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Susanna Griga
I've never felt like this before. It's like you just get me. I feel like my true self with you. Does that sound crazy? And it doesn't hurt that you're gorgeous. Okay, that's it. I'm taking you home with me. I mean, you can't find shoes this good just anywhere. Find a shoe for every you from brands you love like Birkenstock, Nike, Adidas and more at your DSW store or dsw.com hey, it's Ryan Reynolds here for Mint Mobile.
Mark Schiller
Now I was looking for fun ways to tell you that Mint's offer of unlimited Premium Wireless for $15 a month is back.
Felix Jimenez
So I thought it would be fun.
Mark Schiller
If we made $15 bills. But it turns out that's very illegal. So there goes my big idea for the commercial. Give it a try@mintmobile.com Switch upfront payment.
Susanna Griga
Of $45 for a three month plan equivalent to $15 per month. Required new customer offer for first three months only. Speed slow after 35 gigabytes of networks busy. Taxes and fees extra. See mintmobile.com.
Mark Schiller
It's a swampy, desolate area. It's a wooded area.
Judge Alex Ferrer
There's thousands of canals down there.
Felix Jimenez
It's populated with alligators, snakes.
Judge Alex Ferrer
It's just an area that no one.
Felix Jimenez
Would really want to just go to and hang out. It's the ideal spot to dump a body.
Mark Schiller
And when we first went down there, it was pitch black. And I shined a flashlight into the water and I was able to see the barrels. We only had a torso. The head, hands and feet were missing.
Felix Jimenez
All right, ready to go.
Judge Alex Ferrer
Judge Allen and I've tried some of the worst people there are, but this case really got to me. The victims were murdered one night in 1995. A young, successful, good looking couple. Frank was 32 years old. He made a ton of money. He was a millionaire. Christina was his 23 year old girlfriend. And they had everything, boats, hot cars, Lamborghinis. They were living the life. This case had everything. It was, it had sex, it had violence, dark, dark humor.
Mark Schiller
We had a group of muscleheads.
Judge Alex Ferrer
These were a bunch of meatheads, guys who were working out in the gym, probably taking steroids.
Mark Schiller
One of their targets was Frank and Christina.
Judge Alex Ferrer
Basically the plan was kidnap wealthy people, take everything they have and then kill them. They got away with over a million dollars. The most fascinating case I think I've ever tried. Hollywood had to make a movie out of it.
Susanna Griga
When's the last time you paid your rent?
Mark Schiller
When it was, I got a plan.
Judge Alex Ferrer
To change that. If somebody scripted this, you would say, well, that's ridiculous. Except that it actually was true.
Patty Barrientos
He loved fast cars, beautiful girls, and life.
Felix Jimenez
Susanna grew up. Driga can never forget the kidnapping of her brother Frank and his girlfriend, Christina Ferton, back in 1995.
Patty Barrientos
She was very beautiful. She was only 23 years old. My heart breaks when I think what she went through.
Mark Schiller
Very handsome couple. They look like they were made for each other.
Felix Jimenez
Felix Jimenez, now retired from the Metro Day Police homicide department, was lead detective on the case.
Mark Schiller
Frank was the American success story. An immigrant came to this country with $10 in his pocket and made millions.
Felix Jimenez
He came from Budapest, Hungary, and found a minimum wage job in New York City.
Patty Barrientos
It was like a service station. He was changing the oil, washing cars. What he accomplished should make everyone proud, because he went from nowhere to a millionaire on his own, just by using his own resources.
Felix Jimenez
In fewer than 10 years, he was living in an upscale Miami enclave called golden beach, running a phone sex line empire. He was on top of the world until May 24, 1995.
Patty Barrientos
I started calling him and he wouldn't pick up the phone. I kind of knew that something really bad happened then.
Felix Jimenez
The disappearance of Frank and Christina would become one of Miami's most notorious crimes. But who would want to kidnap them? How did this all go down?
Mark Schiller
We got a call that there was a missing. A wealthy couple that was missing out of Golden Beach. That was a little strange because in homicide, we need a crime scene, we need a dead body to respond to. There's few and far between when there's actually a missing person that we would respond. It has to be highly suspicious circumstances. And it so happens in this case, there was.
Felix Jimenez
At first, the detectives hoped they could find Frank and Christina alive.
Mark Schiller
A missing Hungarian couple had said that they were going to the Bahamas the following day. So all their friends assumed that the reason they weren't home was because they were in the Bahamas.
Felix Jimenez
But that all changed, though, when police made a stunning discovery.
Mark Schiller
Their Lamborghini was found in an abandoned wooded area far outside of Miami.
Judge Alex Ferrer
At this point, we realized that something.
Felix Jimenez
Bad, something bad had happened to this couple. Sal Garofalo, also retired, worked the case for his boss, Felix Jimenez, now both CBS News consultants. We got information and we ended up going to Golden Beach. So you have a missing Hungarian couple and Lamborghini.
Mark Schiller
We had more information than that. We had a next door neighbor that had actually been to the house the last time they were seen alive. And they invited her in, introduced her to two muscle bound men that were driving a brand new gold Mercedes and told them that they were going out to dinner to discuss a business deal.
Felix Jimenez
That neighbor would tell police she met the driver of the gold Mercedes and knew his name, Danny Lugo.
Mark Schiller
Danny was a big, muscular guy.
Felix Jimenez
Police would soon learn that Lugo was a burly ex convict who had served time for running a phony loan scam operation. After his release, he became the manager of a suburban Miami health club called the Sun Gym.
Mark Schiller
It's real close to here, Sal. This is where Sun Jim was located. This is what we could call the gang headquarters.
Judge Alex Ferrer
Danny Lugo was a Puerto Rican Cuban kid from the Bronx.
Mark Schiller
He thought he was smarter than anybody else. He had a way of convincing people to do things that they didn't want to do.
Felix Jimenez
The investigation into Frank and Christina's disappearance continued. Detectives learned Luga was the leader of a group made up of drifters and petty thieves who hung out at the Sun Gym. Lugo's main partner in crime was another musclehead, Adrian Dorbol.
Mark Schiller
Adrian Dorbol was Danny Lugo's protege.
Judge Alex Ferrer
Dorball was just an evil. He reminded me of just being an evil guy.
Mark Schiller
He was a steroid freak, 5 foot 7 tall, 5 foot 7 wide. He did everything and anything that Danny told him to do.
Felix Jimenez
In May 1995, Danny Lugo and Adrian Dorbell would be at the center of one of the most notorious crimes in Miami history. A complicated and deadly plot that involved kidnapping, money and murder.
Judge Alex Ferrer
My name is Daniel Lugo.
Felix Jimenez
Eighteen years later, the story was too much for Hollywood to resist. I watch a lot of movies, Paul. I know what I'm doing. In the movie Pain and Gain, Lugo is portrayed by Mark Wahlberg. The film was released by Paramount Pictures. Paramount is part of Viacom.
Judge Alex Ferrer
If you're willing to do the work, you can have anything. That's what makes the USFA great.
Felix Jimenez
The movie captures what Lugo was about in real life.
Judge Alex Ferrer
Real life?
Felix Jimenez
His infatuation with getting rich, says Patty Barrientos who worked alongside him at a gym.
Gail Levine
He said, I'm going to have a lot of money. I want to grow. I want to be somebody very big.
Felix Jimenez
He was money hungry, yes. And with the little money he had, he spent a lot of it here at the Solid Gold strip club. It was here he began an affair with a one time Penthouse model turned exotic dancer named Sabina Petrescu.
Mark Schiller
She was a very, very attractive woman. She fell for Danny and believed everything he told her.
Felix Jimenez
Sabina was another recent immigrant who made a splash in Miami. She was a finalist in the Miss Romania contest in 1990, then came to the United States to begin a modeling career. She made it onto the pages of Penthouse magazine, but filled the rest of her time as an exotic dancer.
Mark Schiller
Danny treated her well. He gave her a BMW.
Felix Jimenez
Sabina would play a crucial role as police continue gathering more evidence connecting Lugo and Dorbal to the disappearance of Frank and Christina.
Mark Schiller
We have the housekeeper, who was also at the home when the muscle men were there. We have the next door neighbor. We show them photographs, they make identifications. So we have a lot to go on.
Felix Jimenez
So search warrants were executed? Yes, search warrants for the homes of Lugo and Dorbo and their associates. I mean, we had so many cops, it wasn't even funny.
Mark Schiller
In fact, we mobilized right here at this park.
Judge Alex Ferrer
Right.
Felix Jimenez
Police quickly hit paydirt in the apartment of Danny Lugo's girlfriend.
Mark Schiller
There was some damning evidence there. Bloody clothing belonging to Frank and Christina. There was the kidnap kit. A case with duct tape, guns, guns, handcuffs. There was so much evidence in that apartment.
Felix Jimenez
Soon Adrienne Dorbal was in custody and refused to talk to police.
Mark Schiller
The main guy that we're after, Danny Lugo, is nowhere to be found.
Felix Jimenez
Danny Lugo had given them the slip.
Susanna Griga
You say you'll never join the Navy, that living on a submarine would be too hard. You'd never power a whole ship with nuclear energy, never bring a patient back to life or play the national anthem for a sold out crowd. Joining the Navy sounds crazy. Saying never actually is. Start your journey@navy.com America's Navy forged by the SEA A Carlos no le gusta larina por quesipe ga todo cuando pareda sorfia el dudoeniro tel con alberca panoramica Lalista y pasaro nuna semana ne lagua vives paratener las cosas a tu gusto. Vivimos Cascada. Tina Yuna. Regadere. Encreible. Expedia. Vivimos paraviajar.
Mark Schiller
This case was all over the news. Miami was riveted as to this attractive Hungarian couple. You know, this yellow Lamborghini found in the Everglades. And that they're missing. And they continued to be missing, but.
Felix Jimenez
Detectives had lost their lead suspect, Danny Lugo.
Mark Schiller
Lugo's gone. We have a warrant for his arrest. He's just vanished. We don't know where he is.
Felix Jimenez
They did have one good lead.
Mark Schiller
We had his girlfriend, Sabina Petrescu.
Felix Jimenez
Sabina Petrescu. Lugo's girlfriend. The magazine Model turned stripper had quite a story to tell. She said her boyfriend wasn't a criminal. He told her he was a CIA agent.
Mark Schiller
Number one, she was smitten with Danny Lugo. And number two, I think she believed what he was saying, that he was a CIA operative, that he was working for the US Government in kidnapping people that were dangerous to this country.
Felix Jimenez
Danny Lugo had convinced her he was a spy on a secret mission. So for now, she wouldn't tell detectives where Danny was, but it would be just a matter of time. In an incredible twist of fate, detectives in another department at Metro Day police had also been looking at Denny Lugo and Adrian Dorbal. Their case was the bizarre kidnapping of another Miami millionaire. Now Lugo and Dorbo were front and center of two cases. The Miami millionaire was Mark Schiller, an accountant.
Mark Schiller
He was Argentinian, born, grew up in the U.S. went to school, got his CPA license. He had a medical billing business that did very well.
Felix Jimenez
The two crimes would become one huge case, a case that Judge Alex Ferrer, now TV's Judge Alex, and Miami Dade prosecutor Gail Levine would never forget.
Gail Levine
This case was what made me who I am today, a career prosecutor.
Judge Alex Ferrer
Of all the cases I've tried, this was by far the most fascinating case.
Felix Jimenez
Shiller would eventually tell police a wild story that five months before the murders of Frank and Christina, Schiller himself had been grabbed by a gang. Bound and gagged, he'd be dumped in an industrial warehouse for more than a month. So this is it.
Mark Schiller
This is it.
Felix Jimenez
So this was an empty warehouse that they had rented.
Mark Schiller
This is a warehouse that was rented by one of the members of the Sun Gin gang. They drove the van with Shiller inside into the warehouse.
Gail Levine
Mark Schiller was the perfect victim because he was involved in something that was illegal.
Mark Schiller
I think he got greedy and started getting involved in Medicare fraud.
Felix Jimenez
Danny Lugo learned about Schiller from this man, George Delgado, who also worked out at the Sun Gym. Schiller and Delgado had been in business.
Mark Schiller
Him and George Delgado started a mortgage business together.
Felix Jimenez
But business went badly and later Schiller and Delgado had a falling out over a deal. Delgado wanted revenge and told Lugo Schiller would be an easy mark.
Judge Alex Ferrer
They basically go, well, he's not going to go to the cops. He was involved in Medicare fraud. We'll shake him down.
Felix Jimenez
So what was the plan?
Gail Levine
The plan was actually very simple. Kidnap Mark Shiller, have him write his own ransom, and then kill him.
Felix Jimenez
Simple as that?
Gail Levine
Simple as that.
Felix Jimenez
But catching Shiller to shake him down was tougher than it looked.
Judge Alex Ferrer
It would be funny if it wasn't so tragic because they made these stupid attempts. They would hide in his yard under black like they were some kind of ninja, waiting for him to come out to get the paper at five in the morning. And they were going to kidnap him, only to be surprised that cars were coming down the street and lighting them up with their headlights. So then they're running through the yards, you know, screaming aboard, aboard. Like they were on some secret mission for the government.
Felix Jimenez
Hollywood could not resist this crazy scene. The gang used costumes and comic book code names like Batman and Robin. There he is. And tried to stage an accident to kidnap Schiller.
Judge Alex Ferrer
They were waiting for him to drive by to stage this accident. They turn the car off and as he's driving by, they're cranking it and the car won't start and he just goes driving by. So it's like the Keystone Cop's gone bad.
Felix Jimenez
Finally, after multiple attempts, the gang that couldn't shoot straight enlisted some serious muscle and planned to take Schiller down outside a restaurant he owned.
Gail Levine
They waited in a van and they had their biggest gym rats come out.
George Delgado
I'm a good hearted person. I just made a mistake.
Felix Jimenez
The man who we agreed to obscure and alter his voice worked with the Sunjin Gang to kidnap Schiller.
George Delgado
I was pretty hardcore.
Felix Jimenez
At your peak, you could bench £475. 505. 505. How big were you?
George Delgado
I was like a lean £270.
Felix Jimenez
Big guy?
George Delgado
Yeah.
Felix Jimenez
Intimidating.
George Delgado
Yeah.
Felix Jimenez
He was desperate for money and sometimes worked at the sun gym. Back in 1994, Lugo and his gang were offering cash for a little help.
George Delgado
He told me, look, I gotta talk to you about something. He owes me money and I need you to come with me and help me collect.
Felix Jimenez
He agreed and in November of 1994, brought his gun. So you had. You had your.45 with you.
George Delgado
I always carried my firearm. We were parked right there, and as soon as he came out of his restaurant, they saw him. So they said, there he is. There he is.
Mark Schiller (altered voice)
It was one of those days in Miami where a storm was coming in.
Felix Jimenez
Schiller, a man who cheated death and whose harrowing ordeal was dramatized by actor Tony Shalhoub in a recent movie. I made a lot of money. Maybe yourself ought to spend some of it on a salad. You know who invented salad? Poor people. Why are you alive?
Mark Schiller (altered voice)
I guess it's divine intervention. I can't explain it.
Felix Jimenez
Schiller's nightmare started just as he Was about to head home after work.
Mark Schiller (altered voice)
I walked out to my car. As soon as I open my door, I'm grabbed from behind by three. Three guys.
George Delgado
And as soon as they grabbed them, the guy grabbed the steering wheel.
Felix Jimenez
Was he screaming?
George Delgado
He was screaming.
Mark Schiller (altered voice)
They just kept punching me. And they had a Taser and they kept Tasering me.
George Delgado
They were Tasing him, begging for mercy. He was screaming, you know, what do you want? What do you want with me? What are you doing?
Mark Schiller (altered voice)
So at that point, they dragged me to the van with the white van. They handcuffed my hands behind my back.
Felix Jimenez
You must have been terrified.
Mark Schiller (altered voice)
I thought they were going to take me to kill me.
George Delgado
They document them. They put a tape in his mouth, and we took off out of here.
Mark Schiller (altered voice)
When we got to the warehouse, they called the boss.
Felix Jimenez
The boss was Denny Lugo. The same man at the center of the Christina Ferton Frank Griga murder case.
Mark Schiller (altered voice)
Told him, the eagle has landed. I go, I guess that was the eagle.
George Delgado
When I left, Schiller was sitting in the chair. He was taped up hands and legs and were beating on him.
Felix Jimenez
Schiller was tortured endlessly. Sometimes it was with fire.
Mark Schiller (altered voice)
Doorbell would yell, fire, Fire. Real sick. And he'd burn me, you know, burned my skin. And then he'd do this again, and he would be laughing so hard he was crying.
Felix Jimenez
Other times they played Russian roulette.
Mark Schiller
They would place a gun to his head. They would take a revolver and spin it and pull the trigger. For the first couple of weeks, he wasn't even allowed to use the bathroom. He would have to urinate and defecate on himself.
Felix Jimenez
But the worst was yet to come.
Mark Schiller (altered voice)
At this point, they thought, well, if you don't give us a list of everything you have, we're going to bring your wife and rape her here in front of you.
Felix Jimenez
Shiller says he was allowed to make one phone call. He called his family, telling his wife to take their two young children and flee to Columbia. She chose not to call the police. Why didn't she call police?
Mark Schiller (altered voice)
I don't know. I think at that point it was prudent not to.
Felix Jimenez
And for some inexplicable reason, neither did any of Shiller's employees or friends or extended family raised the alarm. With his family safely out of the country, Schiller was still suffering. Finally, the daily torture was too much. He gave up giving the gang everything.
Mark Schiller (altered voice)
I signed, they told me my death sentence.
Gail Levine
He was signing over everything, including his life.
Felix Jimenez
How much?
Gail Levine
Altogether it was $1.2 million in cash and assets and a $2 million life insurance policy.
Judge Alex Ferrer
And pretty soon they had everything the man owned. They moved into his house. They changed the pool contract to their name. They were living there and partying in his home. And they were taking some of the furniture they liked and putting it in their own apartments, wearing his jewelry, driving his Dodge Viper and his Mercedes, and just basically living off of his money. Well, at that point, can't let the guy live. So they decide that he's got to go.
Felix Jimenez
Having forced him to sign over his assets, the Sun Gym Gang, led by Danny Lugo, was partying in Mark Schiller's house. In the Hollywood feature Pain and Gain, Mark Wahlberg's character depicts the depravity. I know what I'm doing.
Mark Schiller (altered voice)
They were living in the house, in my house.
Felix Jimenez
Despite his cooperation, Mark Schiller still remained chained like an animal in the Miami warehouse.
Mark Schiller
Shiller was tied to a pipe in a very small bathroom. That's where he spent the next 30 days, was handcuffed to that pipe.
Felix Jimenez
The businessman and father was living in kind of a hell associated with a Third World dungeon, complete with racial slurs.
Mark Schiller (altered voice)
They just told me we got a matzo ball. And what does that mean? I guess they were referring to the fact that I was Jewish.
Felix Jimenez
Schiller can't forget the sixth soundtrack that came with his daily beatings.
Mark Schiller (altered voice)
I mean, this whole time they were laughing uncontrollably. To them, it was just a fun game.
Felix Jimenez
While they were beating you? Yeah. Did any of your captors show you any kindness?
Mark Schiller (altered voice)
Yeah, the guy that was in Knight did because they stopped feeding me. I was starved. I hadn't eaten for, like, three days. He brought me a can of canned ravioli, which I had to eat with my hand.
Felix Jimenez
That would be one of the last meals the Sun Gym Gang intended for Mark Scheller to have as Lugo put his final plan into action.
Judge Alex Ferrer
They give him alcohol to drink, get them all drunk.
Felix Jimenez
They plied you with alcohol for three straight days.
Mark Schiller (altered voice)
It was probably more than that. It was probably like five days.
Felix Jimenez
And then what did they do the last day?
Mark Schiller (altered voice)
They sent me in a chair, and they gave me this concoction to drink.
Mark Schiller
Liquor, tequila, vodka. And gave him sleeping pills. And eventually he passed out.
Felix Jimenez
You were unconscious?
Mark Schiller (altered voice)
I was unconscious.
Judge Alex Ferrer
They put him in his Toyota 4Runner in his SUV.
Mark Schiller
They drove the car into a light pole. Doorball was driving, and then doused the car with gasoline and set it on fire. And that was their attempt to kill him. They backed out about a block away to watch the car as it was engulfed in flames.
Judge Alex Ferrer
The problem is, they don't buckle him in. The flames revive him enough that he stumbles out of the car and towards the road.
Felix Jimenez
The surprised Sun Jim gang moved in to finish off Mark Schiller.
Judge Alex Ferrer
And they see this guy that they just lit on fire standing by the side of the road, and they yell, run him over. Run him over.
Mark Schiller
They drive forward, and they. They try to run him over. They miss, but then they're able to back over him and then run over him again.
Judge Alex Ferrer
And they get back to their place, and they go, you think we killed him? And they're looking at the dent on the car, and they're saying, I don't know. It's not a big dent. Yeah, but we ran him over and we backed over him. I mean, he must be dead.
Felix Jimenez
And what do you remember next?
Mark Schiller (altered voice)
Waking up in the hospital.
Felix Jimenez
It would be months before Mark Schiller could grasp the full horror of how he ended up half dead at Jackson Memorial, Miami's top trauma center.
Mark Schiller (altered voice)
I was in a coma when they picked me up.
Felix Jimenez
You were in a coma?
Mark Schiller (altered voice)
Yeah.
Felix Jimenez
In the frenetic haze of the intensive care unit, burned and bruised, his pelvis broken, Mark Schiller tried to tell his story of abduction and torture to nurses, doctors, anyone who might listen.
Mark Schiller (altered voice)
I told him I was kidnapped. And they go, no, no, you were in a bad accident. No, no, no, no. I was kidnapped. And they just blew it off.
Felix Jimenez
So how many times did you insist that you had been kidnapped?
Mark Schiller (altered voice)
About three. And then I gave up.
Judge Alex Ferrer
And he's trying to convince a nurse to give him a phone because he says he was kidnapped, and she just keeps going, no, you weren't kidnapped. You were drunk and you hit a pole.
Mark Schiller (altered voice)
I knew they weren't going to do anything.
Judge Alex Ferrer
Finally, she gives him the phone. He calls his lawyer.
Felix Jimenez
From there, it took just moments to figure out Mark Shiller needed a lot more than just a lawyer.
Judge Alex Ferrer
My name's Ed Dubois. I'm a private investigator.
Mark Schiller
We represent desperate people.
Felix Jimenez
But even ed Dubois, with 50 years experience as a PI had never heard anything quite like Mark Schiller's story.
Judge Alex Ferrer
The call was unusual because the story was so bizarre.
Felix Jimenez
The PI Met Schiller and believed his story. And soon, both men realized Mark Schiller had an even bigger problem. Lugo and Delgado were intent on finishing the job.
Mark Schiller (altered voice)
I was a sitting duck.
Felix Jimenez
Did you fear that Delgado and Lugo were going to come to the hospital?
Mark Schiller (altered voice)
Yeah. My sister was there and my brother, and we were all in panic.
Judge Alex Ferrer
I said, the easy answer is for you. To get out of the hospital.
Felix Jimenez
Why didn't either one of you go to the police at that point?
Mark Schiller
Well, we couldn't wait for the police.
Felix Jimenez
Schiller's sister ripped the medical tubes from.
Mark Schiller (altered voice)
His arms and the doctors. You can't move him. He's in critical condition.
Felix Jimenez
Schiller's brother and sister booked an air ambulance, grabbed their brother and bolted out of Miami, heading north, not a minute too soon.
Mark Schiller (altered voice)
We left at 8:00 in the morning, and I guess they came at 10:00 to look for me. To kill us all. All three of us.
Felix Jimenez
Delgado and Lugo.
Mark Schiller (altered voice)
Yeah.
Felix Jimenez
At the hospital, the now desperate Sun Gym gang had tracked down their former.
Judge Alex Ferrer
Captive as they're walking the hall of Jackson Memorial Hospital looking for him. He's on an air ambulance flight to.
Felix Jimenez
New York, 1,000 miles from Miami. Mark Schiller, now supported by his family, began to heal. His body and bones fractured.
Mark Schiller (altered voice)
First, I can't walk. And second of all, there's. Who knows how many of these people out there.
Felix Jimenez
Schiller would reunite with his family in Colombia. Weeks would pass, and strangely, despite his ordeal, Schiller did not report it to the police.
Judge Alex Ferrer
What person gets kidnapped, held for a month, and when he finally gets free, leaves the country and doesn't call the police for four months?
Felix Jimenez
I think what's difficult to understand is why you did not go to the police sooner.
Mark Schiller (altered voice)
I did.
Felix Jimenez
But according to authorities, it wasn't until April 1995, four months after his escape, that Schiller contacted police.
Mark Schiller (altered voice)
They want you to come to Miami to report it. I'm like, that's not happening. Who knows how many of these people out there? I run into them by accident, I'm dead.
Gail Levine
Mark Shiller was asked to come and give testimony under oath four times. And he stood up not only the prosecutor, but the police to give that testimony four times.
Felix Jimenez
Prosecutor Gail Levine would eventually lead the investigation and try the case. She says Shiller didn't come forward because he had his own credibility issues due to his alleged involvement in Medicare fraud.
Gail Levine
The victim comes from Colombia. He has a lot of money, more money than I would imagine most CPAs in Miami have.
Felix Jimenez
So after a while, you and Mark decided to go to the police?
Judge Alex Ferrer
Yeah.
Felix Jimenez
But according to Du Bois and Shiller, when they finally did sit down with.
Mark Schiller (altered voice)
Cops, they've never listened at all.
Judge Alex Ferrer
They never went out, never read them their rights. They never asked them a question.
Mark Schiller
They never even said, hello, here I am. We're breathing down your neck.
Judge Alex Ferrer
They went to Metro Dade's top unit that handles just crimes of this nature, just the biggest crimes, and they just didn't believe them.
Felix Jimenez
It had been five months since Mark Schiller's ordeal. The muscle headed gang had trashed his home and burned through his money. They were now hungry for another score.
Judge Alex Ferrer
If the police had listened to him and had investigated, Frank Griga and Christina Ferton would probably be alive today.
Susanna Griga
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Felix Jimenez
Risk is the podcast where people tell true stories they never thought they dare to share. Like our episode, after all, where Ken Cole and Tom Belay share about the night their son had a psychotic break.
Mark Schiller (altered voice)
And at that point I didn't actually.
Felix Jimenez
Know I had been stabbed all over my arm.
Judge Alex Ferrer
I was in shock.
Felix Jimenez
Find the Risk episode after all, on the Free Odyssey app or wherever you get your podcasts.
Mark Schiller
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Felix Jimenez
By May of 1995, five months after his harrowing escape, the Sunjung gang had burned through all of Mark Schuller's money.
Judge Alex Ferrer
They've been partying and going to strip clubs and dropping thousands of dollars on strippers. And it was all his money.
Felix Jimenez
With Schiller's fortune spent, the gang targeted their next victims, Frank Griga and his beautiful girlfriend, Christina Ferton.
Judge Alex Ferrer
There was never any pretense. They knew they were going to kill them.
Felix Jimenez
From the outset, the millionaire had it all.
Judge Alex Ferrer
Lugo and Dorbal, on the other hand, they wanted to live that life, the.
Felix Jimenez
Life Frank Griga had built on those dial tones of a saxophone empire.
Patty Barrientos
It made me very proud that my kid brother made it so big. You know, we were really poor when we were young.
Felix Jimenez
It's a true rags to riches story.
Patty Barrientos
Yes, it is.
Felix Jimenez
His sister Susanna had seen Frank's love for the glittery side of the American dream.
Patty Barrientos
Money was there for him to make other people happy and to play, to buy toys.
Felix Jimenez
His wealth did afford him certain luxury items.
Patty Barrientos
Oh, he loved cars. Yes, he loved cars.
Felix Jimenez
Lamborghini.
Patty Barrientos
Yes.
Felix Jimenez
Frank Griga's yellow Lamborghini was legendary. It was that car that caught the eye of Adrian Dorbal. He'd been told about it by a woman who once dated Griga.
Gail Levine
Dorbal's face lights up and says, who has the yellow Lambo? And she says, oh, don't you know? That's my friend Frank, he's my old boyfriend. And he says, how would I know him? Oh, he comes into this dance club, Solid Gold all the time. Don't you know him? Dorbol wasn't that stupid. Bingo. We got our next victim.
Felix Jimenez
Dorbol and Lugo approached Frank Griga with a phony made up business scheme. And a meeting was set at the Solid Gold strip club.
Gail Levine
And they told him that they were investors and that they had a way to make 20% return on the debt dollar.
Felix Jimenez
But the real plan mirrored the violent abduction of Mark Schiller. Kidnap and torture Griga until he signed over every nickel he had and revealed to the gang where his assets were kept.
Gail Levine
They also needed Christina. Why they needed Christina because if Frank was missing, Christina was going to go to the police because why wouldn't she go to the police? Frank was completely legal and it's the.
Mark Schiller
One with the balcony.
Felix Jimenez
Lugo and Dorbal, posing as businessmen, lured Frank and Christina back to Dorbol's apartment. Within minutes Dorball was strangling Frank in the bedroom.
Gail Levine
Dorbal, not knowing his own steroid strength, either broke his neck or suffocated him.
Judge Alex Ferrer
And she screams and Danny tackles her and injects her with horse tranquilizer, which they had basically bought to tranquilize the two of them.
Felix Jimenez
And it killed her?
Gail Levine
Not initially.
Judge Alex Ferrer
They had a dead person and another.
Felix Jimenez
One, another person near death. 23 year old Christina Ferton, who loved animals swimming and had dreams of being a professional diver, was now shot full of horse tranquilizer. Then Lugo demanded she give up the access code numbers to Frank Riga's house.
Judge Alex Ferrer
And Dorball goes and speaks to her and he comes back and he says his exact words were the bitch is cold. They had injected her with enough horse tranquilizer to kill four 1000 pound horses and now they're both dead. Frank Regan and Christina Ferton. And these two guys don't have a dime.
Felix Jimenez
So what did they do with the bodies?
Gail Levine
Well, they got creative.
Mark Schiller
These were some of the items that we were able to recreate from a Home Depot receipt that we found as to items that they purchased to use in dismembering the bodies.
Felix Jimenez
With the help of George Delgado, Dorbol and Lugo stuffed the bodies of Frank Griga into a couch and Christina Ferton into a large cardboard box.
Mark Schiller
So here you have these two muscular guys, and on a Saturday morning during the middle of the day, it looks like they're moving and they're moving boxes and they're moving a couch. And what they contain are two. Two bodies.
Felix Jimenez
They took the bodies to an empty warehouse. The horror was just beginning.
Judge Alex Ferrer
So they went to Home Depot and they bought a chainsaw. And they come back and they're going to use this to dismember the body. But the chainsaw doesn't have enough power. So these geniuses take this chainsaw back to Home Depot and return it.
Felix Jimenez
You're kidding me. And they brought that back and they ended up buying an electric chainsaw. It boggles the mind that they would return a chainsaw that they were going to use to dismember these people.
Mark Schiller
There's a lot about this case that boggles the mind.
Felix Jimenez
But the second chainsaw jammed in Christina Ferton's beautiful thick hair. That's when Dorbo and Lugo reached for an axe.
Gail Levine
And they started chopping the body parts for hours.
Judge Alex Ferrer
And then they disposed of the torsos in one part of the county in oil drums.
Gail Levine
And they left those hands, heads and feet in buckets at the 31 mile.
Judge Alex Ferrer
Marker in the Everglades on the alligator alley that goes from Fort Lauderdale to Naples.
Gail Levine
I have never passed that mile marker without saying a little prayer for Frank and Christina.
Felix Jimenez
Another gang member would dump Frank Riga's yellow Lamborghini on the side of the road in the swampy Florida Everglades. Police didn't need a gps. The map was clear and it led straight to the sunjum gang.
Gail Levine
And I remember saying, we don't have a missing persons. We have a very major homicide.
Felix Jimenez
And soon Frank's big sister Susanna was on a flight to Miami.
Patty Barrientos
The bodies were found that day, the day you arrived? Yes. Sergeant Jimenez and Salgar of follow came and picked me up at the airport. And they explained that they just had, you know, that they had the bodies. Yes.
Mark Schiller
Sorry.
Patty Barrientos
It's still very hard after 17 years.
Felix Jimenez
As investigators put the pieces together. Mark Schiller's kidnapped story echoed like thunder.
Mark Schiller (altered voice)
They said, we got another case just like yours. Could you come down to Miami? I said, yeah, I'll come to Miami.
Felix Jimenez
The Sun Gym Gang left a massive bloody trail of evidence. The last of the muscleheads would be busted when Danny Lugo's girlfriend, Sabina Petrescu told police that Lugo was hiding out in the Bahamas.
Gail Levine
We're trying to complete this investigation as quickly and as fast as we can.
Felix Jimenez
The crimes and the trial would captivate and horrify all of South Florida.
Judge Alex Ferrer
It was disturbing on every level and I've tried serial killers, but this case really got to me.
Felix Jimenez
Almost four years after he was left for dead, Mark Schiller faced off again against the Sun Gym Gang.
Susanna Griga
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Judge Alex Ferrer
I had jurors coming out to about here. It was just rows of jurors. In the morning, Lugo and Dorball would be brought across the bridge here from the jail.
Felix Jimenez
In February 1998, almost three years after the gruesome murders of Frank Griga and Christina Ferton, Danny Lugo and Adrian Dorbal were set to go on trial.
Gail Levine
It was so encompassing.
Felix Jimenez
The case would be career defining for prosecutor Gail Levine.
Gail Levine
From the day I got the call, from the day I started investigating it, from the day I met the victim's family, from the day I met everybody involved, from the relationship that I developed with police in investigating the case.
Felix Jimenez
Lugo's girlfriend Sabina was granted immunity in exchange for her testimony. She knew all the gang's secrets and details of their plots, though she believed they were undercover CIA agents.
Gail Levine
Sabina Petrescu is probably one of the most beautiful women I've ever seen in my life, but she was also one of the most naive women I have ever met in my life. She was in love with Danny Lugo, and she thought he was her CIA agent.
Felix Jimenez
100 witnesses, thousands of pieces of evidence. The case would drag on for 10 weeks, overseen by State's Attorney for Miami Dade County, Katherine Fernandez Rundle.
Gail Levine
When you have a case that's that grotesque and, you know, people suffered, what do we do to bring justice to.
Felix Jimenez
The victims of this case, either in.
Gail Levine
Their name or for their surviving members?
Felix Jimenez
And justice was what Mark Schiller got this time. He was in control as the prosecution's star witness.
Mark Schiller (altered voice)
Walking in and seeing Lugo and Durbaum, I realized that I was in the driver's seat. They never imagined that I'd be sitting there accusing them.
Felix Jimenez
The prosecution rested. Lugo and Dorbal's attorneys chose not to put on a case.
Judge Alex Ferrer
There are some times when, as a defense lawyer, you don't have anything to go on. You just don't. You can't claim misidentification. You can't claim anything.
Felix Jimenez
What was the defense strategy saved their lives. Jurors wasted little time making their decision. Within hours, they reached their verdict.
Gail Levine
Daniel Lugo is guilty of first degree murder. As to Christina Fortin. Daniel Lugo is guilty of first degree murder. As to Frank Griga.
Felix Jimenez
Dorbaugh was also found guilty, and both men were sentenced to death. A moment Judge Ferrer will never forget.
Judge Alex Ferrer
As I was sentencing him, Danny Lugo was standing there looking at me, and his eyes were watery. Noel Dorbal, on the other hand, he was joking. He was turning around to his girlfriend and making faces like a goofball.
Felix Jimenez
You believe that jury got it right?
Gail Levine
100%.
Judge Alex Ferrer
I think my final words were probably, may God have mercy on your soul.
Felix Jimenez
Have you gotten justice?
Patty Barrientos
What sort of justice can be done? Okay, short of bringing him back. He was reaching for the scene, and the message that he had out there was, you can do whatever you want. And this is what these guys broke short.
Felix Jimenez
Were you satisfied with the verdict?
Mark Schiller (altered voice)
Well, guilty, yeah, but I don't believe in the death penalty. I think being in the jail cell for the rest of the life is worse punishment.
Felix Jimenez
But the ordeal wasn't over for Mark Schiller. As he left the court after the trial, he was surrounded by armed FBI agents who arrested him on charges relating to an extensive Medicare scam. The Medicare fraud that made Shiller such an easy target. For the gang had come back to haunt him.
Mark Schiller
It was a sham.
Judge Alex Ferrer
They never returned the money to Mark Shiller.
Mark Schiller
Mark Shiller did not commit that $14 million worth of Medicare fraud.
Felix Jimenez
In a highly unusual twist, Judge Alex Ferrer stood up for Mark Shiller during the federal fraud investigation. He described how important Shiller's testimony was in bringing down the sunjum gang.
Judge Alex Ferrer
He was treated like a prisoner of war, or actually worse. The torture and the beatings and the attempts to kill him and all of that, for some reason, it just felt to me that that should be taken into consideration.
Felix Jimenez
Incredibly, one of Schiller's torturers, George Delgado, the Sun Gym member who had first told Lugo about Schiller and his millions, ended up helping the federal government make their case in a plea deal. Schiller ended up serving two years in federal prison and paying $137,000 in restitution. He felt betrayed.
Gail Levine
His jail sentence is what he did. But the pain and suffering that he endured, that nobody deserves that. Did Mark Shiller deserve to go to prison? I leave that to the federal government. I wasn't involved in that at all.
Felix Jimenez
Today, while Schiller refuses to talk about the charges, he does say he lost everything. His health, his home, his millions. And even now with a big Hollywood movie, he won't get a dime. I'm a self made man. I made a lot of money.
Mark Schiller (altered voice)
It's a comedy, which is unfortunate because there was nothing funny that happened to me. These were inept and competent people, but they were at the same time malicious and cold blooded murderers.
Felix Jimenez
Ultimately, the rest of the gang went to prison too. This co conspirator was sentenced to two years imprisonment for his involvement in Schiller's kidnapping. And Jorge Delgado got 15. All told seven members of the gang would do time. Is this a hit it situation?
Mark Schiller
It's whatever kind of adventure we want it to be.
Felix Jimenez
Now streaming on Paramount Plus. It's an all new season of adventures. We have to stop this invasion, get into this shit.
Gail Levine
This crew is a team. We are going to find our way.
Felix Jimenez
Out of this together.
Mark Schiller
Chaos. It's one in a thousand.
Felix Jimenez
We get it done or don't blow.
Judge Alex Ferrer
Ourselves up along the way.
Mark Schiller
I like those odds. We'll just turn it off before we blow up.
Felix Jimenez
Star Trek Strange New worlds. New season. Now streaming on Paramount plus. To understand the power of hip hop today, you gotta go back to where it all started. New York City, a new docu series.
Susanna Griga
Hosted by LL Cool J is now on Paramount plus.
Felix Jimenez
You saying hip hop went worldwide from right here. Yeah.
Susanna Griga
Featuring untold stories from artists like Rev Run, Method Man, Dougie Fresh and more.
Felix Jimenez
I want to impact not only my.
Susanna Griga
Generation, but the generation before me, the generation after me.
Mark Schiller
Who would ever think that we could be world famous?
Felix Jimenez
I would have never imagined that hip hop was born here.
Susanna Griga
New docu series now streaming on Paramount.
Episode Title: No Pain No Gain
Host/Author: CBS News
Release Date: August 13, 2025
The "No Pain No Gain" episode of "48 Hours" delves into one of Miami's most notorious and complex crime cases, intertwining the brutal kidnapping and murder of a wealthy couple with a harrowing tale of survival and deception. The narrative explores the rise and fall of Danny Lugo and Adrian Dorbal, leaders of the Sun Gym Gang, whose quest for wealth led them down a path of violence and murder.
Frank Griga, an immigrant from Budapest who built a successful phone sex line empire in Miami, and his 23-year-old girlfriend, Christina Ferton, enjoyed a life of luxury with expensive cars and upscale living. Frank's sister, Susanna Griga, recounts the deep bond and the sudden darkness that befell her brother and Christina.
Susanna Griga [03:18]: "I've never felt like this before. It's like you just get me. I feel like my true self with you."
Frank's ascent from a minimum-wage worker to a millionaire is highlighted, showcasing his determination and success.
Felix Jimenez [04:02]: "In fewer than 10 years, he was living in an upscale Miami enclave called Golden Beach, running a phone sex line empire. He was on top of the world until May 24, 1995."
Danny Lugo, a former convict, managed the Sun Gym and led a gang composed of muscle-bound individuals involved in petty theft and scams. Adrian Dorbal, Lugo's protege, was depicted as a ruthless enforcer within the gang. Their partnership was fueled by a shared desire for wealth and power, leading them to target affluent individuals like Frank and Christina.
Judge Alex Ferrer [06:37]: "Danny Lugo was a Puerto Rican Cuban kid from the Bronx. He thought he was smarter than anybody else. He had a way of convincing people to do things that they didn't want to do."
The investigation into Frank and Christina's disappearance began with their Lamborghini being found abandoned in the Everglades, signaling foul play. Detectives Mark Schiller and Felix Jimenez, along with other key figures, traced the evidence back to Lugo and his gang.
Mark Schiller [05:03]: "A missing Hungarian couple had said that they were going to the Bahamas the following day. So all their friends assumed that the reason they weren't home was because they were in the Bahamas."
Interviews with neighbors and evidence from search warrants pointed directly to the gang's involvement, uncovering a web of deceit and criminal activity.
Mark Schiller [06:37]: "It's real close to here, Sal. This is where Sun Gym was located. This is what we could call the gang headquarters."
Mark Schiller, an accountant and friend of Frank Griga, became another victim of Lugo's gang when he was kidnapped in a separate incident. Schiller's brutal torture was intended to extort money and information, but his resilience and eventual escape led to the downfall of the Sun Gym Gang.
Mark Schiller [17:26]: "I walked out to my car. As soon as I open my door, I'm grabbed from behind by three guys."
Despite enduring unimaginable pain and torture, Schiller managed to survive an attempted murder when the gang's plan to burn his vehicle failed, allowing him to escape and seek help.
Mark Schiller [22:17]: "They drove the car into a light pole... and set it on fire. And that was their attempt to kill him."
With Mark Schiller coerced into signing over his assets, the gang turned their attention back to Frank Griga and Christina Ferton. Posing as investors, Lugo and Dorbal lured the couple to Dorbal's apartment, where Frank was brutally killed, and Christina was rendered unconscious with horse tranquilizers before being murdered.
Judge Alex Ferrer [32:08]: "Lugo and Dorbal, on the other hand, they wanted to live that life, the life Frank Griga had built on those dial tones of a saxophone empire."
The gang attempted to dispose of the bodies in the Everglades, using makeshift methods that ultimately linked them back to their identities.
Felix Jimenez [34:27]: "With the help of George Delgado, Dorbal and Lugo stuffed the bodies of Frank Griga into a couch and Christina Ferton into a large cardboard box."
The trial of Danny Lugo and Adrian Dorbal was a landmark case. Prosecutor Gail Levine led the charge, utilizing the compelling testimony of Mark Schiller as the star witness. Despite attempts by the defense to undermine the credibility of the evidence, the jury swiftly found Lugo and Dorbal guilty of first-degree murder, sentencing them to death.
Judge Alex Ferrer [40:13]: "Daniel Lugo is guilty of first-degree murder. As to Christina Ferton, Daniel Lugo is guilty of first-degree murder. As to Frank Griga."
The verdict was met with a sense of justice for the victims, although lingering questions about systemic failures in law enforcement persisted.
Judge Alex Ferrer [40:53]: "I think my final words were probably, may God have mercy on your soul."
Despite securing convictions, the aftermath of the case revealed deeper issues. Mark Schiller himself faced federal charges related to Medicare fraud, which many believe were fabricated to tarnish his credibility. His ordeal left him bankrupt, estranged from his wealth, and grappling with the psychological scars of his captivity.
Mark Schiller [41:20]: "But the ordeal wasn't over for Mark Schiller. As he left the court after the trial, he was surrounded by armed FBI agents who arrested him on charges relating to an extensive Medicare scam."
The case highlighted flaws in the criminal justice system, particularly in how Schiller's initial plight was dismissed and how delayed reporting affected the investigation's integrity.
Judge Alex Ferrer [27:39]: "If the police had listened to him and had investigated, Frank Griga and Christina Ferton would probably be alive today."
"No Pain No Gain" offers a profound exploration of ambition gone awry, the brutality of crime driven by greed, and the resilience of a man who survived unimaginable torture. Through meticulous reporting and gripping interviews, the episode sheds light on the complexities of the case, the failures in the justice system, and the enduring quest for truth and redemption.
Felix Jimenez [43:20]: "Ultimately, the rest of the gang went to prison too. This co-conspirator was sentenced to two years imprisonment for his involvement in Schiller's kidnapping. And Jorge Delgado got 15."
The episode serves as a cautionary tale of the destructive power of unchecked ambition and the vital importance of listening to survivors of trauma.
This comprehensive summary encapsulates the key elements of the "No Pain No Gain" episode, providing a clear and engaging overview for listeners and those interested in the intricate details of this high-profile case.