A simple police call leads to a shocking confession | Forensic Files

[Music] Our episodes deal with serious and often distressing incidents. If you feel at
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free, you can support Case File on your preferred [Music] platform. On Wednesday, August 8, 2018,
a call came through to the non-emergency number of the Fontana Police Department
in Southern California. The caller was a 53-year-old local named Thomas Perez Jr., better
known as Tom. He lived with his father, 71-year-old Thomas Perez, Senior, or Papa Tom, as he was affectionately
called. Tom explained that his father had left the house to check their mail sometime between 9:30 and 10 the
previous evening of Tuesday, August 7. They lived in a culdeac with a communal mailbox located at the end of the
street, so it was only supposed to be a brief stroll there and back. Thomas Senior took their beloved
dog, a large husky border collie mix named Margo with him. Minutes later, Margo returned to
the Perez home alone. Thomas Senior was nowhere to be seen. At first, Tom wasn't overly concerned
about his father's abrupt disappearance. The pair lived relatively separate lives, and Thomas Senior was
fiercely independent, with a tendency to make plans and go places without telling
his son. Tom assumed he'd gone to visit a close friend or family member and would return of his own accord.
But when the night passed without any word from Thomas Senior and he still hadn't returned by the following
afternoon, Tom became increasingly concerned. Although Thomas Senior was self-sufficient, he was nevertheless
vulnerable due to his advanced age, limited English capabilities, and physical frailty.
Tom feared that his father, who was on a slow cognitive decline, might have mindlessly wandered off while getting
the mail and could be walking the streets of Fontana disoriented and lost. Tom reached out to the Fontana
police and his call was put through to community services officer Joanna Pena, who began preparing a missing person's
report. But as she spoke with Tom Perez, she sensed something was off. [Music] [Music]
Officer Joanna Pena was alarmed by Tom Perez's demeanor over the phone. She didn't get a sense that he was genuinely
concerned about his father's well-being at all. Tom spoke in a nonchalant manner
with no sense of urgency, simply requesting that police keep an eye out for a confused elderly man roaming
around the neighborhood. "Let me know," he remarked. "It may be my father." "That's
it." Officer Pena thought that Tom was also strangely aloof and easily distracted. He kept rambling on about
different topics that had no relevance to his father's missing person's report. Officer Pena spoke to her
supervisor, Corporal Sheila Foley, and the two women decided to pay Tom a visit to complete the report face to face.
At the very least, they figured they could gauge Tom's behavior in person and determine if their suspicions were
warranted. Officer Pena and Corporal Foley arrived at the Perez's two-story, three-bedroom home in Fontana's
North. It was one of many similarly designed homes built around a golf course and positioned almost
wall-to-wall with its neighbors. A large black pickup truck was parked in the driveway right up against the garage
door. Tom opened the front door dressed casually in a pair of white cargo shorts
and a collared short-sleeved blue shirt with its top buttons undone. He greeted the officers who promptly entered the
[Music] premises. The officers were immediately struck by the state of their house.
There was barely space to move with broken furniture, tools, and construction equipment strewn about
while boxes of possessions were piled in every corner. It was so chaotic that the
officers felt the home was unlivable. When pressed about the mess, Tom sheepishly explained that he was
separating from his wife and was carrying out renovations to the home in anticipation of selling it. As a
contractor by trade, Tom was doing most of the work himself. He had eight projects on the go
which had left his home in disarray. The officers conducted a rudimentary search of the premises,
filming as they went on their bodyworn cameras. They were unable to locate Thomas Senior or any evidence to
indicate where he might have gone. Though they did notice a few peculiar things. The mattress from Thomas
Senior's bed appeared to be missing, as did a shower curtain from a bathroom. Some of Thomas Senior's
belongings had also been piled into a messy heap, as though they were about to be discarded.
Tom explained that both he and his father had been getting rid of some things in preparation of moving out, and
that he'd recently dropped some of his father's clothing in a Goodwill donation box. One of the walls in Thomas Senior's
bedroom featured noticeable damage. Tom excused it as part of his renovation efforts, saying that he'd
worked to remove the wall after his father left. To Corporal Foley, it didn't look
like typical construction work. She was becoming increasingly suspicious of Tom, who had some
scratches and bruises across his body. Tom claimed he'd sustained the injuries while working on the house. But
when Corporal Foley asked him, "Are you sure you didn't argue with your dad?" Tom stumbled over his words as he tried
to explain himself. The officers also noted that he kept getting sidetracked, talking about
irrelevant things like his dog's diet. Tom professed that he was just tired, but the chaos inside at the home
led the officers to believe that a struggle had taken place there. Concerns were amplified when
Thomas Senior's cell phone and wallet were discovered. If he had left on his own valition like
Tom claimed, it seemed odd that he would have left behind these necessary items. In the eyes of the police, this
was a sign that Thomas Senior was no longer alive. Bolstering this belief was the
discovery of what appeared to be several smears and spatters of dried blood found
on various surfaces throughout the Perez residence. Some of it had crusted onto the cream
carpet at the base of the stairs. Tom attributed the blood to his father's finger prick diabetes tests and
other unrelated innocuous accidents. Whatever the truth, Officer Pena and Corporal Foley felt Tom was
marketkedly indifferent to the serious matter unfolding. They summoned several more officers to
the premises who agreed that the situation warranted suspicion. Tom was requested to go to
the Fontana Police Department downtown to provide a statement. He was reluctant at first,
but eventually agreed and voluntarily got into the back of a police car to be driven to the station.
Tom was ushered into an interrogation room where he spoke with detectives Robert Miller and Jeremy Hail. A camera
above filmed Tom's every word as he openly discussed the basic facts and timeline of his father's
disappearance. The conversation was mostly polite as Tom offered multiple explanations as to where his father
might have wound up. He suggested that Thomas Senior could have taken the train to his brother's
house or to see a close friend of his in the Los Angeles area. Maybe he was heading further north
to visit his daughter, Tom's sister, in Oakland. While Tom's assertions implied there was an innocent reason behind
Thomas Senior's disappearance, an entirely different scenario was emerging at the Perez house.
Police spoke with neighbors who described the father and son as having a volcanic
relationship. They were known to have screaming matches on their front lawn. On the night Thomas Senior disappeared,
Tom was also witnessed backing his truck into his garage at a very early hour. Tom admitted that he did pickered with
his father right before he vanished with the disordered state of their home being
an ongoing source of contention between the pair. While the two got on each other's
nerves at times, they remained living together as Thomas Senior had nowhere else to
go. He was separated from his wife and not suited to the rules of a senior citizen community.
The two men did their best to coexist, and there was love between them, but they mostly stayed out of each other's
lives to keep the peace. The one thing that brought them together was their dog, Margo, who Tom
referred to as their fur baby. Tom had raised Marot from when she was a puppy, and both he and his father
doted on her by cooking her special meals and sharing in her care. With that in mind, there was no logical
reason why Thomas Senior would abandon Margo midwalk in the middle of the night. A search of the surrounding
streets and parklands had failed to uncover any sign of the 71-year-old, and there had been no reported sightings of
him. With concerns growing that Thomas Senior might have met with foul play and his
son acting increasingly dubious, police were granted a warrant to search the Perez
home. They also seized the men's cars, computers, and cell phones, as well as Tom's tools.
Special equipment was brought in that could reveal traces of blood not visible to the naked eye, even when strenuous
efforts had been made to clean it up. It indicated that blood had been cleaned up throughout the
home. But the most ominous find occurred in Thomas Senior's bedroom. A highly trained Kadaava dog
was brought in and alerted to the recent presence of a human corpse. With that, the relatively benign missing
person's case shifted into a fullscale homicide investigation. As nightfell on Wednesday, August 8, 24 hours had passed
since Thomas Perez senior had reportedly been missing. With everything police had uncovered so
far, they felt they had sufficient cause to believe that a serious crime had taken place involving Thomas Senior's
son, Thomas Perez Jr. Further warrants were obtained to examine both men's phone and internet
records while investigators turned up the heat on their prime suspect. Tom Perez was still answering questions
at the Fontana Police Department when he was informed that police believed his father had come to
harm. Before long, fingers were pointed directly at Tom himself. He appeared shocked, confused,
and upset, and was seemingly at a loss for words. He told the detectives that they were quote
nuts. As the interrogation continued into the night, Tom remained steadfast that his father was still alive
somewhere. By the early morning of Thursday, August 9, upwards of 7 hours had passed since Tom was first brought
in for questioning. While he hadn't revealed anything that implicated him in his father's
disappearance, the police were certain he was feigning ignorance and that he knew exactly what had happened to Thomas
Senior. The first interviewing detectives finished their shift and were replaced by detectives David Yanush and
Kyle Guthrie. After being briefed on the case, they were told by a lieutenant that the feeling among the police was
that Tom had killed his father. Not only did evidence support this theory, as far as they were
concerned, there was simply no other logical explanation. It was just a matter of
getting Tom fess up. Detectives Yanush and Guthrie changed tact. They took Tom out for a
drive to get coffee to lower his defenses. Afterwards, they told Tom they were taking him to a train station to
check the surveillance videos for any sign of his father. Instead, they drove around
Fontana on the lookout for any place that Tom might have used to dump his father's body. If they came close to a
key site, perhaps they could trigger him into talking. Referring to Thomas Senior as Daddy, the
detectives asked Tom to show them where Daddy was. The detectives stopped at the
Goodwill donation box where Tom said he had discarded some of his father's clothing. They circled around housing
estates where Tom said he had been looking to buy before reaching the golf course near the Perez home.
Tom maintained that he had no knowledge of his father's whereabouts, but as they
passed by a pond on the golf course, he randomly asked if bodies floated. The bizarre question piqued the
detective's interest, and they kept driving, waiting for Tom to say more. They eventually came to a remote
dirt field near the edge of Fontana, where they stopped the car. Tom became visibly nervous and refused
to get out. This indicated to the detectives that the otherwise benile side held
importance. Yet, no matter what, Tom refused to entertain the thought that his father was
dead. Tom had already informed police that he suffered from various afflictions, including high blood
pressure, asthma, depression, and stress. As the pressure mounted, he said that he
was starting to feel unwell and asked for his medication from home. The detectives assured Tom that he
would receive his medication soon, but in their eyes, he was perfectly fine. While he was clearly tired and
anguished, he was still fully functioning, cognizant, and coherent. Despite this, Tom kept requesting
medical attention. To the detectives, it seemed like he was trying to weasle his way out
as they inched closer to uncovering the truth. They told him that going to the hospital wasn't going to help him as it
was the easy way out. Tom muttered, "But I need I needed attention." Detective Yanosh put his foot down. "No,
you don't," he said, making it abundantly clear that Tom's attempts to derail the interrogation weren't going
to work. After their long drive, the detectives took Tom back to the station and resumed their questioning.
As the hours passed, they relentlessly bombarded him with accusations while his emotions spiraled in all
directions. One moment, Tom confidently professed his innocence and acted bewildered at the allegations against
him, while the next he sobbed into tissues, repeatedly asking, "Where's dad? Where's dad? Where's dad?"
The detectives remained convinced that the remote dirt field near the edge of Fontana held
significance. They drove Tom back there in an attempt to elicit a reaction, but he gave them
nothing. Back at the station, Tom's distress heightened as time wore on. Detectives sensed he was reaching a
breaking point that could lead to a confession. They wondered if Tom would open up to
someone he knew and trusted. He'd asked to speak with a close friend and business partner of his
named Carl Pazzza, which gave detectives an idea. Carl was summoned to the station
where detectives revealed they had overwhelming evidence to indicate that Tom had killed Thomas Senior.
They said blood was found everywhere throughout the Perez home and that they had video footage of Tom dumping blooded
clothing. They told Carl they were zeroing in on a site where they believed Thomas Senior's body had been buried,
but they needed Carl's help in getting a confession from Tom and determining the
exact location of the grave. Carl was stunned. He couldn't believe that his friend was
capable of murdering his own father. As far as Carl was aware, the two had a loving relationship, and he'd never had
any indication that Tom was violent towards Thomas Senior. Nevertheless, Carl agreed to
help the police. He was permitted to enter the interrogation room to be alone with Tom
while the pair were secretly monitored. Carl gave Tom a warm embrace and then sat across from him to discuss the
predicament. "They got you on murder," Carl said. Tom shrugged his shoulders and
replied, "Impossible." Carl explained that the police had enough evidence to charge him
and asked point blank, "Tom, could it have happened?" Tom outright rejected the [Music]
suggestion. The detectives resumed their interrogation, warning Tom that if he didn't help locate his father, he would
owe the city up to a million dollars in restitution. They also warned that he risked going to jail for the rest of his
life. Tom didn't budge. He maintained that his father was simply missing. to which Detective Guthrie
remarked, "He's missing because you killed him." An emotional and exasperated Tom
continued to deny it. On multiple occasions, Tom requested to terminate the interview and go
home. The police were incredulous. Did he honestly believe they would let him go back to an active
crime scene where he could tamper with potential evidence? With their ploy involving Carl PZA
having failed, it was time for the detectives to come up with another [Music] plan. The Perez family's dog, Margo, was
brought to the Fontana Police Department and led into Tom's interrogation room. She entered eagerly, her black and white
tail wagging with excitement as she rushed over to her owner. Tom immediately lit up in her
presence. After he had showered Margo with affection, she came to rest quietly on the floor near his
feet. Meanwhile, the interrogation continued. "Detective Yanush put it bluntly to
Tom." "You murdered your dad," he stated. Tom's mood dropped again, his voice cracking as he responded. No, I
did not. The detective pressed on. Your daddy's dead because of you. Not only that, but poor Margo had
witnessed it. At the mention of this, Tom lent back in his chair a perplexed expression
on his face. Finally, he said, "No." before wiping his eyes with a tissue. It did happen. The detective said you
killed him and he's dead. You know you killed him. You're not being honest with yourself. How can you sit there and say
you don't know what happened and your dog is sitting there looking at you knowing that you killed your dad? Look
at your dog. She knows because she was walking through all the blood. The detectives informed Tom that blood
had been found on Margo's paws and she was so traumatized after witnessing the murder that she needed to be
euthanized. Tom looked at Margot, who was lying contently on her belly. The detectives said they'd give
him a moment alone with her to say goodbye. After they exited the room, Tom dropped
to the floor and snuggled up against Marot, patting her gently while [Music] weeping. Afterwards, Marot was taken to
an animal shelter in a neighboring county to be put down. The detectives told Tom, "Your
dog's now gone. Forget about it." By this point, Tom snapped. He wailed loudly, punching himself in the
head multiple times and began ripping out his hair. He tore his shirt open before falling back into his chair,
utterly drained. In the eyes of the police, his conduct was further proof of his guilt.
Yet Tom remained in denial. Hoping it would compel him to start talking, detectives divulged a
major development in the case. They told Tom that the police had found Thomas Senior's body and it was in the
morg riddled with stab marks. Tom sat with his arms crossed over his chest and barely
reacted. Frustrated, Detective Guthrie said, "We just told you we found your dead dad and you don't give a fuck."
Tom kept his eyes cast down and continued to gently deny that he'd killed his father. You did, the detectives
said. Tom stuttered. I don't have any idea. To which the detectives repeated, "You do.
You do." The detectives continuously reminded Tom that the police had evidence that he
killed his father and he should therefore just admit it. They told him that the human mind
often tries to suppress troubling memories and suggested that he might have attacked his father while under the
influence of his prescription psychiatric medication. The longer Tom was questioned, the less resolute his
protests of innocence became. Eventually, he became despondent and lost in thought. The detectives asked Tom to
explain what he thought could have happened between him and his father. They suggested possible
scenarios in order to jog Tom's memory. Tom offered his own suggestions and provided insight into how they could
have played out, but stopped short of confessing. Detectives pressed on, building a
narrative based on their interpretation of the crime scene. They wondered if there had been a
fight involving a stick or broken beer bottles. Maybe it could have been a knife or
scissors. "Did you stab him?" they asked Tom. Tom appeared contemplative as though he was trying to remember
something he couldn't quite figure out. He then said coolly. It's plausible. I think that I
did. The detectives pushed for more information, asking, "What did you do? Where would you have stabbed
him?" Tom replied blankly. "Maybe in the belly." Eventually, after 17 hours of interrogation, police pieced together
enough details to get a rough idea of what transpired. In his investigation report,
Detective Yanush wrote, "Tom said he grabbed a pair of scissors and went over to the couch and
stabbed his dad. He said if he was enraged, he probably stabbed him a lot." Tom said after his dad was stabbed, his
dad went upstairs to the bathroom. Tom heard him fall, so he went up there and saw his dad lying on the
ground of the bathroom, not waking up. He said he slapped him in the face a few times, but he still wouldn't
wake. Tom's dog came in the bathroom, and so he tried getting the dog out of the bathroom because there was blood
everywhere. Once he got the dog out, he then wrapped up his dad's body in the green shower curtain and transported his
body down the stairs and into the garage. He then put his dad's body in the back of his
truck. The detectives pried Tom to reveal more details about the murder, but he simply replied, "I don't know."
before vomiting into a trash can. Tom believed he must have killed his father while in a blackoutlike state,
which explained why he couldn't vividly remember the attack. Tom was clearly racked with
guilt, remarking, "I'm sorry, Dad. I had no idea. I love you." He had a message for his sister,
too, saying, "I didn't mean to take your daddy away. I have no idea. I still don't
understand. Tom was momentarily left alone in the interrogation room, at which point detectives noticed he'd
removed a leather shoelace from his shoe and was trying to take his own life. They rushed in to rescue him before
promptly restraining him and placing him under arrest. Given Tom's fragile state, he
was placed on a 5150 hold. This provision allows an adult experiencing a mental health crisis to
be involuntarily detained for a 72-hour psychiatric evaluation. Tom was kept in a hospital
over the weekend where staff were given strict orders not to let him have any contact with any
outsiders. Then days after Tom's confession, a young nurse came to his bedside. She broke protocol to tell
him. I know it says in your file not to speak to anybody, but your dad's on the [Music]
phone. On the night of Tuesday, August 7, 2018, 71-year-old Thomas Perez senior left his home to collect the mail at the
end of his street. But his plans didn't stop there. He walked onwards to the Fontana
train station where he boarded a train to visit his brother. From there, he caught a bus to
a friend's place to stay the night. The next day, Thomas Senior traveled to Los Angeles International
Airport as he'd booked a flight to visit his daughter in Oakland. Thomas Senior hadn't mentioned any of
this to his son Tom as they didn't typically keep one another in the loop of their
plans. Thomas Senior had also absent-mindedly left his cell phone at home, preventing him from contacting Tom
while on his journey. Unbeknown to the older man, as he went about his travels, police
believed he'd been murdered and his son was being relentlessly interrogated as the prime suspect.
Early on in the investigation, Tom Perez Jr. had told the detectives that his father might have gone to Oakland. He
even gave them his sister's details so they could check with her. Instead of doing so, the detectives
remained fully focused on building a homicide case against Tom. By 8:45 p.m. on Thursday, August 9,
over 30 hours had passed since he'd reported his father to be missing. While Tom was still being
interrogated, Detective Robert Miller finally spoke with Tom's sister over the phone. To his shock, she revealed that
Thomas Senior was very much alive and well, waiting for a flight to Oakland at Los Angeles International Airport.
Officers rushed to the departure gate where they found Thomas Senior, perplexed by all the
attention. Even though he wasn't suspected of any crime, the 71-year-old was promptly detained and read his
rights. He was placed in the backseat of a police car and driven back to Fontana,
unsure of what was going on. By the time Tom Perez Jr. was attempting to take his own life at the
Fontana Police Department. 2 hours had passed since detectives had confirmed that Thomas Senior was
alive. Instead of informing Tom, they placed him under arrest and sent him for psychiatric
evaluation. In the meantime, Thomas Senior was taken to the same interrogation room that his son had been
held in. A flimsy yellow blanket lay bunched on the floor. the same blanket that his
son had used during breaks in questioning to try and get some rest on the ground. The police didn't give Thomas
Senior any information about what had happened to his son, nor did they reveal the allegations that were being leveled
against him. They simply told Thomas Senior that his house was being investigated as a crime scene.
Detectives quizzed him about his relationship with Tom and asked whether he'd ever gotten
violent. Eventually, Thomas Senior was permitted to return home. He broke through the crime scene
tape that encircled the property and headed inside, finding the place to be trashed.
In their search for evidence, the police had sliced open the Perez's leather sofa, emptied the contents of their
drawers and closets, moved their hot tub, and damaged its motor. Even then, Thomas Senior had no
idea where his son was or what he was being accused of. When Thomas Senior finally learned that
his son was in hospital, he wasn't allowed in as the police had placed Tom in lockdown. Thomas Senior tried to call
instead, but he was consistently denied the opportunity to speak with Tom. Days passed before a nurse finally
broke protocol and handed Tom the phone. The moment Tom heard his father's voice on the other line, he dropped to
the floor in tears. Tom was released from his 5150 hold later that day and allowed to return
home. When the father and son were reunited for the first time since Thomas Senior had left home almost a week
earlier, a bewildered Tom asked, "Dad, is that really you?" Thomas Senior replied kindly,
"Yes, it's me." "They told me you were dead," Tom explained. No, no, I'm here," his father responded
as the pair embraced with tears in their eyes. Shortly after, the Perez got a call from the animal shelter where their
dog Margo had been taken. The police had erroneously classified Margo as a stray, which meant
she was permitted to be euthanized. Luckily, Tom had Margo implanted with a microchip, which allowed staff at the
shelter to identify her owners, thus halting her euthanization. When the Perez went to
collect Margot, they were pained to see that she couldn't walk properly. During her time in police
custody, Margot had sustained an injury to the cruciate ligament in her right hind limb, which required corrective
surgery. Other possessions that had been seized from the Perez's home were also returned in a damaged and unusable
state. Even though Thomas Senior had been found alive and well, the police remained convinced that Tom must have
assaulted and killed someone at their home. They obtained a third warrant to search the premises and received
permission to put a tracking device on Tom's truck. Ultimately, their investigations led
nowhere and the case was officially closed without Tom being charged with any [Music]
crime. In hindsight, Tom felt his treatment went far beyond a misguided misunderstanding. When he'd reported his
father missing, he spoke with a Fontana police lieutenant named Ronald Caval. Tom had a poor relationship with
Lieutenant Kaval due to previous interactions on a separate matter. While it was apparent to Tom that Lieutenant
Koval disliked him personally, he nevertheless went ahead with filing a missing person's
report. At the time, Tom remained calm, clinging to the reasonable belief that his father was likely
fine. When officer Joanna Pena and Corporal Sheila Foley arrived at Tom's home to investigate the matter, Tom felt
that they were immediately hostile towards him. They said they'd been summoned to the house by Lieutenant
Caval, which sparked a degree of apprehension on Tom's part, as he sensed that the police were treating his
father's case as suspicious from the outset. Tom was dismayed when the officers barged into his home and began pointing
out purported evidence of foul play. He remained composed and cooperated while offering plausible and honest
explanations to all of their suggestions. The so-called evidence of homicide found at the Perez home was not
as concrete as investigators accepted. The Kadaava dog that had picked up a scent in Thomas Senior's bedroom wasn't
an official police canine, but belonged to a volunteer within the sheriff's department. Then there was the matter of
the dried blood. Police had an image of a door in the Perez home that appeared to have
dried blood smeared on it. Tom agreed that it looked like his door, but maintained there had been no red
marks on it when police officers showed up. Footage taken from the bodywn cameras of the first responding officers
confirmed this. In their search for evidence, police had used a liquid known as blue
star, which is considered to be the first line method of picking up blood stains that aren't visible to the human
eye. Police claimed that Blueest Star conclusively found large amounts of blood in the Perez home. However,
Blueest Star is known to give false positives for other substances, including minerals found in
paint. Tom had been painting the house as part of his renovations, and no lab ever confirmed what the substance was.
Furthermore, no officer would later testify to seeing any visible blood in the Perez
home. Samples of the alleged blood were taken, but no positive identification was ever
made. The Perez's were just told that they were identified as coming from a male.
One police expert asserted, "No reasonably well-trained police officer would have believed that
they had a probable cause to obtain a search warrant in these circumstances." When Tom had first
agreed to go to the police station, he was informed it was in his best interest to do so.
He didn't want to submit to an interrogation as he felt he had nothing to prove, but he ultimately complied,
albeit under protest. He was placed in a tiny interrogation room he referred to as the
police's little box of horrors. During the lengthy interrogation sequences that followed,
Tom repeatedly, specifically, and consistently denied all accusations leveled against him. He even voluntarily
submitted a DNA swab and let officers take photographs of his naked body despite his
discomfort. On multiple occasions, Tom asked that the interrogation come to an end. He also asked to speak with his
lawyer, to be given his medication, to see his doctor, and to be taken to the hospital. Detectives refused every
request. Reflecting back on his experience with the police, Tom said. I felt like they were my capttors
and I had nothing. There was nothing I could do. When threatened with the possibility
of going to jail for the rest of his life, Tom was terrified because under the circumstances, it seemed like a real
possibility. He had refused to get out of the police car at the dirt field near the edge of
Fontana because he felt the situation was getting out of control and he feared the detectives were about to either beat
or kill him. Tom had no idea the police were lying when they told him that his father's body had been found riddled
with stab wounds or that blood had been found on Margo's paws. Tom was left devastated at the thought
that his father was dead and Margo had been put down as a result. By the early evening of
Thursday, August 9, almost 30 hours had passed since Tom Perez first called the police about his missing father, and
he'd been interrogated almost nonstop for 17 hours. During that time, he'd barely eaten or
slept and had remained deprived of his medication. Exhausted, confused, and griefstricken, Tom reached his breaking
point. He later told CNN, "I no longer could see in color. I was seeing everybody in black and white,
and then I felt physical pain, like an electric shock, and it went from head to toe.
As detectives suggested possible scenarios in which Tom lashed out at his father, he started to absorb a false
belief and accept it as truth. Unable to provide his own version of events, he simply went along with
what the detectives told him. If they said, "Well, you stabbed him." Tom would reply, "Okay, I stabbed
him." In Detective David Yanusha's report, he stated that Tom had admitted to stabbing his father with a pair of
scissors while he sat on the couch before wrapping his body in a shower curtain and putting it in the back of
his truck. However, Tom never directly confessed to any of these things. They were Detective Yanush's words.
Eventually, Tom became fully convinced that he had murdered his father and attempted to take his own life as a
result. He later recalled to CNN, "They attacked me right at the very thing that I loved most, my fur baby and
my father. And it didn't seem like there's anything left. I couldn't see the reason to continue with more
pain." By the time Tom was placed under arrest and read his rights for the first
time, including his right to remain silent, the police already knew that Thomas Senior was still
alive. They admitted Tom to the hospital for psychiatric evaluation regardless, securing him in excessively tight
handcuffs that caused extreme pain and discomfort. Tom asked for them to be loosened, but his requests were ignored.
He was subsequently kept in hospital for 3 days where he endured continual mental
anguish. As Tom's attorney, Jerry Steering, explained, they didn't have the nerve to
look Tom in the face. They didn't have the nerve to tell him his dad was okay. A year after the events, Tom Perez
Jr. sought accountability for what he endured. He filed a federal lawsuit against the city of Fontana, naming a
total of 15 Fontana Police Department employees that played a role. He accused the group of false imprisonment and due
process violations, among other offenses. As a direct result of his ordeal, Tom suffered substantial damages, including
lost income, damage to his personal property, medical and psychological bills, and emotional and mental
distress. In the direct aftermath of his ordeal, Tom feared answering the phone or leaving his home, even to collect the
mail at the end of the street. According to the lawsuit, the amount of damages amounted to in excess of $10
million. Additionally, Tom had paid approximately $12,000 towards Margo's ongoing medical needs as a result of the
injuries she sustained while in police custody. In their depositions, the police members involved maintained that
they had reason to believe Tom was lying to them. In turn, they deceived him in order to get
information. They maintained that they didn't cause Tom's emotional distress and rejected his assertions that the
trained officers should have been able to detect his sincerity and swiftly terminate the interview.
They regarded Tom as a quote startlingly odd human being who lived a life filled
with unexplainably bad decisions given he had a history with the police. They criticized his character
claiming who admits to murdering their father when a murder never happened. Tom was accused of creating a
money motivated falsehood and deemed undeserving of winning anything in the litigation.
Fontana city officials were fiercely defensive of the police officers and vigorously denied that they had violated
any state or federal law during the investigation. They maintained that the police had good legal cause to suspect
Tom Perez of serious criminal activity. They claimed that Tom voluntarily agreed
to be questioned in relation to his father's disappearance and denied claims that he was interrogated for 17 hours
straight or deprived of food and his medication. They asserted that Tom was voluntarily undergoing questioning and
therefore free to leave at any time. A US District Court judge disagreed. In a summary judgement, she
wrote that circumstances suggested to Tom Perez that he was not free to leave. She also maintained several
claims on his behalf, stemming from allegations that the officers had falsely imprisoned Tom and inflicted
emotional distress. However, after reviewing hours of the interrogation tapes, the judge
sided with the police on some issues. She also ruled in their favor when it came to Tom's claims that the police had
unlawfully searched his home and used excessive force. The judge allowed the lawsuit to
proceed, stating, "A reasonable juror could conclude that the detectives inflicted
unconstitutional psychological torture on Tom Perez." Their tactics indisputedly led to Tom's subjective
confusion and disorientation to the point he falsely confessed to killing his father and tried to take his own
life. He was sleepdeprived, mentally ill, and significantly undergoing symptoms of withdrawal from his
psychiatric medications. There is no legitimate government interest that would justify treating Tom
in this manner while he was in medical distress since the Fontana Police Department already had two warrants to
search his person and property and he was already essentially in custody and unable to flee or tamper with any
evidence. As soon as the case was permitted to go to trial, Fontana city officials entered settlement
talks. In 2024, Tom Perez agreed to settle the lawsuit rather than take the case to trial. He held concerns that a
jury award could be overturned on appeal on grounds of qualified immunity. Qualified immunity protects
law enforcement officers from lawsuits involving much of what they do in the scope of their jobs.
In the US, it is legal for police to lie to adult suspects during questioning. They are trained in how to
use falsehoods to elicit confessions, a tactic that is broadly protected by the courts. The detectives who interrogated
Tom asserted that they were only following their training. one explained. We had been with Tom all day
and we were running out of things to say to him to try to get the answer. We used
a ruse to elicit certain information and that is perfectly legal under the law and it is perfectly legal under the
policies and procedures of the Fontana Police Department. According to Tom's attorney,
Jerry Steering, the decision to settle was based on the Court of Appeals history of tossing out police misconduct
lawsuits. As part of his settlement, Tom received $898,000 in damages. A statement on the Fontana City
website read, "The settlement in this case was a business decision which was recommended
by a federal court mediator to save the city further time. effort and expense. The party's written settlement
agreement contains no admission of wrongdoing by anyone, and Tom Perez specifically agreed to settlement on
these terms. Had he requested an admission of wrongdoing, the case would have never
settled. Tom Perez's case is an example of how lying to suspects during police interrogations can lead to false
statements, or worse still, false confessions. Advocates are working to have detectives retrained with newer
methods that will no longer allow them to lie or trick suspects into confessing.
As one advocate explained, the Fontana case is an extreme one, but it fundamentally begins
with a mistaken belief about the use of deception in the interview room. A community caretaker doesn't lie
or deceive the community it serves, at least not for very long without the community questioning, "Are you really
my caretaker?" or something else. Following Tom's ordeal, there were no indications that there was an internal
review within Fontana Police, and those involved faced no internal repercussions
or discipline. On the contrary, several detectives involved were promoted to the
position of sergeant, while one was named 2019 employee of the year. City officials have since claimed that
law enforcement leaders have developed many service enhancements to deal with quote mentally challenged individuals,
though they have not publicly elaborated on what those enhancements are or what they
entail. Tom Perez's interrogation video has been described by those who've seen it as both fascinating and disturbing.
Although several media publications got a hold of it and showed snippets in news
reports, they have since had to return it to the city of Fontana unaired as it is subject to a protective order and
cannot be published. Carl PZA, Tom's close friend and business partner, who had been
recruited by police to elicit a confession, has expressed remorse for his involvement.
He was led to believe that Tom had killed Thomas Senior. But even after speaking with Tom face to face, he
couldn't understand how the crime had allegedly occurred. It wasn't until after he
participated in the interrogation that Carl learned the evidence he had originally been told was overwhelming
was in fact circumstantial. Carl felt dubed. He wanted to go back into the interrogation room to inform Tom, but
wasn't permitted to talk to him again. Since the ordeal, Carl could tell that Tom was struggling to
cope. Carl wrote in court documents. There's sadness there. I can tell by the way Tom acts, even sometimes
the way he walks or stands. He's not the same. No one involved in the case has apologized to Tom or Thomas
Senior. Feelings from the ordeal remain raw between the pair, and they haven't reached the point where they're able to
openly talk to one another about what happened. Tom wrote in court documents that while it was difficult to hold
back, it was difficult to talk about anything because they didn't know what to do or say.
The father and son still lived together, though Tom remained traumatized by his experience for a long time
afterwards. In an exclusive interview with CNN, Tom explained that his father helped him by making sure his
necessities were met, which allowed him to work through his trauma. He still carries one lesson from
his ordeal. Don't call the cops. The pair's beloved dog, Margo, died in February 2023, leaving a permanent hole
in both their lives. Tom believes the reason he confessed to a murder he didn't commit
was because he'd been brainwashed by the interviewing detectives. "I just allowed the belief
of others to dominate me," he explained. "I never want to be in that kind of place again mentally. I didn't know
anybody could be in that kind of place. I didn't know that such a place existed. To this day, Tom feels he still
doesn't have a clear explanation for why he was treated so badly. But the Perez has told CNN they are grateful to still
have each other as they have helped each other heal. Tom's attorney, Jerry Steering, called
Tom's treatment the worst act of deliberate cruelty that he had seen in his 40 years of suing the
police. Quote, mentally torturing a false confession out of Tom Perez, concealing
from him that his father was alive and well, and confining him in the psych ward because they made him suicidal.
I never thought that it was easy, maybe even possible, to get a completely innocent person confess to something
like that. Jerry said that Tom's ordeal laid bare the way in which police officers
can force people to make false confessions, explaining, "This case shows that if the
police are skilled enough and they grill you hard enough, they can get anybody to
confess to anything. [Music] [Music]

When 71-year-old Thomas Perez Senior failed to return home after a short walk to his mailbox in Fontana, California, his son Tom wasn’t overly concerned. He suspected his father had just gone to visit friends or family and would return home of his own accord. But when police arrived at the Perez home to complete a missing person’s report, they came to suspect something else entirely.

CREDITS Narration – Anonymous Host Research & writing – Milly Raso Creative direction – Milly Raso Production & music – Mike Migas Music – Andrew Joslyn Audio editing – Anthony Telfer

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Brief Summary

Tom Perez Jr. was wrongfully suspected of murdering his father, who was actually alive, after a flawed police investigation.

Key points

The Disappearance of Thomas Senior. Thomas Senior goes missing after a trip to the mailbox, raising concerns for his son Tom.
Suspicion Arises. Officer Joanna Pena senses something off about Tom's demeanor during the missing person's report.
Evidence of a Struggle. Police discover signs of a struggle in the home, raising alarms about Thomas Senior's fate.
The Shift to Homicide Investigation. The case shifts from a missing person to a homicide investigation after alarming discoveries.
Tom's Emotional Breakdown. During interrogation, Tom's emotional state deteriorates as he faces accusations of murder.
Tom's Denial and Despair. Tom struggles with the reality of his father's death and his own guilt.

Episode highlights

Episode quotes

"Let me know, it may be my father.".

Tom's nonchalant response about his missing father raises suspicion.

4:12WatchMay 3, 2025

Tension

75/ 100High tension

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