Till Murder Do Us Part

Volkman and Cummings ( Goombata ) dramatically tell the story of a murder investigation full of absorbing twists. Robert Fioretti was an arrogant, authoritarian New York City cop who was demoted to a ``dumping ground for problem cops.'' When Fioretti began an affair with his female partner, his long-suffering wife Rita finally tried to divorce him. Then, as Fioretti prepared to marry his pregnant partner, Rita disappeared. The rest of the book belongs to the investigators, notably Vincent Barbaro, who senses evil in Fioretti and in his denigration of his missing wife. Barbaro reconstructs Rita's life, finds a fake signature on a bank withdrawal attributed to her and begins to dog his quarry. The trail takes him to Fioretti's bizarrely emotionless new wife, to a girlfriend of Fioretti's brother and to Fioretti's terrified son Robert Jr. Though a headless torso in the Hudson River seems to be Rita, it is not until Fioretti's stepdaughters claim they were sexually abused by him that Fioretti is arrested. He is convicted in federal court on bank fraud charges and pleads guilty to rape and sexual abuse. As he currently serves ten years in prison, the murder case remains unresolved. Photos not seen by PW. (Jan.)