Covina: Woman, 51, and husband among nine family members slain
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Teresa Ortega, a 51-year-old Latina, was killed along with her husband and seven other family members during a rampage at the family’s annual Christmas Eve party on the 1100 block of Knollcrest Drive in Covina late in the evening of Dec. 24, 2008.
Ortega, of Upland, was the sister-in-law of Sylvia Pardo, 43, whose ex-husband, Bruce Jeffery Pardo, 45, went to the home armed with four semi-automatic weapons and a canister of fuel.
The attack began when Pardo, dressed in a Santa Claus suit, knocked in the door about 11:30 p.m.
When an 8-year-old girl opened the door after he knocked, Bruce Pardo shot her in the face, wounding her. Inside the home he shot 10 others, killing nine and injuring a 16-year-old girl whom he shot in the back.
Amid the chaos, Pardo doused the home in fuel and set it on fire. He left the scene and drove to his brother’s home in Sylmar with severe burns. His brother found him dead from a self-inflicted gunshot and called police about 3:30 a.m. Christmas Day.
Police said Pardo appeared to have made multiple escape plans.
-- Joel Rubin, Ari B. Bloomekatz and Tami Abdollah
