Victim was ‘afraid for life’ before triple shooting, talked about ‘taking out’ Sander
Weeks before he and his family were shot to death, Sandy Mazzella showed up crying on a friend’s porch, explaining that he was “afraid for his life” in the escalating war with his next-door neighbor, witnesses said Friday.
Mazzella, his wife, Stephanie, and his 76-year-old mother, Elaine, all died of shotgun wounds in 2016, after a months-long dispute with his business partner Jonathan Sander, now charged with their murders.
Sander’s death penalty trial hit its fifth day with testimony from Bob Rollar, who did website design and SEO consulting for Sander and Mazzella’s lawn and landscaping business, and who said he was surprised to find his friend Mazzella on his porch after a long absence.
Mazzella apologized for neglecting some business with Rollar, and told him, “He was afraid. He was afraid for his life. ... He was just afraid there was going to be a battle,” Rollar testified.
Witnesses this week have described the northern Wake County neighbors as best friends whose relationship crumbled when the Mazzellas had money trouble, again when they suspected Sander of embezzling from the business, then finally exploded when an underage member of the Mazzella family accused Sander of inappropriately touching her, prompting them to seek a temporary restraining order.
After the March 2016 shooting, police and sheriff’s deputies coaxed Sander out of his house after roughly an hour of negotiations, during which he repeated, “I’m already dead.”
Later, witnesses testified, he said he “reached his breaking point” after consuming alcohol and smoking marijuana.
Rollar described Mazzella as a casual friend whom he did not see socially, but described him as gentle, noting, “It would be really hard for me to fathom that Sandy would hurt anybody.”
Still, he said, Mazzella once showed him the Beretta pistol he owned. In several text messages leading up to the shooting, he suggested he would retaliate violently if Sander came onto his property.
Text messages between the two, read into testimony Friday, included:
Rollar: So he’s threatened you?
Mazzella: No worries, Bob. I’ve got plenty of firepower.
Rollar: I know you do.
In other texts to Rollar, Mazzella said Sander was cowering in the house because “he can’t take the mental torture anymore,” and also said he was “waiting for him to make a move on my property so I can legally take him out.”
Around the same time in early 2016, Mazzella also texted a friend and real estate agent Karen Bell saying of Sander, “he comes near me, he leaves in a body bag,” according to testimony.
Along with a shotgun, investigators discovered a Beretta pistol on the porch of the Mazzella’s house after the shooting in March 2016. It lay near Sandy Mazzella’s body, and investigators also discovered a holster and a “projectile” unlike the numerous shotgun shells scattered around the scene.
The pistol, investigators said, was cocked when found.
Testimony continues Friday afternoon.