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Nelson Iván Serrano Sáenz (Quito, 1938) is a former Ecuadorian businessman and nationalized US-citizen (since 1971) who was convicted of murdering Frank Dosso, Diane Patisso, George Patisso, and George Gosolves in 1997 in Bartow, Florida. A jury recommended the death penalty for Serrano in October 2006 after he was convicted of the murders. On June 26, 2007 Judge Susan Roberts sentenced him to death by lethal injection.

Life and trial

On June 26, 2007 Judge Susan Roberts sentenced Nelson Serrano to death by lethal injection even though not a shred of evidence, not counting the footprint on the chair by the raised ceiling tile in his old office where he kept a gun and where most of the murders took place, or the fingerprint on the parking ticket which exposed a lie he told to investigators when he was first questioned about the crimes, placing him in Florida while he claimed he was in Georgia, could connect Mr. Serrano with the crime scene or the murders. It is currently under appeal at the Florida Supreme Court. More info can be found at www.nelsonserrano.org [1]. His conviction was based also on testimony by his own nephew that he (the nephew) was asked to rent a car and leave it at the airport. Serrano originally told police he was in Atlanta on a business trip, the details of which he never thought useful to explain to the jury. However investigators uncovered an elaborate plot where he flew to Atlanta and checked into a motel near the airport. He is seen on security camera tape leaving the motel early in the morning and not returning until later that night. In between, Mr. Serrano flew back to Florida (Orlando) under a false name, which just so happened to be the name of his illegitamite son he had abandoned years before, and retrieved the car his nephew had rented for him. It was the ticket from the parking garage at the airport that provided the evidence which exposed his lie that he spent the entire day in the motel in Atlanta with a migraine headache. From the airport, he drove to the Bartow factory, killed four people, and then drove back to a different airport (Tampa)and flew back to Atlanta, where he was seen returning to the motel, again on security camera tape, in just the right amount of time that it would have taken to execute his plan. If he had decided to use emergency exits at the motel instead of the door in the main lobby at other times throughout the day (which would have explained why he appears on the security camera only early in the morning, returning later that night) he never bothered to explain that to the jury. It is thought that since his plan was discovered, and his statements to investigators were proven to be lies, Serrano decided not to testify at his own trial, relying instead on a series of legal maneuvers, including the claims of false extradition mentioned below. None of them swayed the jury.

During the trial Serrano's lawyers fought for a mistrial claiming that that Serrano was illegally deported from Ecuador to the US. Nelson Serrano is an Ecuadorian citizen by birth and a naturalized US Citizen, entered Ecuador as an Ecuadorian prior to his abduction and so proven and agreed to by Ecuadorian officials as well as the Inter-American Commission on Human Rights. These evidences can be confirmed using proprietary documents from the Ecuadorian government and this human rights commission and can be found on the website, [2]. These evidences were also presented during trial and were confirmed by the Ecuadorian Ombudsman through his testimony. Judge Roberts chose to ignore these facts and denied defendant's motion to dismiss this case. She also denied the motion for a Change of Venue despite the fact that one of the victims, Diane Patisso, was an assistant District Attorney that worked in that courthouse and was known to her. Her murder was perhaps the most unfortunate of all because she was rarely at the factory, and was only there the night of the murders because her husband's car was being repaired and she was picking him up. "Maybe she walked in, in, in the middle of something," Serrano actually told police in statements made the day after the murders, before details of the crime scene were even known to anyone other than the police, and mirroring the state's theory that Diane Patisso stumbled upon the scene after the gunman had killed the three others. Diane was found near the entrance, away from where the others where killed.

On March 6, 2009, the Ecuadorian government delivered an official and written letter of protest to the U.S. Embassy in Ecuador requesting U.S. cooperation in Nelson Serrano's return to Ecuador to face charges according to law and the extradition treaty these two countries have with each other. As of the press conference held on April 6, 2009 in Miami, the U.S. State Department has yet to respond. Copies of these documents can also be found at www.nelsonserrano.org[3].

External links

Full coverage of the quadruple murder trial of Nelson Serrano
http://www.nelsonserrano.org - coverage for reporters, law students, etc.

This United States biographical article related to crime is a stub. You can help Wikipedia by expanding it.

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 On June 26, 2007 Judge Susan Roberts sentenced Nelson Serrano to death by lethal injection even though not a shred of evidence, not counting the footprint on the chair by the raised ceiling tile in his old office where he kept a gun and where most of the murders took place, or the fingerprint on the parking ticket which exposed a lie he told to investigators when he was first questioned about the crimes, placing him in Florida while he claimed he was in Georgia, could connect Mr. Serrano with the crime scene or the murders. It is currently under appeal at the Florida Supreme Court. More info can be found at www.nelsonserrano.org [http://www.nelsonserrano.org]. His conviction was based also on testimony by his own nephew that he (the nephew) was asked to rent a car and leave it at the airport.  Serrano originally told police he was in Atlanta on a business trip, the details of which he never thought useful to explain to the jury.  However investigators uncovered an elaborate plot where he flew to Atlanta and checked into a motel near the airport.  He is seen on security camera tape leaving the motel early in the morning and not returning until later that night.  In between, Mr. Serrano flew back to Florida (Orlando) under a false name, which just so happened to be the name of his illegitamite son he had abandoned years before, and retrieved the car his nephew had rented for him.  It was the ticket from the parking garage at the airport that provided the evidence which exposed his lie that he spent the entire day in the motel in Atlanta with a migraine headache.  From the airport, he drove to the Bartow factory, killed four people, and then drove back to a different airport (Tampa)and flew back to Atlanta, where he was seen returning to the motel, again on security camera tape, in just the right amount of time that it would have taken to execute his plan.  If he had decided to use emergency exits at the motel instead of the door in the main lobby at other times throughout the day (which would have explained why he appears on the security camera only early in the morning, returning later that night) he never bothered to explain that to the jury.   It is thought that since his plan was discovered, and his statements to investigators were proven to be lies, Serrano decided not to testify at his own trial, relying instead on a series of legal maneuvers, including the claims of false extradition mentioned below.  None of them swayed the jury.
-During the trial Serrano's lawyers fought for a mistrial claiming that that Serrano was illegally deported from Ecuador to the US. Nelson Serrano is an Ecuadorian citizen by birth and a naturalized US Citizen, entered Ecuador as an Ecuadorian prior to his abduction and so proven and agreed to by Ecuadorian officials as well as the Inter-American Commission on Human Rights. These evidences can be confirmed using proprietary documents from the Ecuadorian government and this human rights commission and can be found on the website, [http://www.nelsonserrano.org]. These evidences were also presented during trial and were confirmed by the Ecuadorian Ombudsman through his testimony. Judge Roberts chose to ignore these facts and denied defendant's motion to dismiss this case. She also denied the motion for a Change of Venue despite the fact that one of the victims, Diane Patisso, was an assistant District Attorney that worked in that courthouse and was known to her.
+During the trial Serrano's lawyers fought for a mistrial claiming that that Serrano was illegally deported from Ecuador to the US. Nelson Serrano is an Ecuadorian citizen by birth and a naturalized US Citizen, entered Ecuador as an Ecuadorian prior to his abduction and so proven and agreed to by Ecuadorian officials as well as the Inter-American Commission on Human Rights. These evidences can be confirmed using proprietary documents from the Ecuadorian government and this human rights commission and can be found on the website, [http://www.nelsonserrano.org]. These evidences were also presented during trial and were confirmed by the Ecuadorian Ombudsman through his testimony. Judge Roberts chose to ignore these facts and denied defendant's motion to dismiss this case. She also denied the motion for a Change of Venue despite the fact that one of the victims, Diane Patisso, was an assistant District Attorney that worked in that courthouse and was known to her.  Her murder was perhaps the most unfortunate of all because she was rarely at the factory, and was only there the night of the murders because her husband's car was being repaired and she was picking him up.  "Maybe she walked in, in, in the middle of something," Serrano actually told police in statements made the day after the murders, before details of the crime scene were even known to anyone other than the police, and mirroring the state's theory that Diane Patisso stumbled upon the scene after the gunman had killed the three others.  Diane was found near the entrance, away from where the others where killed.
 On March 6, 2009, the Ecuadorian government delivered an official and written letter of protest to the U.S. Embassy in Ecuador requesting U.S. cooperation in Nelson Serrano's return to Ecuador to face charges according to law and the extradition treaty these two countries have with each other. As of the press conference held on April 6, 2009 in Miami, the U.S. State Department has yet to respond. Copies of these documents can also be found at www.nelsonserrano.org[http://www.nelsonserrano.org].