Florida is home to some of the most shocking true crime stories in the country.
One case left a community baffled for decades.
And a murder mystery at a luxury Florida mall left an FBI agent asking this scary question.
A mall in Boca Raton, Florida becomes the sight of murders and kidnappings
The Boca Raton Town Center Mall in Florida was the sight of several gruesome crimes over the span of nine months in 2007.
Randi Gorenberg, a mother of two, was murdered in 2007 after shopping at the mall.
Another mother only known as Jane Doe was kidnapped outside the mall with her two-year-old son.
Nancy Bochicchio and her young daughter Joey were murdered after a trip to the mall.
Retired FBI agent John MacVeigh worked all three cases for a decade.
“I heard about them just like everybody else on the news, and it was just horrible,” MacVeigh said. “We contacted Boca Police Department, knowing that it was something that, you know, we could possibly assist.”
He believes that all three cases could be connected and that the killer could still be out there.
Gorenberg left the mall on the afternoon of March 23, 2007.
Then, 45 minutes later, a 911 came from someone who heard gunshots and saw a body pushed out of a car at a local park. The body was that of Randi Gorenberg.
“It does appear that she resisted at some point,” MacVeigh said about Gorenberg. “She was shot and basically thrown out the car while the suspect drove away.”
In August 2007, Jane Doe and her son were kidnapped in the parking lot of the mall.
“She puts her son from the passenger side into the center car seat. She walks around to the trunk,” MacVeigh explained. “She opens the trunk. She puts the stroller in. She walks back around. As she opens the door to get in the driver’s seat, the suspect had already jumped in the back passenger seat. Now, you’re talking seconds … so he had to be extremely close to her.”
Jane Doe was taken to an ATM where she withdrew $600.
“Just terrified. I mean, she’s in the car with her 2-year-old, and this man has got a gun on her and threatening her,” MacVeigh stated.
The kidnapper put blacked-out swim goggles over their eyes and dropped off the mother and her young son back at the mall’s parking lot.
“It was just so blatant and bizarre because you just wouldn’t think that somebody would be accosted in the middle of the day — handcuffed, blindfolded — forced to go to an ATM and then brought back to the same location and dropped off,” MacVeigh said. “It wasn’t the norm.”
Bochicchio and her seven-year-old daughter Joey were abducted in the mall’s parking lot in December 2007.
Police believe that she was bound and taken to an ATM.
“Nancy resists. She breaks her handcuffs. We do believe that she tried to get Joey out of the car, and then he turned around and shot both of them,” MacVeigh stated.
Their bodies were found in the mall’s parking lot with their car engine still running.
One thing ties together all three cases
MacVeigh noticed a pattern in all three cases.
“The suspect was trying to control women,” MacVeigh explained.
All three women were bound, and the crimes took place around the same time of day.
“It’s not a small little coincidence,” MacVeigh said. “There’s not … one or two small things. This is an accumulation of things.”
Boca Raton police and the FBI interviewed more than 10,000 people who worked at the mall during their investigation.
Charges were never brought in any of the cases.
“It’s just so hard to believe that it’s not the same person,” MacVeigh said. “Three of these incidences … in the same area, and very similar. Here you have a very affluent mall … and, you know, you are targeting people that you suspect have money.”
Jane Doe was never able to give a clear ID of the suspect.
Boca Raton police hope that advances in DNA technology can give them a breakthrough in the case.
DeSantis Daily will keep you up-to-date on any new developments in this story.
