Man charged with killing Amy Giordano

TRENTON, N.J. (AP) - March 20, 2008 Rosario DiGirolamo is accused of killing Amy Giordano of Hightstown. He was arrested Thursday in the basement of his parents' home in Brooklyn, N.Y., prosecutors and his lawyer said.

DiGirolamo, 33, is charged with murder and tampering with evidence, and faces a term of 30 years to life in prison if convicted, Mercer County Prosecutor Joseph L. Bocchini said.

He is being held in New York on $1 million bail, and no extradition hearing was immediately scheduled. Courts are closed on Friday for Good Friday.

Bocchini declined to comment on what led to the arrest, but said evidence shows that Giordano is dead.

"We've accumulated a lot of evidence at this point," Bocchini said, but declined to give any specifics.

The prosecutor also would not comment on whether anyone else was involved, or when and where she was killed. He said the search for her body continues.

DiGirolamo's lawyer, Jerome Ballarotto, said they are ready to defend the allegations. He said he learned of the charges from the prosecutor's office.

"They told me they did not find the body, so we are a little confused as to how they have determined she is dead," Ballarotto said.

DiGirolamo, who had lived in Millstone, N.J., and was married, was having an affair with Giordano at the time of her disappearance.

The couple's 11-month-old baby has been in foster care since June, when he was abandoned in the parking lot of Christiana Hospital in Newark, Del., by DiGirolamo. The 11-month-old was found with a handwritten note pinned to his diaper calling him "John Vincent" and saying his caregiver had no job or health insurance.

According to authorities, DiGirolamo flew to Italy on June 14, the day that police in Delaware and New Jersey connected the baby to him and Giordano. He returned in early August and surrendered to police in Delaware on charges of reckless endangerment and child abandonment. He pleaded guilty to those charges in November.

"This case has taken several turns over the last 10 months," Bocchini said.

Giordano, 27, was last seen two days before the infant was discovered. On the day in between, she talked by phone to her 6-year-old son who lives with her ex-husband in New York.

Nine days later, her purse was found in the back of her bedroom closet in her third-floor walk-up apartment, still containing her wallet and ID.

In February, the Delaware Department of Services for Children, Youth and Their Families moved to terminate the parental rights of Giordano.

---

Associated Press writer Jeffrey Gold in Newark, N.J., contributed to this story.