Sun Sentinel Palm Beach Edition
Murders unsolved after 20 years
Scene was staged to look drug-related, police say
It has been 20 years since two babies were bludgeoned to death in Miramar, two women beaten and shot, and a crime scene staged to look like a drug-related home invasion.
On Monday, police and survivors of the Altidor family pleaded for the public to help solve the four murders.
“This was a brutal slaying, overkill, and very personal,” Miramar Police Detective Danny Smith said about the killings of Marie Altidor, 29, her mother, Theresa Laverne, 68, and Marie and George Altidor’s daughters, Sabrina, 6 weeks, and Samantha, 2.
Laverne had traveled from Haiti to help care for the new baby whose christening was planned but never held.
“We want to make sure that the individual or individuals that are responsible for this
remember that we are not forgetting about this case and that we are still investigating it,” Smith said.
George Altidor, who moved away from Florida, remains a person of interest in the investigation, Smith said. Altidor was never arrested or charged in the case.
“I’d love to talk to him,” Smith said. Though detectives who investigated the killings before him have spoken with George Altidor, Smith said he has not. “I don’t want to say that I believe any one person did it, but I’d be more comfortable as an investigator if I could rule [George Altidor] out.”
Attorney Richard Diaz hasn’t spoken with Altidor for several years, but said he represented Altidor after the murders and still does.
Diaz said Altidor has nothing to gain by cooperating further with police.
“What benefit does he get by eliminating himself as a person of interest?” he asked. “They’ve had 20 years to come up with proof. They can take their curiosity to a grand jury and let a grand jury decide.”
Efforts to reach Altidor, who lives in Oklahoma, were not successful.
The bodies were found April 30, 1997, in the 8800 block of South Crescent Drive.
According to Smith, the Broward County Medical Examiner’s Office was not able to determine when the family died.
The killers left behind a message scrawled on a wall: “I want my 100,000 drug money. They stole my drugs.”
“It’s a complete farce,” said Smith, who has worked the case for 10 years. “No one in this family had any drug involvement whatsoever. Not one little bit.”
Marie Altidor’s sister, Marie Carline Laverne, and her adult children, Joshua Pierre and Carla Joseph, spoke Monday about their loved ones. Joseph was 10 and said she was supposed to have slept over at the Altidors’ home the night of the killings.
“There is still a killer or killers on the loose who murdered four of our loved ones,” Marie Carline Laverne said. “Our suffering will never end, but it will lessen when we have some kind of closure.”
Pierre and Joseph described Marie Altidor as a kind aunt who made a happy home and let them enjoy her family’s pool and watch movies and sports on TV. Her sister called Altidor a loving sister who enjoyed cooking for the family.
“If you do have information, treat it as if it’s your family,” Pierre said. “Three generations is gone. This killer, if he can do it to our family, [there is a] high possibility he’ll do it to yours, too. So if you have anything, say something.”
Two decades later, police also want to talk with a family friend whose name or nickname may be Didrot Roc or Rock, who has been sought in the U.S. and Haiti. He is not a person of interest to detectives but may have information about what led to the deaths of Altidor family members, Smith said.
Investigators ask anyone with knowledge of the killings to call Broward County Crime Stoppers at 954-493-8477. The organization accepts anonymous tips and will pay up to $3,000 for information that leads to an arrest.
Meanwhile, the Altidor family’s survivors wait, as they have for two decades, for a break in the case.
“Our family are living with strong faith that one day, justice will be served,” Marie Carline Laverne said.