He had a great career within NASA but a millionaire divorce changed his plans and under the guise of Santa Claus he committed a bloody massacre.

Bruce Pardo had a great career within NASAbut he couldn’t bear the divorce. Precisely, he could not bear the fact of having to pay 2,100 euros per month in support to his ex-wife. This led him to commit a massacre rare, at least, outside the United States.

Santa Claus Dress (Santa Claus in the United States) visited his ex-wife’s housewhere they were celebrating Christmas as a family and, when one of her daughters opened the door, she shot her in the face. He entered and continued shooting the rest of the family members, while setting the house on fire with a flamethrower. He ended up murdering 9 people in what became known as the “Covina Massacre.”

The story of Bruce Pardo and the Christmas massacre

Since he was a child, Bruce Pardo showed an aptitude for mathematics and computing, something he inherited from his father, an engineer. Born in Los Angeles on March 23, 1963, teachers remembered him as a brilliant student but one who always wanted to attract attention.

Once graduated, he began working at the Jet Propulsion Laboratory, a center that builds unmanned spacecraft for NASA. But He was more dedicated to hacking the system than working. At that job he met Delia, a young woman with whom he planned his wedding for June 17, 1989 at the San Fernando Mission. But that day he stood her up at the altar, took $3,000 from her account and went on vacation.

The friends They described him as a “big, silly, adorable boy.”and they said that despite his intelligence he lacked common sense. When he returned from his vacation he had no regrets whatsoever. A few years later, he rebuilt his life with Elena Lucano, who had a 1-year-old son. But soon after, the child, who was under his care, fell into the empty pool while he was watching television.

The accident left the boy paraplegic and led to the breakdown of their relationship. Three years later, his brother-in-law introduced him to Sylvia Orza, a 40-year-old woman with three children. They got married in 2006 and everything was going well until he became much more greedy and all the arguments they had revolved around money.

In March 2008 Sylvia decided to separate and a month later he asked for a divorce. Bruce did not take the news well at all, and it was worse when he found out that he had to pay him 2,100 euros a month in support. From then on he began to develop his revenge plan.

A week before Christmas, they appeared before the judge to settle their divorce. Bruce would pay Sylvia $10,000 and keep the dog and wedding ring. By then, he already had everything arranged. Santa Claus suit made by the dressmaker, 5 guns, bullets and a flamethrower.

Christmas Eve was the ideal day to carry out the plan. Disguised, he went to Sylvia’s house. The 8-year-old girl who opened the door couldn’t believe she had Santa himself in front of her eyes. The shot in Katrina’s face was the first, and she immediately began shooting indiscriminately at the rest of those present. Sixteen managed to escape quickly, but 9 of them died in the attempt. Among them his ex-wife, father-in-law and mother-in-law, as well as several of Sylvia’s siblings.

One of the survivors, Katrina’s mother, managed to call the emergency services for help.: “We need someone right away. My daughter was shot. She was shot in the face!”

After the shooting, Bruce took out the flamethrower and started setting the entire house on fire. 80 firefighters had to attend to put out that fire and it took them 2 hours to control it. The murderer was escaping in a blue SUV.

Although he had plans to escape to Canada, he did not expect to have so many injuries to his legs, arms and neck. Without the possibility of continuing to flee, he decided to shoot himself so as not to face the sentence.