Click here to subscribe today or Login.
WILKES-BARRE — A padlocked door, sealed around its edges with tape and tissue paper, led investigators to the dank attic that was Maria Brea’s tomb.
Expert testimony Wednesday in trial of Brea’s suspected killer described in graphic detail the manner in which the mother of two’s body was discovered: bound by duct tape at the hands and feet and wrapped in a clear plastic sheet. One of her socks appeared to have been shoved in her mouth and taped, according to testimony.
While prosecutors and state police forensics expert Trooper John Corrigan dissected the discovery, Oscar Lozano Garcia hung his head and avoided eye contact with the projection screen flashing dozens of images of Brea’s body.
Lozano Garcia, 38, faces an open count of criminal homicide after prosecutors say he choked the 32-year-old mother to death and stowed her body in the attic above her second floor Hazleton apartment on Dec. 14, 2012.
Corrigan testified he and another trooper found Brea’s body four days later, after the two made their way through a hallway leading to the padlocked and duct-tape-guarded attic door inside a storage room.
Once up the stairway, Corrigan said he found “a corpse wrapped up in the attic.”
An autopsy found blood under Brea’s fingernails and revealed a yellow plastic bag had been placed over her head, he added. The cause of Brea’s death had previously been ruled asphyxiation due to strangulation.
Lozano Garcia’s fingerprints were found on the tape, Corrigan said, though he acknowledged during cross-examination he only collects and analyzes prints, and doesn’t identify them.
Asked by defense attorney John Sobota if his analysis of the apartment yielded any signs of a struggle, Corrigan stated “nothing obvious” was discovered.
Prior to Corrigan taking the stand, witnesses on Wednesday were mostly comprised of Lozano Garcia’s co-workers at Daron Northeast, a masonry and concrete company in Archbald.
Most of their testimony centered around the sudden strange behavior, scratch-laden skin and requests for quick cash that preceded his escape to Mexico in the days surrounding Brea’s disappearance.
One co-worker, James Hyde, testified a panicked Lozano Garcia on the day Brea went missing showed up to work “with a handful of scratches” and indicated he wouldn’t be able to stay for his shift. Hyde said Lozano Garcia mentioned the police and appeared “frightened and nervous.”
He assumed the couple got into a fight because he often overheard the pair arguing on the phone, Hyde said. The spats would sometimes result in Lozano Garcia leaving work early, he testified.
Lozano Garcia’s supervisor, Ivan Frable, gave a similar account.
He testified Lozano Garcia had been a model employee until the weeks leading up to Brea’s disappearance, when he regularly began showing up late for work.
The unusual behavior peaked on Dec. 14, 2012, when Lozano Garcia again arrived late and announced he was quitting, Frable said. He was given an older paycheck he was owed and asked for an advance on his pay for the current period, which he did not get, according to Frable.
Then Lozano Garcia said something else, Frable said.
“He said there was big trouble with policia and (he) had to leave,” he said, noting Lozano Garcia appeared “very anxious.”
Sobota targeted inconsistencies in Frable’s written statement to police, noting there was no mention of “policia.”
“So you forgot to put that in?” Sobota said.
“Apparently,” Frable responded.
Angel Cantoran met Lozano Garcia through a mutual friend a few months prior to December 2012 and testified Lozano Garcia asked him to borrow around $1,000. Cantoran said Lozano Garcia turned over the title to his truck as collateral while he paid back the loan.
Lozano Garcia told him in December 2012 he couldn’t come up with the rest of the money but would give him the truck if Cantoran could loan him even more cash, Cantoran testified.
He said he noticed a scratch on Lozano Garcia’s face when the two met to make the exchange in Wilkes-Barre.
The last witness before Corrigan’s testimony, Juan Cervantes said he accepted $600 in cash from Lozano Garcia in exchange for a ride to Mexico.
Cervantes, a fellow Daron employee who makes an annual trip to Mexico to visit family, said he dropped off Lozano Garcia at a shopping center in Jalisco, Mexico and watched him depart in a taxi.
It was the last time he saw Lozano Garcia, he said.
U.S. Marshals captured Lozano Garcia in Puebla, Mexico, in January 2014. He was extradited to the U.S. in June 2014.
Testimony is set to resume Thursday at 9:30 a.m.
The trial is being heard by Luzerne County President Judge Richard M. Hughes III, after Lozano Garcia on Monday waived his right to a jury trial.
