SC SC - Scott family of four, ages 59-82, Pendleton, 1 Nov 2015

[Chimera]

Wondering if the vile pair paid rent for the trailer they lived in on her mom and stepdad's property ?
Also, had they borrowed money from any of the victims, and refused to pay it back, and things became more heated ?
Omo.

 

[tlcya]

“I don’t understand why any of it has happened and I just keep thinking it’s a dream I’m going to wake up from. Whoever did this, I don’t see how you can live with yourself.”
Woman Went on TV and Asked How Her Family's Killer Could 'Live with Yourself'. Now She's Charged with 4 Murders

wakey wakey Amy and Ross, time to face the music.

 

[ilovewings]

“I don’t understand why any of it has happened and I just keep thinking it’s a dream I’m going to wake up from. Whoever did this, I don’t see how you can live with yourself.”
Woman Went on TV and Asked How Her Family's Killer Could 'Live with Yourself'. Now She's Charged with 4 Murders

wakey wakey Amy and Ross, time to face the music.

I was not familiar with this case which I just read at DailyMail- so of course I came here to see if there was a thread and sure enough, here it is---Great news they caught Amy and Ross- I imagine t hey were pretty confident they had gotten away with it after so many years!!! She murdered her mother for God's sake-- evil, purely evil!

 

[Chimera]

I was not familiar with this case which I just read at DailyMail- so of course I came here to see if there was a thread and sure enough, here it is---Great news they caught Amy and Ross- I imagine t hey were pretty confident they had gotten away with it after so many years!!!

Agreed.
Would like to have seen the looks on their faces when the police showed up !
Sad it took so long, but better late than never.

 

[worm]

Agreed.
Would like to have seen the looks on their faces when the police showed up !
Sad it took so long, but better late than never.

They had to see the writing and know they were being looked at. Tho I don’t expect it I’d like to know the full story.

 

[Seattle1]

Reportedly, the 'cold-case' investigation was beginning to steam up again last spring when the Anderson County Sheriff's office named them persons of interest. Their arrest definitely should not have come as any surprise!

Married South Carolina couple charged with brutally killing 4 members of their own family

12/16/23

Amy Vilardi and Rosmore “Ross” Vilardi each stand accused of four counts of murder over the Halloween 2015 slayings of Cathy Scott, Michael Scott, Barbara Scott, and Violet Taylor. The victims — each stabbed and shot — were Amy Vilardi’s mother, father-in-law, grandmother-in-law, and maternal grandmother.

The Vilardis were arrested on Friday after being named persons of interest in the case by the Anderson County Sheriff’s Office in March.

[..]

The sheriff described the daughter allegedly reporting the grim find and ensuing 911 call as “the foundation of the case” but was largely reticent to disclose additional details about the murders and investigation. Instead, he implored the media to attend the courtroom proceedings and suggested any information that he divulged to the press might be used against the state by the defense.

[..]

The Vilardis lived on the same property as the victims at the time of the killings but in a separate house on Refuge Road in Pendleton, a small town that borders Clemson, the namesake of the public university well-known for its NCAA football team.

[..]

According to the coroner, there were no signs of breaking and entering, WYFF reported.

 

[ilovewings]

All crimes are horrible, but killing your mother, father in law and 2 elderly women they were related to, is truly beyond horrible. It is twisted and very evil. That kind of betrayal is beyond comprehension.

 

[Seattle1]

I'm new to the case but was thinking even if evidence was contaminated, how could this horrific massacre go without an arrest for 8 years. Seemed pretty obvious this was not random. When you need to shoot somebody after they are deceased (throats cut), that's just hate, hate, hate. After listening to Sheriff McBride, I'm wondering if the grand jury had problems agreeing to indict the couple, and the Murdaugh case helped to get them off the bubble. I'm going to check out the podcast -- loved Unsolved Mysteries in the days of Robert Stack. JMO

Years after Pendleton quadruple homicide, sheriff names persons of interest

The sheriff said new evidence points to victim's daughter and her husband as persons of interest.

www.foxcarolina.com

3/15/23

Sheriff Chad McBride, who inherited the unsolved case when he was elected in 2016, has said for years that he is confident about who he believes committed the murders - but investigators are still working to firm up their case.

He hopes a podcast released in March by Unsolved Mysteries, which puts the case in the national spotlight, will help get more answers in the investigation. Anderson County Staff Sergeant Scotty Hill told producers with Unsolved Mysteries that he doesn’t believe the murders were committed by a stranger.

“The family had to have known them because nobody put up a fight until after the attack occurred or started,” Hill said in the podcast.

McBride echoed this opinion.

“It is not a crime of randomness,” he said. “It is a very planned, personal crime is what this is. And all the details in the crime point to it being very personal and it had to be somebody they knew very well.”

[..]

At this time, no charges have been filed in the quadruple homicide investigation, but the sheriff said the double murder conviction of Alex Murdaugh could help investigators.

“The Murdaugh case was very interesting you know, to say the least,” McBride said. “There was a lot of circumstantial evidence. And it’s a lot like our case, we have some evidence. It’s not just circumstantial.”

 

[Cool Cats]

I just found out about this case too and am glad to see a thread. There is a whole bunch to find out about!

South Carolina couple is charged with murder in the 2015 killings of four of their family members

A South Carolina couple has been charged with killing four older family members in a gory 2015 Halloween attack in the victims’ home.

apnews.com

The defendants and some of their other relatives filed claims and counterclaims over belongings and thousands of dollars in cash that was taken as evidence from the property. Those assets were eventually divided among them in a 2021 settlement.

 

[Seattle1]

As referenced by Sheriff in March 2015 MSM upthread:

The Scott Family Massacre

On November 2, 2015, the Anderson County Sheriff’s Office responds to a 911 call and walks into a horrific scene. The bodies of Mike and Cathy Scott, and their two elderly mothers, are sprawled across the blood-soaked floor of their Pendleton, SC home. Seven years later, the brutal quadruple...

unsolved.com

 

[worm]

As referenced by Sheriff in March 2015 MSM upthread:

The Scott Family Massacre

On November 2, 2015, the Anderson County Sheriff’s Office responds to a 911 call and walks into a horrific scene. The bodies of Mike and Cathy Scott, and their two elderly mothers, are sprawled across the blood-soaked floor of their Pendleton, SC home. Seven years later, the brutal quadruple...

unsolved.com

I read your post in the other thread and I wondered too about the sheriff going into the AM case. I took it to mean all of the attention probably led to more pressure here. As I stated earlier, I think LE were intentional with announcing POIs and such to shake these people up. Imagine being the proverbial fly on the wall around the suspects for the last year.

 

[Seattle1]

I just found out about this case too and am glad to see a thread. There is a whole bunch to find out about!

South Carolina couple is charged with murder in the 2015 killings of four of their family members

A South Carolina couple has been charged with killing four older family members in a gory 2015 Halloween attack in the victims’ home.

apnews.com

The defendants and some of their other relatives filed claims and counterclaims over belongings and thousands of dollars in cash that was taken as evidence from the property. Those assets were eventually divided among them in a 2021 settlement.

Since the case hasn't populated in the online records system yet, I presume the AA not yet publicly accessible. I'll keep watching for it. It will be good to read about the evidence.

From the quoted link:

They have a preliminary court hearing scheduled for Feb. 20.

The case hadn’t been added to the state’s online court records system as of Tuesday, and a spokesperson for the county sheriff’s office said the agency has not identified an attorney who might speak on their behalf. In interviews with news outlets since the killings, the couple has said they are innocent.

 

[Seattle1]

I read your post in the other thread and I wondered too about the sheriff going into the AM case. I took it to mean all of the attention probably led to more pressure here. As I stated earlier, I think LE were intentional with announcing POIs and such to shake these people up. Imagine being the proverbial fly on the wall around the suspects for the last year.

Sitting patiently, waiting for the AA to drop! I think we might find some answers there on how this could take 8 years to indict.

 

[worm]

Sitting patiently, waiting for the AA to drop! I think we might find some answers there on how this could take 8 years to indict.

Im interested to know what made them turn the corner and charge it? I feel like it’s one of those that they knew all along but just didn’t have enough and the sheriff leaned into that notion himself with the “this day would come” comments.

 

[Seattle1]

As long as 7years ago -- the had SLED profilers on the case and still there was no arrest. That hurts...

2/5/16--Investigators bring in crime profilers to help solve quadruple homicide​

 

[Cool Cats]

Since the case hasn't populated in the online records system yet, I presume the AA not yet publicly accessible. I'll keep watching for it. It will be good to read about the evidence.

From the quoted link:

They have a preliminary court hearing scheduled for Feb. 20.

The case hadn’t been added to the state’s online court records system as of Tuesday, and a spokesperson for the county sheriff’s office said the agency has not identified an attorney who might speak on their behalf. In interviews with news outlets since the killings, the couple has said they are innocent.

Thanks for being "on the case."

I have gotten alot of information from you on various threads, thank you!

Anything you find in the court records system will be appreciated! Be nice to have access to their court Dockets.

 

[StarryStarryNight]

Just a thought.
LE certainly suspected the daughter and her husband early on. It was almost exclusively circumstantial evidence and it grew steadily. People have been arrested on less, yet no arrest.
So maybe the question is not why did it take 8 years to arrest them with all this evidence but, instead, what kept LE from arresting them despite having all that evidence.

 

[Cool Cats]

I read your post in the other thread and I wondered too about the sheriff going into the AM case. I took it to mean all of the attention probably led to more pressure here. As I stated earlier, I think LE were intentional with announcing POIs and such to shake these people up. Imagine being the proverbial fly on the wall around the suspects for the last year.

Yes worm, I believe you are correct.

That LE deliberately publicly named the Vilardis as POI's to get them to talk. I believe to talk on wiretaps.

I am still following a 2016 case from Ohio where a mom and dad and their 2 adult sons murdered a family of 8 people and 14 months later LE named them publicly as POI's to get them to talk on wiretaps. LE had evidence but not enough to get the Grand Jury to indict.

This brought enormous media attention and the Daily Mail (of course) published photos of them, their rental house, their church, etc... And then the media started seeking interviews with people who knew them.This included their former and current church pastors and a neighbor.

LE tracked the mother posting in social media groups that were about the murders. The lead investigator would get on the SM sites and post about the family being guilty and it got the mother all stirred up, got her posting.

LE bugged their phones and their truck. The lead investigator sent a photo to their phones of one of them holding a gun and that got them paranoid and talking and one son said he wanted to kill the lead investigator.

The point I am trying to make is that when LE has enough evidence to publicly announce that specific people are POI's, it often means that LE has enough evidence to secure a Wiretap Warrant. And I think it possibly happened in this case with the Vilardis.

Who knows? It is always possible that there are postings or conversations where the Vilardis incriminated themselves.

2 Cents

 

[Seattle1]

Anderson County Massacre: Arrests Finally Announced - FITSNews

"We were praying this day would come ..."

www.fitsnews.com

12/20/23

[..]

Emboldened by the lack of arrests in the quadruple homicide case, the Vilardis filed a lawsuit (.pdf) in Anderson County against the sheriff’s office after the murders seeking the recovery of items seized in the execution of search warrants. Those items included two vehicles, various electronic devices, firearms and $60,000 in cash. The total value of the property seized was estimated at more than $100,000.

The search warrants executed in connection with the murder investigation encompassed the two mobile homes on Refuge Road as well as a storage unit. A total of four vehicles were seized.

Pursuing ownership of two of those vehicles, Any Vilardi filed a separate lawsuit against her aunt – Pam Isbell of Spartanburg, S.C. Isbell lost her brother and mother in the 2015 slaying. According to Isbell, Amy Vilardi forged signatures on the car titles in order to transfer ownership. Isbell countersued the Vilardis for the recovery of jewelry and collectibles belonging to her late mother and brother.

The civil suits filed by the Vilardis against the sheriff’s office and Pam Isbell were dismissed after a global settlement was reached by the parties – and approved by S.C. circuit court judge J. Cordell Maddox Jr. – in December 2021. That settlement released a total of $65,890 to family members. Of that sum, $34,890 was distributed to the Vilardis. A firearm and the four vehicles went to Isbell – along with $21,412.

Due to the ongoing criminal investigation, the sheriff’s office retained possession of currency and personal property with the understanding that if and when the sheriff’s office was prepared to release those items, property removed from the single-wide mobile home would go to the Vilardis and property removed from the double-wide would go to Isbell.

[..]

The Vilardis case will be prosecuted by the office of S.C. attorney general Alan Wilson, with senior deputy attorney general Heather Weiss and assistant attorney general Kinli Abee leading its efforts.

 

[Seattle1]

Daughter Brutally Massacred 4 Family Members by Slitting Throats: Cops

Amy Vilardi and her husband, Ross Vilardi, are accused of murdering Amy's mother, stepfather, grandmother and step-grandmother, three of whom had their throats slit before being shot. Amy's mother was stabbed in the chest and then shot while still alive.

www.insideedition.com

12/18/23

[..]

A judge denied that request in 2018, and a lawyer representing the estate of Michael said in a memorandum filed in the case that Amy and her husband failed to produce records providing any sort of accounting that would explain how they came to earn the amount of cash discovered in their trailer.

“I think we knew this day was coming, we were praying this day would come,” Sheriff McBride said on Friday after news of the arrest. “So far, a lot of prayers have been answered.”

Amy and Ross made their first court appearance over the weekend, at which time a judge denied the two bond and set a preliminary hearing for February.

The two have both maintained their innocence in various television interviews in the eight years since the murders.

An attorney who previously represented the couple in their civil case did not respond to a request or comment.