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- [00:01]
Narrator
Along the banks of the Passaic river, police make a terrifying discovery.
- [00:07]
Investigator/Detective
We're talking about large hefty bags filled with body parts. Roughly 65 pieces.
- [00:14]
Officer Richard Freeman
We just couldn't believe what we were looking at.
- [00:17]
Narrator
As the mysterious scene begins to unravel, details surrounding the victim emerge.
- [00:24]
Officer Richard Freeman
What did the guy in the bags do to make him cut him up in such a way?
- [00:32]
Detective
There was suspicion at first that perhaps the Russian mob was involved.
- [00:36]
Colleague of Yakov Glusman
He had made some very, very important discoveries.
- [00:40]
Prosecutor
He was considered to be an asset for the Soviet Union.
- [00:44]
Defense Attorney or Legal Analyst
She had quite a bit of influence over him and his situation here in the United States.
- [00:51]
Narrator
The key to unlocking this ghastly crime lies in a tangled story of jealousy and greed.
- [01:00]
Prosecutor
Things started to add up that something nefarious really did.
- [01:05]
Defense Attorney or Legal Analyst
There's a very consistent theme that she's very controlling, very manipulative, and very vindictive.
- [01:11]
Prosecutor
If she couldn't have him, nobody could.
- [01:31]
Narrator
April 7, 1996. It's 10am on Easter Sunday, and officers in East Rutherford, New Jersey, are looking forward to a light day of patrols.
- [01:43]
Officer Richard Freeman
I had coffee with the other guys on my shift, and a little after 10 o', clock, I headed down towards the west end of town towards the industrial complex. Since this was Easter Sunday, you know, it's a holiday, very, very little activity was taking place.
- [02:03]
Narrator
Officer Freeman drives through the area to make a routine check and spots something strange.
- [02:11]
Officer Richard Freeman
I headed down towards the river and that's when I came upon a powder blue car with the trunk open. As I approached this vehicle, I noticed several things. Number one, the front license plate was bent, so I could not read it. Second thing is, there were garbage bags. And I could see the ties, the yellow ties sticking out of the trunk. To my left, there was a dumpster. And I'm thinking to myself, if this car is backed up and it's got garbage bags in it, why wouldn't the person who's operating the car be dumping the garbage in that dumpster? Something was definitely wrong. And up from the riverbank comes a gentleman, bearded gentleman. He came about halfway up, stopped, looked at me, and the fear of God was in his eyes. I unsnapped the holster just in case I had to use my weapon. I called him up. I said, come over here. And as he started walking towards me, I kept an eye on him and I opened one of the bags in the trunk of the car. I look inside and I see what I perceive to be human intestine. I was like, whoa. I don't know what I got here, but it looks like body parts. This guy might have murdered somebody. I watched him come up and as he was walking slowly, I'm observing him and he had a latex glove on his hand. And I also noticed some droplets of blood on one of his work shoes. I motioned him to stand at the rear wheel of his car and I said, give me your driver's license. I looked at it and his name was Vladimir Zelenin. He was Russian. I said, what are you doing here? What's in the bags? And he just kind of like looked up in the air. I assumed that he didn't speak English. I really didn't want to ask him a lot of questions until he was handcuffed. He had this look about him that he might try to overpower me. He was definitely eerie. I got my portable radio. I called for a backup. I said, listen, I said, I think I got a body in the trunk of a car, so you better send me everybody.
- [05:06]
Narrator
Minutes later, backup patrols arrive and the man is taken into custody.
- [05:12]
Officer Richard Freeman
We handcuffed him and put him in the car and I read him Miranda warning. I did ask Vladimir how many bodies were in the bags. And he answered one. And with that he started to motion his his head to the left and he said, more parts. I said, what? He said, more parts. And there was a car parked maybe 40, 50ft away. We opened up the trunk and there was a couple more bags in there. You could see like a scalpel, a pair of pliers, an axe belt. You could make out a piece of, of what would appear to be skull, but missing the ear. We just couldn't believe what we were looking at. Never in my wildest dreams would I have ever thought that I would encounter such a horrific scene. He realized that he's obviously caught. This whole demeanor changed, that he wanted to get this off of his chest.
- [06:35]
Prosecutor
Mr. Zelenin told the police that the victim was Yakov Glusman.
- [06:47]
Narrator
Doctor Yakov Glusman was a 48 year old scientist world renowned for his breakthroughs in cancer research. He and his wife Rita Glusman had known each other since they were children.
- [07:01]
Detective
Yakov Glusman was born in Ukraine, 1947, when Ukraine was part of the Soviet Union. Rita Glusman was born in 1948 in Ukraine.
- [07:13]
Prosecutor
She was a brilliant woman. She was highly educated, a scientist as well.
- [07:23]
Narrator
While Yakov attended Moscow State University, him and Rita kept in touch and after a brief courtship, got married in 1969. Their first act as man and wife was to plan an escape from the Soviet Union.
- [07:40]
Prosecutor
Both Rieder and Yakov were Jewish. And at that point in time, there was a lot of discrimination against Jewish. The Jewish population in Communist Russia.
- [07:49]
Colleague of Yakov Glusman
Rita had petitioned to get the family out of the Soviet Union and go to Israel. And eventually she was allowed to go. But Yakov, because he was a scientist, was not allowed to leave.
- [08:02]
Prosecutor
He was considered to be an asset for the Soviet Union, and so he could not leave the country. Yakov, however, told Rita, please leave, you know, because she was pregnant with your child.
- [08:14]
Investigator/Detective
And.
- [08:18]
Narrator
In 1970, Rita immigrated to Israel, where she gave birth to the couple's only child, a son. But she was determined not to leave her husband behind.
- [08:30]
Detective
Rita Glusman came to the United States, where she launched a protest in front of the United nations and a hunger strike, drawing attention to the plight of her husband.
- [08:41]
Colleague of Yakov Glusman
She even lobbied members of Congress and wrote to the President of the United States.
- [08:48]
Narrator
Desperate to reunite her family after 22 months apart, Rita's hard work resulted in an emotional reunion.
- [08:57]
Detective
Yaakov Glusman is allowed to join Rita in Israel at long last. And they lived in Israel for several years, pursuing postgraduate education.
- [09:13]
Narrator
In 1977, the couple immigrated to Long Island, New York. Yakov was hired to do his postdoctoral work at Cold Spring Harbor Laboratories, one of the world's leading research centers.
- [09:27]
Colleague of Yakov Glusman
I was a colleague at Cold Spring Harbor Laboratory with Yakov, a family that lived on the campus in an apartment. Yakov really enjoyed the idea of living on the campus and being able to spend time with his son. He was a gentle giant is the way I remember him. A lot of fun, but very serious scientist when it came down to it. This was a very interesting time in cancer research because it was known that viruses could cause cancer. And everybody was interested in what are the genes inside these viruses that can cause cancer. He had made some very, very important discoveries.
- [10:11]
Detective
By the early 80s, Rita was raising their son, who would have been 10, 12 years old. In 1987, Yakov Glusman gets an offer from a major pharmaceutical concern headquartered in Pearl River, New York, looking for cures for cancer and is paid a very nice salary.
- [10:30]
Narrator
Yakov's new job paid so well, he and Rita were able to buy an expansive home.
- [10:37]
Prosecutor
The home was in Upper Saddle River, New Jersey. This area was a very affluent neighborhood. There were multimillion dollar homes, very large, almost mansion type of homes.
- [10:48]
Detective
Sometime after the Glesmans resettled, Rita decided to start a technology company. And it was a electroplating concern known as ECI Technologies.
- [11:01]
Prosecutor
ECI Technologies was a business that was involved in electronic components for other Businesses.
- [11:08]
Narrator
For more than a decade, the Glusmans lived their American dream. With their son grown, they focused on expanding their business and traveling together.
- [11:19]
Investigator/Detective
We met in Jamaica at the end of 1995. She talked about how much she loved her husband.
- [11:26]
Prosecutor
She said more than once how brilliant he was.
- [11:29]
Investigator/Detective
They were just a loving couple.
- [11:35]
Narrator
But now their dream life has turned into a nightmare with the discovery of Yakov's alleged remains in the trunk of a car. Within an hour, the East Rutherford Industrial park becomes the site of a massive murder investigation.
- [11:53]
Prosecutor
This brought a. A huge response from numerous other police agencies. They brought in forensic teams, they brought in scuba diving teams to go into the river to search for additional body parts. There was no way at that point in time, in this early stage in the investigation to confirm exactly what Vladimir Zelenin had told the police.
- [12:20]
Narrator
Hoping to confirm the victim's identity and learn more from their suspect, detectives transport him to the station.
- [12:29]
Officer Richard Freeman
Was it the Russian mafia? And I'm thinking, what was going through his mind? What did the guy in the bags do to make him cut him up in such a way? I mean, it was brutal.
- [12:50]
Narrator
Coming up, the prime suspect makes a horrifying confession.
- [12:56]
Prosecutor
He was trying to cut up the body and to such small pieces that couldn't be identified.
- [13:01]
Narrator
And he claims he didn't act alone.
- [13:05]
Prosecutor
While he was in the bathroom, he heard her yell out to him, he's still breathing. He's still breathing.
- [13:18]
Narrator
While murder suspect Vladimir Zelenin is brought in for questioning, divers search the river for any additional evidence.
- [13:27]
Officer Richard Freeman
There was a bag left on a rock down at the riverbank. Obviously, you know, he got some stuff into that river. We're gonna have to find it.
- [13:37]
Detective
The Passaic is very polluted and murky. It was a cold day. Divers did heroic work.
- [13:43]
Narrator
The divers managed to recover several more body parts that are assumed to belong to the same person found in two vehicles at the scene.
- [13:53]
Forensic Investigator/Medical Examiner
We contacted the medical examiner's office, and they took possession of all the bags to be positively identified.
- [14:01]
Investigator/Detective
We're talking about large, hefty bags filled with body parts. Roughly 65 pieces of this man. And they weren't small pieces. There were parts of his arm, parts of his hand, his fingers, eyes, the heart, liver. It was a fairly gruesome, ugly situation.
- [14:29]
Narrator
Now police need more information from their suspect.
- [14:33]
Prosecutor
Once back at the East Rutherford Police Department, detectives were speaking with Vladimir Zelenin with the assistance of the interpreter.
- [14:42]
Narrator
The brutal nature of the crime has led to speculation about the Russian mafia. However, it turns out Vladimir and Yakov were friends.
- [14:53]
Forensic Investigator/Medical Examiner
Vladimir Stalin is the cousin of Rita Glusman. Rita and Yakov were very instrumental in bringing Zelenin from Russia back in 1993.
- [15:08]
Prosecutor
Vladimir Zelenin had lived in the former Soviet Union. His wife had been murdered during a robbery of a check cashing company that she had worked at. He had told authorities, though, that she was the victim of an anti Semitic murder, and that was the basis for his seeking political asylum in the United States.
- [15:32]
Forensic Investigator/Medical Examiner
Rita basically took Vladimir under her wing. She provided for him. Rita got him a job at ECI Technology, got him an apartment in Fairlorn.
- [15:43]
Defense Attorney or Legal Analyst
She had quite a bit of influence over him and his situation here in the United States.
- [15:51]
Narrator
According to Vladimir, he had no reason to kill Yakov. But Rita did.
- [15:58]
Prosecutor
Vladimir Zelenin told the police that for several months his cousin Rita Glusman had been complaining to him that she and Yakov Glusman were going through a divorce.
- [16:10]
Forensic Investigator/Medical Examiner
He knew that the divorce was bitter. He told us that Yakov had moved out back in 1995 and got his own apartment. He had enough of her lavish lifestyle, and he was a very frugal man.
- [16:25]
Narrator
Vladimir says Rita feared the divorce would mean the end of her business.
- [16:31]
Prosecutor
Rita kept telling Vladimir Zelenin that if ECI Technologies went under that she would lose everything.
- [16:37]
Investigator/Detective
Once the divorce became a reality, she was gonn do anything she could to protect the assets that she had.
- [16:48]
Detective
Rita Glusman had come to Vladimir Zelenin sometime in February of 1996, asking for his help in murdering her husband, Yakov. He had at first declined. Rita reminded him that his livelihood and his immigration status in the United States depended entirely on his employment at eci.
- [17:13]
Prosecutor
Rita had been threatening if Vladimir did not help Rita kill her husband, she was gonna go to the authorities and tell them that his political asylum application was falsified and that he would then be thrown out of the country. According to Mr. Zelennan, he felt like he had no other option.
- [17:33]
Defense Attorney or Legal Analyst
He did not want to go back to where he came from. He felt that that was a death sentence.
- [17:43]
Narrator
Vladimir says the plan was simple.
- [17:46]
Prosecutor
He told the police that Rita still had access to the apartment that Yakov Glusman was living in. The plan that they came up with was that they would lay in wait inside the apartment, that they were armed with axes, hatchets, and knives, and when Yaakov Klozmann came home, they would attack him.
- [18:12]
Detective
Yakov Glesman worked late on Saturday, April 6, returning home to his apartment after 11:45 at night.
- [18:25]
Defense Attorney or Legal Analyst
The door opened, and Vladimir said that he had both hands on the ax. He hit Yakov in the head with the ax and he made a sound and he dropped down and he hit him again. And then Rita came around the corner and started attacking him.
- [18:47]
Prosecutor
Rita Glusman had a hatchet, and Rita was furiously hitting him with the hatchet at the top of his head.
- [18:58]
Narrator
However, things didn't go quite the way they anticipated. Vladimir says during the frenzy, Rita cut his hand with her axe and he went into the bathroom to bandage it.
- [19:13]
Prosecutor
While he was in the bathroom, he heard Rita yell out to him, he's still breathing, he's still breathing. Vladimir came out of the bathroom, looked down at Yakov and said, there's nothing I can do now. Rita then took the knife and began to use it, stabbing Yakov Glusman in the torso area.
- [19:41]
Narrator
Once they were sure Yakov was dead, they began covering their tracks.
- [19:48]
Investigator/Detective
Vladimir's job was to dismember him. Vladimir was in the bathroom doing what he needed to do in the bathtub while Rita sanitized that apartment.
- [20:00]
Prosecutor
Vladimir said that Jakov was a fairly large person and that they couldn't really just carry him out of the apartment. So he had no other choice but to dismember the body, to put them into different bags. He was trying to cut up the body into such small pieces that it couldn't be identified. So that's why he cut off the ears, he cut off the nose. The fact that one person could do that to another human being shocks the conscience so much.
- [20:37]
Investigator/Detective
By now. It's about six o' clock in the morning and they dragged those bags downstairs. These are heavy bags.
- [20:45]
Forensic Investigator/Medical Examiner
According to Zelenin, Rita told him to put the bags in the trunk of Yakov's car. So they were able to use Yakov's car as well as Selenin's car to put all 11 bags of body parts and tools into the trunk of both cars.
- [21:11]
Narrator
Vladimir says they planned to dump the bags in the river, but Rita made a stop for medical supplies along the way.
- [21:19]
Forensic Investigator/Medical Examiner
They stopped at a CVS store and they bought a tremendous amount of bandages and gauzes and band aids to take care of Selennan's hand. And then they proceeded to drive both vehicles to the ECI Technologies parking lot. Upon arrival, they left Yakov's vehicle there, and then Selenin drove Loretta back to the house in Upper Saddle river, and then he returned back to ECI Technologies with Yakov's car was to dump the body parts in the Passaic River. That's when he was found by police officer Richard Freeman.
- [22:01]
Narrator
Based on his confession, Vladimir is charged with murder. Now detectives must determine if Rita is the mastermind or another potential victim.
- [22:14]
Forensic Investigator/Medical Examiner
We knew where Solana was. We had no idea where Rita was.
- [22:19]
Defense Attorney or Legal Analyst
We didn't know if his statement was accurate. We need to corroborate what he says. She was possibly a witness, possibly a person of interest, possibly dead. Even.
- [22:39]
Narrator
After the arrest of Vladimir Zelenin, New Jersey police are focused on locating his alleged co conspirator, Rita Glusman.
- [22:49]
Prosecutor
Given what Vladimir had said about what he had done to Yakov, the police were concerned that perhaps, you know, he had done something also to Rita.
- [22:58]
Detective
Officials tried to find Rita Glusman at the Glusman family residence in Upper Saddle River.
- [23:04]
Forensic Investigator/Medical Examiner
Once the search warrant was authorized by the judge, we entered the residence and we proceeded to search.
- [23:12]
Detective
They were unable to find Rita Glusman there or anyone at the Glusman household.
- [23:18]
Narrator
But police do find some incriminating evidence.
- [23:25]
Forensic Investigator/Medical Examiner
We knew that one of the knives in the bag of tools was a Henkel knife. I realized that there was a block of Henkel knives on the kitchen that were missing several of them. Part of my search is always securing the trap from the washer because usually when you wash an item with blood, there's blood left in the trap. But in order for me to do that, I had to remove the dryer first. In the vent of the dryer on the wall, there was an envelope. I wanted to know, why is this envelope so well secured in here, so well hidden? It turned out to be a couple of business cards and phone numbers ripped from a phone book that was seized as evidence.
- [24:21]
Narrator
When detectives are finished at the house, they try to find Rita at her company.
- [24:27]
Prosecutor
At her company, ECI Technology. The workers there all said they had not seen her. So what was decided was a nationwide alert would be put out to all law enforcement agencies, both state and federal, to see if they could locate Rita Glusman.
- [24:47]
Narrator
Their next stop is the alleged crime scene, Yakov Glusman's apartment.
- [24:53]
Forensic Investigator/Medical Examiner
As we were walking into the the building, like you could see some small amount of smeared blood on the door jamb.
- [25:06]
Narrator
But when detectives go inside, they find the place is spotless.
- [25:13]
Prosecutor
There was no obvious signs that a murder had taken place. So it was very difficult at that point in time to really determine whether or not what Vladimir Zlen said was actually true, that a murder occurred there. However, after the police did some forensic investigation and spoke with neighbors, things started to add up that something nefarious really did happen in this apartment.
- [25:40]
Forensic Investigator/Medical Examiner
I did go downstairs to the apartment directly below Yakov's apartment. And I spoke to a female there. She told me that in the middle of the night, she heard hammering upstairs, and she was wondering what the heck could anybody be doing at this time of night.
- [25:58]
Prosecutor
In the morning, another neighbor told the police that they had looked out their kitchen window and observed what appeared to be a female and a male going to the vehicles. Just like Vladimir said,
- [26:10]
Investigator/Detective
she saw them dragging the bags, putting them in the trunk. The woman had her head covered, and she was kind of careful to keep her head down and not to be seen. We're obviously trying to be as discreet as possible, but they weren't.
- [26:27]
Narrator
Unfortunately, the witness can't say for certain the woman was Rita, but her testimony corroborates much of what Vladimir told police. The most important thing left to confirm is the identity of the victim. On April 9, two days after the body parts were found, a medical examiner determined determines they are missing a piece.
- [26:54]
Forensic Investigator/Medical Examiner
We tried to basically rebuild, if you will, the body with all the parts. There were 65 pieces at that point. And by doing that, we were able to realize that we were missing his left forearm. We contacted the Bergen county police diving team again, and they went back and they found it.
- [27:23]
Narrator
Even with a full body, identification proves difficult.
- [27:29]
Forensic Investigator/Medical Examiner
All fingerprints, all tips of all the fingers have been severed off.
- [27:35]
Detective
There was suspicion at first that perhaps the Russian mob was involved because the modus operandi matched theirs.
- [27:43]
Investigator/Detective
Vladimir was meticulous in what he did to diminish the ability to identify him.
- [27:50]
Prosecutor
Fortunately for the medical examiner, Vladimir Zelenin also committed one huge mistake in that he did not remove and cut the jawbone with the teeth. The medical examiner was able then to use dental records to make a positive identification of Yakov Kluzman.
- [28:11]
Narrator
Nearly every detail of Vladimir's confession has now been verified. The one piece still missing is Rita.
- [28:21]
Investigator/Detective
That's about the time that the bureau started to get involved. They came to us because we had the resources to start to cover the New York metropolitan area in a way that the local jurisdictions don't have the capacity to do.
- [28:36]
Forensic Investigator/Medical Examiner
We put out all points at all the airports, contacted all the transportation agencies.
- [28:43]
Prosecutor
Some of the information that was returned was that Rita Glusman's vehicle had entered LaGuardia Airport at about 3 o' clock in the afternoon on Sunday. You have to get a ticket when you pulled in, and then that would trigger a camera to read a license plate. Is she hiding out? Is she fleeing? The car then exited a short time later.
- [29:08]
Narrator
As media coverage of the brutal crime spreads across the Tri State area, another witness comes forward.
- [29:16]
Prosecutor
Pictures of Rita Glusman were flashed on television screens and newspapers throughout the Tri State area. Ultimately wound up at a CVS pharmacy and spoke to a clerk who said that he had recognized Rita's picture in the newspaper as being a woman who came in to buy bandages at or near the time after the murder had occurred.
- [29:43]
Narrator
The clerk's identification of Rita seems to remove any doubt she was involved in her husband's murder.
- [29:51]
Prosecutor
It became pretty apparent that Vladimir Zelenin's statements were checking out and that he was telling the truth.
- [29:58]
Forensic Investigator/Medical Examiner
She was not a victim. She basically flew the coupe.
- [30:02]
Investigator/Detective
We had no idea where this woman was.
- [30:09]
Narrator
Coming up. Investigators find evidence that reveals a woman scorned.
- [30:15]
Prosecutor
How dare he find someone else, Someone younger than her.
- [30:19]
Investigator/Detective
She wanted to take him for everything she could.
- [30:31]
Narrator
The investigation into the murder of Yakov Glusman is entering its fourth day, and the alleged mastermind, Rita Glusman, is still missing. While the search continues, police build their case by examining the couple's finances.
- [30:51]
Investigator/Detective
Rita had quite a life before Yakov announced that he wanted a divorce.
- [30:56]
Detective
Yakov Klusman was making about $170,000. In the mid-1990s, Rita was making somewhere in the neighborhood of $80,000 from her work at ECI.
- [31:10]
Defense Attorney or Legal Analyst
Yakov had made what he felt was a very generous settlement offer for their divorce. He was going to give up his share of the house, and he was also going to give up some of his 401s.
- [31:24]
Narrator
Despite Yakov's attempts at diplomacy, Rita refused his term.
- [31:30]
Investigator/Detective
We realized she wanted to take him for everything she could.
- [31:38]
Narrator
The couple's divorce attorneys tell investigators a key point of contention was ECI Technologies, the company they founded together.
- [31:48]
Investigator/Detective
She wanted that company to be signed over to her. She wanted complete control of it.
- [31:54]
Defense Attorney or Legal Analyst
He didn't know the financial situation of the business, and he was trying to determine that before he made his settlement, and she was precluding that from happening.
- [32:04]
Narrator
The company's financial records give detectives insight into why Rita was so hesitant.
- [32:11]
Prosecutor
Rita Glusman, as the president of ECI Technologies, used her position to full advantage. She used the company to pay the mortgage on her home, to pay mortgages for her sister and her mother. She had expensive cars that were leased through the company. She was eating out at fine restaurants, buying furs, jewelries, expensive clothing. All these things that she really couldn't afford were being paid through ECI Technology. She was spending upwards of $20,000 a month.
- [32:48]
Investigator/Detective
She was milking the company.
- [32:54]
Narrator
But greed wasn't the only Thing driving Rita to kill her husband. Yakov's phone records reveal many of his calls were to a phone number from Israel.
- [33:10]
Detective
Yaakov Klassman had met a young researcher in Israel on a trip there in 1994, and the two began a friendship that would later matriculate into an extramarital affair.
- [33:25]
Investigator/Detective
He was not seeing her while he was still living in the home with Rita. He was separated.
- [33:31]
Narrator
When Rita found out, the woman says, she was furious.
- [33:36]
Prosecutor
How dare he find someone else, find someone younger than her. And basically, if she couldn't have Yakov, nobody could.
- [33:50]
Detective
Rita's suspicious of what was going on at Yakov's apartment, so she hired a private investigator.
- [33:58]
Narrator
Detectives call the numbers from the business cards in Yakov's laundry room, and when they find Rita's private investigator, he tells them everything he did for her.
- [34:09]
Defense Attorney or Legal Analyst
The private investigator referred her to a couple of technicians. She had them place a recording device in the home.
- [34:18]
Narrator
He says Rita used the information she gathered to wage war on her husband.
- [34:25]
Investigator/Detective
Rita discovered that Yakov was working either to bring her here to the United States or to go back to Israel to be with her. He was determined to maintain this relationship. She was determined to destroy it.
- [34:40]
Defense Attorney or Legal Analyst
We learned that Rita Glusman paid a private investigator in Israel to follow her husband, and he was photographed with this woman. Those pictures were sent back to Rita in New Jersey via her courier account. Those pictures turned up at the Glusman family in Israel, looking to ruin his and tarnish his reputation and a family's reputation that they didn't pay $100,000.
- [35:13]
Prosecutor
It was her intent to blackmail Yakov Kluzman. However, she was mistaken because Yakov had introduced her to the family in Israel. They liked her, and they were very pleased that Yakov was dating this young woman.
- [35:31]
Narrator
With her blackmail attempts thwarted, Rita ratcheted up her efforts to destroy Yakov's relationship.
- [35:39]
Prosecutor
Rita was asking these investigators in Israel to do really crazy things, like plant cocaine on Yakov's girlfriend to prevent her from getting here to infect her with the AIDS virus in a drink. She was just really getting very desperate.
- [35:58]
Narrator
A month later, in December 1995, Yakov filed for divorce. Four months after that, he was murdered. On April 12, 1996, investigators get a tip that changes everything.
- [36:18]
Colleague of Yakov Glusman
Cold Spring Harbor Laboratory is a big international center for scientific conferences and for training scientists in courses. So we have these cabins on the north shore of Long island where people would stay, and they were not used except during the summer. One of our security people saw a light on in one of these cabins. And investigators saw someone living there and called the police.
- [36:46]
Investigator/Detective
The woman was Rita. Then they arrest her for trespassing. Rita knew the grounds really well. She knew the bungalows, and I don't think she believed that anybody would really be looking for her there.
- [37:01]
Narrator
Rita is apprehended without incident. Inside the cabin, police find evidence she'd been planning her next move.
- [37:10]
Prosecutor
They observe various items, like travel books to countries like Switzerland, which does not have an extradition treaty with the United States. And they found hair dye that Rita had changed the color of her hair.
- [37:24]
Investigator/Detective
She was obviously planning to leave.
- [37:31]
Narrator
Although the evidence appears to be stacked against Rita, prosecutors know convictions aren't guaranteed.
- [37:39]
Prosecutor
One of the major hurdles that we were facing was how could we bring a case against both Vladimir Zelenin and Rita Glusman in this matter, given that we only had Vladimir Zelenin's confession?
- [37:53]
Investigator/Detective
And then we started to think about charging her with this novel new law.
- [38:07]
Narrator
After only six days of investigation, New Jersey police have apprehended both suspects in the gruesome murder of Yakov Gluzman. As the mastermind, his wife, Rita, faces an array of charges, including interstate conspiracy, extortion, and illegal wiretapping. She is also charged under a relatively new law passed in 1994.
- [38:34]
Detective
So it was decided that the US Attorney and the district attorney would make a joint prosecution and charge Rita under the Violence Against Women act, which made it a federal crime to cross state lines and abuse a spouse, resulting in death.
- [38:48]
Investigator/Detective
Initially, the law was designed to protect women.
- [38:56]
Narrator
Vladimir Zelenin is offered a plea deal in exchange for testifying against her.
- [39:02]
Prosecutor
In exchange for his cooperation against Rita Glusman, he would receive a reduced jail sentence by a few years.
- [39:10]
Defense Attorney or Legal Analyst
Without him, there's no case against Rita.
- [39:17]
Narrator
Nine months later, in January 1997, Rita stands trial in federal court.
- [39:24]
Prosecutor
The theory in the prosecution of Rita Glusman was that Rita was very concerned that if the divorce went through and Yakov backed out of ECI technology, that she would then lose the business and the lifestyle that it brought her. This was not an aggrieved wife who was about to be divorced because her husband's having an affair, but rather a cold, calculating individual who did not want to lose the lifestyle that she was accustomed to.
- [39:54]
Investigator/Detective
Rita snapped because she was going to lose everything. She was going to lose her kingdom.
- [40:00]
Forensic Investigator/Medical Examiner
I have seen people, you know, killed and dismembered to a degree, but not 66 pieces.
- [40:09]
Defense Attorney or Legal Analyst
There's a very consistent theme that she's very controlling, very manipulative, and very vindictive.
- [40:21]
Prosecutor
The main event, if you will, was their cross examination of Vladimir Zelenin and his involvement in the murder of Yakov Kluzman. It was an intense session, but at the end of the day, the defense really was not able to damage Vladimir Zelenin and his version of events.
- [40:46]
Narrator
On January 29, 1997, the jury reaches a verdict.
- [40:53]
Defense Attorney or Legal Analyst
Rita Glusman was found guilty of all the charges surrounding the incidents that happened in New York and New Jersey.
- [41:00]
Prosecutor
The judge did sentence her to life in prison without parole.
- [41:09]
Narrator
Vladimir Zelenin is sentenced to 22 and a half years.
- [41:15]
Prosecutor
The hardest part of this case was trying to understand why Vladimir Zelenin committed the crime the way he did as a human being. You just have this feeling of this has to be a different way to resolve this issue that he faced.
- [41:34]
Narrator
Vladimir is released in 2015. And five years later, despite her life sentence, Rita gets a chance for early release.
- [41:45]
Forensic Investigator/Medical Examiner
She had beginning stages of Parkinson's disease while in jail. She had suffered a number of mini strokes.
- [41:57]
Detective
The judge, in July of 2020, grants Rita Glusman compassionate release. She's 72 years old.
- [42:09]
Investigator/Detective
She was given a compassionate release, which I find pretty ironic because she snuffed
- [42:17]
Prosecutor
her husband's life out.
- [42:20]
Investigator/Detective
So I don't really feel as if it's fair that she's allowed to live in freedom.
- [42:28]
Narrator
More than two decades after his murder, Dr. Glusman's memory lives on in his work and in the hearts of his friends and colleagues.
- [42:40]
Colleague of Yakov Glusman
He will always be remembered here by those who knew him as a fantastic person, as an amazing intellect, as a. As a gentle giant. That's the way I remember him. And I will carry that memory for as long as I live.