He Receives Sympathy From Victim’s Family and Jurors : Killer Who Tossed Body From Plane Gets Life

Donald P. DiMascio, who admitted killing a 27-year-old Anaheim man aboard an airplane, then tossing his body into the ocean beyond Santa Catalina Island in 1982, was spared the death penalty Tuesday when an Orange County jury returned a verdict of life without parole.

Jurors later said it would be unfair to impose a death verdict on the 37-year-old ex-convict from El Monte when the pilot of the rented airplane, Lawrence R. Cowell, who had masterminded the murder, was sentenced to only 25 years to life in prison by another jury in a separate trial.

After the verdict was read, Gary and Collene Campbell, parents of the victim, Scott Campbell, hugged DiMascio’s father, Philip, in the hallway of the Santa Ana courtroom.

“Please forgive my son--and me,” Philip DiMascio told the Campbells.

‘A Relief’

To jurors who had gathered around, the elder DiMascio said, “Thank you for sparing my son,” adding that their verdict was “a relief for me. . . . “We bring them into this world; we try to do the best we can by them.”

Although Gary Campbell said he and his wife thought a death verdict would have been proper, he added, “We have a lot of empathy for the DiMascio family. We know what it’s like to lose a son.”

Deputy Dist. Atty. Thomas M. Goethals praised the Campbells, whose private investigation into their son’s death led police to Cowell and DiMascio, who were arrested in March, 1983. “If it hadn’t been for the Campbells, we probably would never have known about these two guys,” the prosecutor said. “Their son might have ended up just another missing person.”

Car Discovered

The Anaheim couple began their search when Scott Campbell failed to return from a business trip to North Dakota on April 17, 1982. They eventually discovered his car parked at Fullerton Municipal Airport and learned that Cowell, a friend of their son, had rented a plane there that morning.

It was the Campbells’ digging that also uncovered proof that Cowell had lied about where he had gone that day. That information prompted Anaheim police investigators and the Orange County district attorney’s office to get involved.

What the Campbells did not know was that their son was on his way to North Dakota to sell a pound of cocaine. And what Scott Campbell did not know was that the buyer was an undercover federal drug agent, Greg Fox.

With Fox’s help, law enforcement authorities set a trap for Cowell and then DiMascio.

Cooperating with Anaheim police, Fox came to Orange County, called Cowell and convinced him that people he worked for needed to know what had happened to Campbell because he had been carrying phone numbers on him that could hurt Fox’s bosses.

‘Fishy Bait’

Cowell, unaware that the conversation was being taped, told Fox that he and DiMascio had killed Campbell and that the Anaheim man was now “fishy bait.”

The next day, Fox and undercover Anaheim officers used the same ploy with DiMascio, who freely admitted killing Campbell while Cowell piloted the plane.

“Larry said he was going to give me $5,000 for offing the dude,” DiMascio told them, according to the tape of that conversation, which was played for jurors in the first phase of the trial. “I broke his neck. I broke his nose . . . and threw him out.”

Cowell, 38, was convicted of first-degree murder more than a year ago in a non-jury trial. Prosecutors also had sought the death penalty for Cowell, alleging that he had robbed Campbell during the plane ride, a special circumstance that can warrant a death verdict under state law.

But Superior Court Judge Donald A. McCartin rejected that allegation, saying Cowell’s primary motive was revenge against Campbell over a previous drug deal. The robbery, McCartin said, was an afterthought, and he sentenced Cowell to 25 years to life in prison.

DiMascio’s circumstances were different. Because he had agreed to kill Campbell for $5,000, prosecutors accused DiMascio of the legal equivalent of murder-for-hire--murder for financial gain, another special circumstance that can carry a possible death penalty.

When DiMascio’s jury found him guilty of first-degree murder on July 15, the panel also determined that the crime was committed for financial gain, a finding that automatically led to a second penalty phase of the trial, in which jurors were asked to choose between death and life without parole.

Because of the rules of evidence, DiMascio’s jurors could not be told why DiMascio’s situation differed from Cowell’s. All they knew was that Cowell did not get a death verdict, and DiMascio’s attorney argued that it would be unfair to impose a death sentence on his client for the same crime.

Jurors indicated Tuesday that they agreed. “Larry Cowell was involved just as much as DiMascio,” jury foreman Nick Soffel of Buena Park said Tuesday. “It just wasn’t fair for one to get death and the other get a chance at parole; we all agreed on that.”

Concern for Family

Juror Frank Paterlini of Irvine said panel members also had tremendous sympathy for DiMascio’s family. Besides his parents, DiMascio is married, has two teen-age sons and a stepdaughter.

“We were especially concerned about his children,” Paterlini said. “At least this way they get a chance to have some kind of contact with him.”

In seeking a death sentence, Goethals told jurors of DiMascio’s past--he served four years in prison for two armed robberies and an assault. But defense attorney Clarence E. Haynes hit home to jurors that if Cowell didn’t get a death sentence, then DiMascio shouldn’t get one.

Philip DiMascio said Tuesday that he had always believed his son’s claim that he was innocent of Campbell’s murder but that now “I have to accept the jury’s verdict. They say he killed that boy.”

DiMascio had been free until his conviction on $250,000 bail. The money was put up by the defendant’s four brothers, a sister, an aunt and two cousins, Philip DiMascio said.

“No matter what he might have done, he was still my son,” Philip DiMascio said. “We knew that he was worth saving.”

He blamed Cowell for his son’s troubles with the law. “Donald is a follower,” his father said. “Now he will have to pay.”