many nights, so fair enough, just bear with me.
Well, I do think that you need to buckle up, whether you're tired or not, for this case. This is the story of the Porco family axe murder. Or is this is titled the Murder of Peter Porko because well, he's the main victim. I get one of the main victims in this one. He is the one who gets killed. And so yeah, I think we need to tell his story. Okay, you ready for it?
I am. I haven't no idea what's going to happen here, but I'm ready.
Well, like I say, buckle up. So on the morning of November fifteenth, two thousand and four, Peter Porko, a law clerk from the New York State Supreme Court Applelit Division, didn't show up for work in Albany like he normally did. He hadn't called in or let anyone know that he'd be absent that day, which was very unusual. So earned his colleague, since Court Officer Michael Hart, to check in on him at his home at Broccoli Drive in Delmar.
Broccoli Drive, Brockley, Oh, Broccoli okay. I was like, I love that, I want to live there.
It's Brock, like the name Brock, and then l e y brah Okay, broccoli not broccoli.
Broccoli would be cool, would it?
Well? When Michael arrived and walked up to the house, he glanced through the front door window and immediately he was met with a horrific sight. There was Peter's lifeless, blood covered body sprawled across the floor without hesitation. He called for emergency responders, who quickly arrived to the scene. Now when they were there, they made their way inside, and they found fifty two year old Peter Porco dead, laying in a pool of his home blood. He had
suffered severe head trauma. His wife, sixty four, well not sixty four, fifty four year old my apologies, Joan Porco, was discovered in bed, also brutally attacked. She though was alive, barely clinging to life. She was unable to speak and could barely move, but she managed to raise a hand to signal that she was still conscious.
Holy okay.
Beside her on the bed was the murder weapon, a bloodied fireman axe.
There are some weapons I feel like that just like make you cringe. That someone would ever use that on another human being.
If there is a weapon that screams brutality, it's going to.
Be an en. Oh gosh, yeah, that's scary now.
The Court Medical Examiner, doctor Jeffrey Hubbard, later determined that Peter had been struck multiple times with the axe sixteen to be specific, one blow going straight through his skull and another slicing off part of his jaw. Joan had also been hit three times, cause devastating injuries. Her jaw was shattered, her skull was split wide open, deep enough to expose her brain, and she lost an eye and
several teeth. No Investigators soon realized that the acts belonged to the Porco family, meaning the attacker had not brought a weapon with them to the home, but the used one that was already there. So this adding to the mystery. Something else. Someone had cut the phone lines, they'd disarmed
the burglary alarm, and sliced through a window screen. Peter and Joan had been savagely attacked in their sleep, as far as police could determine, sometime between one thirty am and six thirty am, But what happened next made this case even more chilling see, despite the massive injuries that he suffered, Peter didn't die immediately. Incredibly, his brain injury caused him to go into a sort of autopilot. He
began performing routine tasks as if nothing went wrong. For what so after the attack on that morning, his alarm went off. Okay, police were able to follow the blood trail through the house like the and I'm talking a blood trail, like there was blood everywhere. They went and followed the blood trail, and they were able to retrace his steps. They found he got out of bed and began his usual routine, all while covered in blood from
this catastrophic head trauma. They tracked his way through the house and he went first to the bathroom, where it appeared he attempted to try and shave, his daily routine. He likely stared down his own reflection in the mirror, unaware of the extent of his injuries. And I mean there's blood pooling in the sink beneath him. He had been, as I mentioned, struck sixteen times in the head with
an axe. A large section of his skull was missing, his brain was partially exposed, and most of his jaw was gone, and he stood in the mirror as if nothing was.
Wrong, just like getting ready for the day exactly ho shit, His body kept moving, he kept going through the motions, and he made his way out of the bathroom dazed, and in this dying state, he made.
His way down to the kitchen. There he loaded the dishwasher with the dishes from the last night's dinner and even packed himself a lunch, getting ready for his day at work, completely unaware of the horrific injuries he was currently suffering. His body was running on nothing less than adrenaline and muscle memory at this point, and if it wasn't shocking enough, he then walked out to the front door grabbed the morning newspaper, only to accidentally lock himself
out of the house in the process. There, standing outside the locked door, drenched in blood with severe brain trauma, Peter had enough awareness about him to remember they had a spare key hidden under the front pot plant. He bent down, grabbed the key, unlocked the door, and stepped back inside with the newspaper. But that was it. Whatever was keeping him going finally gave out. His body collapsed there in the foyer, face down in a pool of blood, and that's where he remained until he was found.
Seriously, hey, yeah, the best way to describe it was he was a zombie. I almost have trouble just like comprehending that. I know, like there would have had to been something I don't know, like seriously wrong with his brain kind of thing. Right. And then was it like the blood loss that made him eventually just collapse and pass away?
Most likely? Most likely? Now the thing is like he was clearly in a massive amount of shock, right, Yeah. And my assumption is when his alarm went off that morning, we just I mean, lots of us have had this happen before we can even react. We're just so used to that routine of getting up for work in the morning. We reach over, turn our alarm, clock off, turn the light on, or grab our phone. We have a routine that we immediately set into.
Well, gosh, you think he'd be like, well, I feel particularly sore this morning, Like that is crazy.
But with the adrenaline, he's numb.
I guess. Holy shit.
And he was quite literally operating on autopilot, not recognizing anything around him, not even recognizing what was going on in the mirror in front of him. When he looked at himself, like.
He literally went and loaded the dishwasher.
He loaded the dishwaking in his lunch. Yes, now there are crime scene photos and I saw photos of this dishwasher, and it is there's blood droplets all over it, there's handprints on the dishes from him loading like it's bloody, and he doesn't see this. He's just loading the dishwasher.
It's honestly kind of sad.
It really is when you think about this, No, it really is.
Like you wonder, well, I don't know. I'm just like, gosh, if you like realized what the hell had happened, like if his brain allowed him to do that and then he's got help, would that have changed anything? But probably not. I don't assuming.
I think the extent of his injuries were unfortunately too far. But there is a very sad moral to that part of the story, if I may digress for a moment, is he was so concerned with getting to work he had no idea of his own well being. And I think that goes for many people today. Honestly, they're so consumed with the job they don't look at themselves and their own well being.
But I digress, well, and I just have to say too.
Though.
Imagine getting hit sixteen times by an axe and still being able to crawl your ass out of bed. Yeah, that is uncomprehendible.
Can you barely crawl my ass out of bed on the best of days?
Like WHOA? Just like, I don't know, strength and our bodies are just kind of incredible sometimes, I guess.
Now. The only surviving witness to this crime was his wife, Joan. Though she lived, the attack left her permanently disfigured. She lost an eye, her face was so badly damaged that it would never be the same, and when police arrived, they wasted no time trying to get answers from her because they knew that she might not survive these injuries, so they had to act fast, being that this is
the only witness that they had right now. She couldn't speak, but she was able to communicate by nodding or shaking her head in response to yet or no questions.
Okay, the fact that she couldn't speak, because I was a bit concerned or confused. I was like, well, she's just talking to her husband and he was just going on is like day without I was just curious how that went down. But Okay, that makes sense. Now.
There is some debate among this. I saw a few reports saying that she blinked in response instead of nodding, blinking once for no and twice for yes or something like that, but majority of sources that I found said that she nodded. Honestly, it's impressive if she was able to do either, because hey, remember she lost an eye, so blinking's impressive for one, and nodding being struck in
the head like that also think spinal injury again impressive. Yes, But as far as I can tell, she was nodding, not blinking, and with that police would get their first suspect by getting her to answer these yes or no questions. So their first suspect was an individual by the name of Christopher Porko.
Okay, I was gonna be like, was it the neighbor?
Nope, the sun?
The sun.
Now a detective on the scene, we're working as paramedics were trying to stabilize Joan, and he was asking if she was able to identify the person responsible, and he's like, was it a family member, which, of course is like one of the first questions they always ask, right, Hey, family members statistically most likely those close to the victims, right, yep.
She indicated yes, and he asked, He's like, was it your older son, because he knew there's two sons here, right, and she shook her head, No, was it your younger son? And she nodded yes, younger son being christopher older son Jonathan. So she indicated it was Christopher, the younger son, and that was all investigators needed. Joan was rushed to the hospital, where she underwent a grueling twelve hour surgery before being
placed into a medical induced coma. But the damage was done, and police considered her response as confirmation that Christopher had attacked his parents, killing his father and nearly killing his mother.
Probably suspected that he did kill her.
Yeah. Two hours later, an APB or an all points bulletin was issued for Christopher Porko. Now to understand what led up to the horrific events in the Porco family household, we need to take a closer look at the family itself. So we're going to reel it back just a little bit, okay, back in time a bit so Peter Parko and Joan Belzano I believe how you say her name married in the mid nineteen seventies, eventually setting into a comfortable life in Delmar, which is located in New York. It's a
quiet suburban neighborhood near Albany. They had two sons, Jonathan, born in nineteen eighty one and Christopher, who arrived in July ninth of nineteen eighty three. Peter worked as a law clerk in the State Appellate Division, while Joan built a career as a children's speech pathologist. By two thousand and four, their eldest son, Jonathan, was twenty three years old who was an officer in the US Navy stationed
in South Carolina. Meanwhile, twenty one year old Christopher was attending the University of about two hundred and thirty miles away. There was no outright rivalry between the brothers, but it was clear Jonathan followed a more disciplined, responsible path, earning the family's admiration for his dedication to the military. Christopher, on the other hand, had a troubling pattern of deception, fraud,
and reckless behavior at school. Christopher was known for being tall and good looking and charismatic, but he was also a compulsive liar. He boasted about coming from an ultra wealthy family with multiple properties and luxury vacation's home, luxury vacation homes and such. Though none of this was true, a former classmate recalled that some teachers considered him quote insane, and as he grew older, his behavior became more concerning.
Christopher had a history of staging fake burglaries in his own home. At nineteen, he stole two of his parents' laptops, a Mac and Adele. Then on twenty first, two thousand and three, while home for summer break, he sold yet another laptop and sold it on eBay. His dishonesty extended beyond the home, though. While working at a veterinary clinic during college, the facility experienced a string of burglaries involving
missing electronic equipment. Then in October of two thousand and four, just a month before the murders, both Jonathan and Christopher froze their eBay accounts. Why because Christopher had scammed customers
out of their money. See he had sold items online but never delivered the goods, and in a desperate attempt to avoid accountability, he pretended to be his older brother Jonathan on his account and emailed the victims claiming Christopher had suddenly died as a way to escape actually delivering this, and he's just like, yeah, sorry, my brother died, I can't deliver these items. Yeah.
That is shady, isn't it.
So this, of course paints a picture of a disturbing young man willing to lie and steal for personal gain, and investigators would later argue that this was just the beginning of a much more sinister plan. Authorities believe Christopher saw his parents as a solution to his financial problems, but not in the way a struggling student might normally
turn to family for help. He had a site set on potentially their life insurance payout a sum of over a million dollars, and the fastest way to access that money may very well have been murder.
That.
I don't know.
I just feel like that doesn't work. No, it doesn't, Like you're just like an complete idiot. And also like, do your parents their life not mean anything to you?
I mean, clearly not, clearly not. It's funny. I just realized I'm in the middle of researching another case for Patreon exclusive episode and it also involves a life insurance policy scandal. Just clued into that. But yeah, and again for that one, it didn't work either.
Well, I just can't comprehend, like you're wanting this life insurance of your parents and so you're gonna go and kill them with like an axe. I just that just isn't like, I don't know, that's just dumb. It's stupid, it really is.
But I mean, money does a lot of stupid shit to people, debt, and especially when you're in debt, and Christopher had racked up a lot of debt, mostly through reckless spending. See, he wasn't focusing on his studies because we know that he's in post secondary.
Right right, which I was like, that's good.
Yeah, No, he instead was basically he went to extreme lengths to maintain the illusion of wealth this whole time, right, Like, for example, his most prized possession was a brand new, bright yellow Jeep Wrangler, which is an expensive, basically status symbol that he drove around campus.
Right.
No student going to college needs a brand new vehicle, let alone and jeep Wrangler. Not saying Wranglers are like top tier, but they.
Ain't cheap, you know, well, yeah, a brand new vehicle ain't cheap.
Yeah. Now, his financial troubles combined with his obsession with appearing rich put a strain on his relationship with his parents. There are email exchanges that were found between Peter, Joan and Christopher in the months leading up to the attack, revealing increasing tension over money. His parents were frustrated. They were worried and running out of patience with their youngest
son's irresponsibility. But while they may have thought Christopher was just a reckless spender, they had no idea how far he was actually really willing to go. Now, the tension between them had reached I've been building, let's say that, for a while, but the real breaking point seemed to come at the end of the fall semester in two
thousand and three. At the time, Christopher was a student at the University of Rochester, as I mentioned, but due to his consistently poor grades, school officials had to withdraw him from his courses. So instead of getting zac together, he transferred to Hudson Valley Community College in Troy, New York. But the change in scenery didn't help. He never even
completed a full semester. In fact, Peter and Joan eventually learned that what was going on, and in March of two thousand and four, while Christopher was off on a care free trip to England. Yeah, they sent him an email with a subject line failing grades. You did it again, huh. So basically he was forced out of the initial college because his grade sucked. Yea, went to a different one and his grade sucked again. And here he is off in England and his parents are finding out about his bad grades.
Yeah, and he's just like, yeah, it doesn't give a shit, I guess.
Yeah. So in this email, they were, of course very disappointed and frustrated, and they wrote, quote, you just left and we can't believe our eyes as we look at your interim grade report. You know what they say, three strikes and you're out. Explain yourself and explain he did. He wrote back, and explained by lying as usual. A few days later. In this email, when he wrote back, he blamed the school quote, Obviously they're incorrect. My lowest grade on anything was a B on a physics test.
Don't jump to conclusions. I'm fine.
I don't even actually understand how they got his grades. Really, Like he's I feel like, when you're in post secondary parents aren't really you know, privy to that sort of stuff necessarily.
Well, I'm sure, Like they're kind of paying for his schooling and stuff, right, so they might have like signed up to get grades through their email or something too. That might have been part of it, like yeah.
We want I guess yeah they're paying now.
Christopher also spun a story about one of his professors losing his final exam in this email, claiming that the reason for his failing grade was this, basically saying like, yeah, my professor lost my final exam, which resulted in me going from an A or a B to a failing grade.
Okay, yeah that doesn't make sense at all.
Yeah. Now, to top it all off, he reassured his parents the school was going to cover his next semester's tuition fee due to this mistake, which was another blatant lie. But Christopher didn't stop at just deceiving his parents. He took it a step further. He convinced them that he needed their financial information, claiming he required a loan for them to co sign to cover a two thousand dollars
tuition fee of sorts. Whether it was backdated fees or it's unclear, but there was a two thousand dollars fee. He claimed he needed them to co sign for In reality, he was about to use their details to secure a loan for thirty one thousand dollars from City Bank, listing his father Peter as a co signer without his consent.
Oh my gosh, she's just completely using.
Them, Yes he is, huh Now. Christopher wanted to return to the University of Rochester, but with his disastrous academic record, that wasn't about to happen. So what he did was he turned to his usual tactic of fraud. He forged transcripts from Hudson Bay Community College, giving himself perfect grades or near perfect grades. Anyways, with his fabricated academic success, he reapplied to the university and was now accepted once again. Peter and Joan had no idea that their son was
up to this. For a while, it seemed like Christopher had gotten away with it, but then Peter discovered the fraudulent bank transaction and immediately tried to reach his son. However, his phone calls were going unanswered, so Joan tried. They went unanswered too. Days turned to weeks, and Christopher was just ignoring them completely, and Peter had had enough. Frustrated and furious, he sent another email quote did you forge my signature as a co signer. What the hell are
you doing? You should have called me to discuss it. I'm calling City Bank this morning to find out what you've done. I'm going to tell them I refer used to be on it as a co signer. The next day, City Bank delivered more bad news. Christopher had also taken out a car loan for the continued payments of his jeep Wrangler Oh no, again using his dad's forged signature.
Peter sent another message, this time issuing a warning quote, I want you to know that if you abuse my credit again, I will be forced to file forgery affidavits in order to disclaim liability that applies to Citybank college loans if you attempt to reactivate it or use my credit to obtain any other loan.
Oh okay, I mean that's that's really overstepping it really is. And honestly, like, I understand the anger in these emails. But despite this anger and frustration, Peter Peter loved his son. Yeah, and this was still evident because he ended the email with a heartfelt message quote, we may be disappointed with you, but your mother and I still love you and care about your future. Oh my gosh, yeah it was. And he was like warning his son. He wasn't just like
going right, you know. And what did he say?
What was his threat that he was going to do file affidavits.
Yeah, like he didn't just go and do that right away. No, it's like you can tell these are good parents exactly.
No, these they're keeping law out of it. They're trying to talk about it and figure it out. But unfortunately Christopher was not trying to figure it out. He was just going to continue to do these these negative, fraudulent things, and it was pushing them further and further.
Because like, I don't know back then how much a jeep wrangler would wrangler wrangler? Yeah, I would cost say twenty five grand or whatever. I have no idea.
Well that we're Canadian too, so that's American, so maybe even like twenty American.
And so like, but still fifty thousand dollars is what he had made his dad Cose sign on. Basically, Yeah, that's a lot of money.
Now, it was clear that his parents wanted to mend things that. As we just mentioned, they wanted Christopher to come home face the consequences, of course, but they also want to work towards a fresh start, and Christopher did come home, but as we know, not to make things right.
Oh my god, is that when he came home? Yes, oh no.
His parents hoped to resolve the issues, but he had something else in mind to resolve it than talking.
Wow.
So by now, as I mentioned, this is when he came home. Peter was found dead and Joan was in the hospital, and police had Christopher in their sights. They caught up with them and they questioned him about his whereabouts on the night of November fourteenth to fifteenth in two thousand and four. He had a ready answer. He claimed that he spent the night at the Monroe House, a dormitory lounge in the University of Rochester, about three and a half hours away in Delmar, so this would
be on his campus, right. He said. He only learned about his parents' attack the next morning, when the Times Union reporter covering the crime reached out to his roommate for information about the Porco family. The moment he found out, Christopher said he immediately rushed home to Albany and went to see his mother in the medical center. In the medical center where she was undergoing surgery and recovering.
Yeah, that's like terrifying, though. I hope, like, I hope, okay, you get well, I'm just like he didn't get in there, right, because that's just oh man, Okay.
I'm unsure if he did. I'm assuming he probably did, but yeah, the thought of the murderer, Yeah yeah, yeah. So detectives weren't satisfied with his answer. They questioned his fraternity brothers, friends, campus safety officers, and even his ex girlfriend about his whereabouts during the critical early morning hours
of November fifteenth. Two weeks later, a grand jury was convened by the Albany Court District Attorney Office to hear testimony that could implement implicate there we go, implicate Christopher in his father's murder.
Now.
During this closed door hearing, witnesses including fraternity brothers from Sigma Sigma Pi Epsilon, classmates, and former girlfriend testified. Finally, nearly a year after the attack, in November of two thousand and five, Christopher was formally charged. But just when the case seemed air tight, a shocking twist changed everything. Christopher's mother, Joan Porko, had emerged from her coma, and when she did, she insisted her son had nothing to do with the attack.
What the yeah, okay? I was not expecting that whatsoever.
Yeah, She said her son had nothing to do with it. She even recorded a videotape statement for the grand jury in December of two thousand and five, talking about her family but refusing to identify Christopher as the attacker. Over the coming months, jones unwavering loyalty to her son became a focal point as the case headed to trial.
What yeah, because what was that? Probably the main evidence was her primarily yeah, huh okay.
By then, the case had gained widespread media attention in Albany, so Christopher's trial was moved to Goshen, Orange County, New York. It began on June twenty seventh, two thousand and six. He faced two charges, second degree murder for killing his father and second degree attempted murder for the brutal attack on his mother. Prosecutors were adamant Christopher drove over three hours to Albery in the early morning of November fifteenth
to kill his parents in cold blood. The evidence seemed overwhelming, which of course contradicted his alibi, proving that he wasn't at his dorms that night see his own fraternity brothers testified not a single one could place him at the dormitory during those hours. Meanwhile, classmates described Christopher as an increasingly heavy drinker who had once threatened to kill a
female student. Security cambriage footage from the University of Rochester captured a yellow jeep Wrangler identical to Christopher's, leaving campus at ten thirty pm on November fourteenth and returning at eight thirty am on November fifteenth. That timeframe is perfect lines up perfectly, yeah.
And also like it's a noticeable vehicle, right exactly.
Additional evidence showed that the Porco's home burglar alarm had been deactivated at two fourteen am and the phone line was cut at a round four fifty nine AM, suggesting a deliberate effort to stage a robbery. However, detectives quickly saw through it. Nothing had act actually been stolen, the same with the cut screen on the window suggesting an entry point, but nothing had been stolen. Even more dam damning, Christopher was one of the few people who knew the
four digit code to disable the house alarm. His older brother Jonathan testified that their relationship had been strained and that Christopher was fully aware of his parents' life insurance policies to New York State through a toll booth collectors provided further confirmation. One toll operator near Rochester reported seeing a yellow jeep at ten forty five pm, while another at Exit twenty four in Albany saw the same speeding jeep approaching the toll plaza before two am on November fifteenth.
A neighbor also told investigators that he spotted a yellow jeep in the porco's driveway before for a m the picture was clear. Christopher had left Rochester the night before, used the hidden spare key, the very same one that Peter knew was there even in his zombie like state, to enter the house. He disabled the security alarm and attacked his parents with an axe. Afterwards, he cleaned up, staged a fake burglary, cut the phone line, and drove
back to Rochester before morning. Investigators theorized that Christopher wore medical scrubs during the attack, ones that he likely would have gotten in working at the medical the pet medical facility, the vet veterinary clinic, or whatever you want to call it, and then dispose of them somewhere Afterwards, colleague testified that he had experienced cleaning up after surgical procedures from this facility as well, which further supported the theory on why
there was not much evidence left behind.
Holy shit. Yeah, okay, so sorry, I'm sure you have more to say, but I have like a million questions, but I'll let you carry on.
We'll shoot if you got questions.
Well nope, I'm assuming they're going to be answered though. Like, I'm just shocked here of why the mom changed her ways. I'm assuming she decided it wasn't worth it for her kid to be going into jail forever. Or maybe he's like threatening her that he'll come back and finish the job. I don't know. I'm just like, what the hell is going on here?
Maybe he didn't attack her, maybe she had brain damage and doesn't remember.
Well, yeah, I'm like, did he actually do it?
I don't know what the heck. Well, as far as did he actually do it, Christopher's legal team and husband, which was a husband and wife duo, argued that despite all the circumstantial evidence that was against him, and you know what, it's true, it is all circumstantial evidence, they had no physical proof of linking him to the crime. Sure he wasn't where he said he was supposed to be. Sure he was driving across the counties or cities or whatever you want to say. Sure he was seen here
and there and all over this place. Doesn't mean he killed his parents, right, well, I guess not. There was no fingerprints found on the acts, no DNA placed him at the scene, there was no blood evidence tying him to the murder. But as legal battle played out, it wasn't the defense's argument that stole the show. It was Jones's heartbreaking devotion to her son. She stood by Christopher's side throughout the trial, even walking arm in arm with
him into the courtroom. She even took the stand as a defense witness, telling jurors that she had no memory of even implicating her son and that he could never have done such a horrific thing. Joan acknowledged that Christopher's financial misdeeds had caused strain, but she insisted their family loved each other and wanted to mend their relationship. Her
loyalty went beyond these words. After Christopher's indictment in two thousand and five, Joan put up a two hundred and fifty thousand dollars for his bail, ensuring that he remained free until trial. After closing arguments wrapped up on August second, two thousand and six, the jury deliberated for six days
before delivering their verdict on August eighth. Christopher was found guilty and convicted of second degree murder for his father's death and second degree attempted murder for the attack on his mother. On December twelfth, two thousand and six, he was sentenced to twenty five to life for each count, ensuring he would serve a minimum of fifty years in prison. Today, Christopher Porko remains behind bars at Clinton Correctional Facility in
Clinton County, New York. And that is a story of the Porko family axe murder and the murder of Peter Porko.
Holy shit, I don't even know what the hell the thing my brain is just like right away, it's like, holy that complete asshole. I still sort of I think he did it.
Oh, I think he did it too, But I'm just like.
Shook to by the mom I am just like flabbergasted here. There was so much going through my brain. Yeah, huh okay. Well, also like I feel pretty confident that we're not having kids. I do like cases like this because it's like, okay, like this, this is good, but also wow, I can't I also can't imagine being the like am like the paramedic, yea, dealing with this shit like oh those people are just like some of them. I just feel that's just a
hard job. And then also asking like that question or whatever, like was this your son? And then they nod, Oh, I just cann't imagine, just like you're insides were just like twist. I like, that's just so disturbing.
Yeah, I just want to say, I love, I absolutely love when I do a case and you get so hung up and flabbergasted, you're stumbling over your own words and you're I just and that's how you sound at the end of it.
Well, yeah, I do sound like that right now because I'm just shocked because there is a little bit of doubt potentially there is, but the mom, because the mom completely changed her ways.
Yeah, but here's the thing. She doesn't even remember implicating her son. She doesn't remember saying yes, he did it, which leads me to believe, Okay, yeah, there's some residual brain damage trauma.
But then at the time it was so fresh, like she would have she wouldn't have made that up, right if it wasn't her son, I don't think correct.
And now, even so, even if you want to make the argument, okay, if there's there's trauma and brain damage preventing her from membering, well, then there could potentially be trauma and brain damage prevent or convincing her that it was. So the argument goes both sides there. So let's just say the witness testimony is out the fucking window. Okay, However, you have to consider all the circumstantial evidence leaving leading up to it.
Mm hmm. Well, because I just need to say too though she could have she could have been misunderstood right, She wasn't able to communicate fully correct. It could have been misunderstood that she was implicating her son.
Well, it was a yes or no, and they asked was it a family member? She said yes? Was it your oldest son Jonathan, No? Was it your youngest son Christopher Yes?
I just yeah, I want to think that a kid could not do couldn't do this. How could they do this to their parents?
Right? Their parents over money? Money? Well, I mean there's there's a lot more emotional things at stake than just the money, But it ties down to money that they were arguing over.
Fucking money, Hey, yeah, money, how many things like so many I feel like cases and just bad shit that happens. It's because of money.
Money sucks, Money do suck?
Oh this world. I just don't like how it's so.
I don't know, money driven, money hungry. I mean, they say money is the root of all.
Evil, right, So the evidence is basically that between that timespan, he wasn't accounted for his vehicles seen you know, was it was seen in the driveway?
It was it was seen in the driveway.
Geez, Okay, it was seen in the fucking driveway. Okay. And then they knew the code, they knew where the spare the spare key was. He probably had a fucking key, to be honest.
He may have. He may have used a spare key. But that's the thing. Not only was his vehicle seen in the driveway, and he wasn't accounted for every time his vehicle was seen and was accounted for leaving and returning to campus, for example, passing back through the toll booths and in the driveway, all of it painted the picture of leaving and driving back the exact timeframe. At each point he was seen.
Hmm, so it was him. But oh the mom just like has convinced herself that her son could just never do this. I think so, which I mean, I don't blame her.
Yeah, it's hard to think that someone like that could do something like that to you, right.
Well, yeah, like killed her husband. The dad like the son's dad Like.
Huh, So he had the motivation for it. He was not living the best life because I mean, hey, you have people who are like, yeah, he's going on downwards, spile, drinking more and even threaten someone. His vehicle was unaccounted for he was seen or his vehicle or vehicle matching his very unique vehicle's description was accounted for in certain areas at certain times. He lied to police officers, all accumulating to a big old stepot of circumstantial evidence, which
was enough circumstantial evidence to put him behind bars. As the court confidently said, you are the one to have committed this crime without us seeing any concrete evidence. So it's enough circumstantial evidence to say you did it.
I bet that his mom goes and visits him.
Probably I believe so too. My gosh, I have a feeling his brother Jonathan has nothing to do.
With her, probably just like the escalation there. I just can't imagine being that angry at someone that he would go into their home and literally, like, I don't know you, was an axe on them. He swung that ax. What would it be like nineteen times? Was it sixteen for the dad or something?
And three for those mom sixteen for the father and three for the mother.
So like to swing that ax nineteen times at these like two individuals that like raised you. Yeah, I don't know, okayes, he's something seriously.
Messed up there, Yeah, no kidding. Anyways, hopefully you guys enjoy this show. If you have thoughts on whether Christopher was the one to do this or not, I'm curious. I want to hear about it because it is circumstantial evidence that he was convicted on. So if you think there's another way that this could have actually played out, yeah,
shoot us a message, shoot us an email. We've been getting some emails recently, and messages, I mean we get them every once in a while, but particularly lately, we've had a lot of messages about people reaching out regarding not even the content of our show, but just saying some really nice things about how we've been there for them and we've helped them through things, and we just want to say that means a lot. So thank you
for everyone who's been reaching out like that. We're trying to get back to each and every one of you, and we will if we haven't yet. So just yeah, thank you.
Yeah, it's unreal to think that I don't know we've even remotely impacted anyone's life, So that's really nice.
It is. So Yeah, I just wanted to say at the end here, thank you. It means a lot. If you're interested in shooting us an email message, whether it's a show or anything else, we have links in the description where you can find all that information, whether it's Facebook, YouTube, Instagram, emails, it's all there. We have a website you can check it all out. Links you name it, description of this show. Yeah, I have to.
Say one more thing real quick. How the hell do people listen to true crime as like a bedtime story going to sleep? Because I was pretty pumped to go to sleep, but now I'm like all riled up. I don't know if I'll be able to just like snooze right now. So, but people literally listen to this to fall asleep, Well, yeah, that's incredible. How do they do that.
As a kid? And stuff like didn't you ever listen to like ghost stories before bed and stuff?
I don't know if I did before bed. No, anyway, Shit, you just wrecked my sleep.
I'm sorry. Well, I'm going to have a good sleep. Hopefully you guys do too.
And until next episode, stay Wicked.