Jimmy "Superfly" Snuka charged with 3rd-degree murder of mistress in 1983
Jimmy "Superfly" Snuka was a pro wrestling superstar in 1983 who traveled the country for matches accompanied not by his wife, but a young mistress who previously had dated Hulk Hogan.
There was an incident when they made a stop in Syracuse in which Snuka got violent on his girlfriend, which led him taking on a bunch of cops and then an arrest.
Nancy Argentino continuing seeing Snuka, then wound up dead four months later.
Snuka, an off-and-on South Jersey resident since the 1980s who currently resides in Waterford Township, N.J., with his third wife, told different stories to police and medical personnel.
He said that she fell and hit her head on concrete when they stopped on a highway so see could go to the ballroom next to their vehicle.
He said that they were fooling outside their motel room, he pushed her and she hit her head in a fall.
He said that he struck her inside their room and she hit her head.
An investigation led to nothing ... nothing but a cold case that went on for decades, one that seemingly would go on forever.
Then in 2013, Lehigh County District Attorney Jim Martin decided to reopen a case after reading a series of new newspaper articles on the case plus a letter from the victim's family.
Two years later, Snuka, 72 and battling stomach cancer, was charged on Tuesday with third-degree murder and involuntary manslaughter.
"The grand jury and the evidence we were able to produce before the grand jury made the difference in what has happened today compared to what happened 32 years ago," Martin told the Allentown Morning Call.
The charges were handed down after a grand jury concluded that Snuka repeatedly assaulted Argentino in their motel room and then waited too long to get medical attention.
After being charged, Snuka turned himself in, was jailed and then freed on $100,000 bail.
Louise Argentino-Upham, Argentino's sister, is thrilled that their decades-long quest to see Snuka be held responsible finally could happen.
"I think that it's been a long road," Argentino-Upham told the Morning Call. "They did the right thing in the face of all the evidence."
source: http://www.nj.com/phillies/index.ssf/2015/09/jimmy_superfly_snuka_charged_with_third-degree_mur.html
