web1_TTL120916bryk.bdy_.jpg

Happy birthday Bryan Adam Bryk!

web1_Giraffes-with-headline.jpg

Tallest land animal is now at risk of extinction, biologists say

<p>WILKES-BARRE &#8212; The estranged wife of a man who was killed after her then-boyfriend allegedly shot him and dumped his body in a neighboring county took the witness stand Friday in the accused murderer&#8217;s trial.</p><p>Lisa Vacante, 53, detailed to the Luzerne County jury the nearly three-year relationship she had with Eleazar Yisrael and disputed the tone of text messages she received from her husband&#8217;s phone the night of his murder, claiming they were unlike any she&#8217;d received from him before.</p><p>The reason, according to prosecutors, was because the person sending the messages wasn&#8217;t Samuel Vacante, but the man who hours earlier shot him in the back with his own .22-caliber rifle. Yisrael, 31, of W. 10th Street, is accused of gunning down the 52-year-old father of two inside the garage of his Drums home on Aug. 31, 2015.</p><p>That night, Lisa Vacante received a text message from Samuel Vacante&#8217;s phone. The message, the style of which she described as uncharacteristic of her estranged husband, purported Samuel Vacante was picking up and leaving the state.</p><p>&#8220;I&#8217;m getting stitches &#8230; then going to Florida,&#8221; said the message, shown to jurors on a large projection screen in the courtroom. &#8220;I treated you unfairly, abused you mentally and worst physically. I can&#8217;t take it. I don&#8217;t want anything but myself. So long.&#8221;</p><p>Lisa Vacante, however, testified that Samuel Vacante &#8220;wasn&#8217;t a big texter&#8221; and didn&#8217;t punctuate like in the message. In fact, she said, the messages read more like ones she&#8217;d gotten from Yisrael. She added Samuel Vacante wouldn&#8217;t leave his children behind to bolt to another state.</p><p>&#8220;Sam was not somebody who would want to be alone,&#8221; Lisa Vacante said.</p><p>The couple, who married in 1986 and had two sons together, were in the final stages of a divorce and were at odds because Lisa Vacante didn&#8217;t want to sell the valuable Drums residence, located at 20 Coventry Lane, according to testimony. Lisa Vacante, however, flatly denied the claim during cross examination from attorney Allyson Kacmarski.</p><p>&#8220;I was not opposed to selling the house,&#8221; she said. &#8220;That&#8217;s not true.&#8221;</p><p>She initially wanted to refinance the home and live there with one of her sons and his girlfriend, she said, but changed her mind when her son turned down the proposal. She said she and Samuel Vacante had the home appraised not long before his death and were waiting for repairs to be completed before putting it on the market.</p><p>The text message, though, bequeathed the property and some of Samuel Vacante&#8217;s other possessions to Lisa Vacante.</p><p>&#8220;You know what Lisa just have everything. Show this to whoever you need to. The house is completely yours. I&#8217;m selling my car,&#8221; the message read. Lisa Vacante said she found the line about the car strange because Samuel Vacante&#8217;s white 2014 Kia Cadenza was under lease.</p><p>Investigators found the vehicle about two blocks from Yisrael&#8217;s home not long after the murder. Yisrael&#8217;s fingerprint was identified on a license plate found inside the Kia&#8217;s trunk and black markers, like the one used to scribble out the vehicle identification number, were located inside Yisrael&#8217;s apartment along with the vehicle&#8217;s key fob, according to testimony.</p><p>Lisa Vacante told jurors she&#8217;d seen Yisrael wearing a straw farmer&#8217;s style hat found in the car&#8217;s backseat.</p><p>Yisrael and Lisa Vacante met in 2012 through their jobs; he delivered samples to a microbiology lab she worked at, she said. The pair started out as friends but became romantically involved the following year and eventually moved in together.</p><p>&#8220;One thing led to another and &#8230; it just became a romantic relationship,&#8221; Lisa Vacante said. It was unclear when their relationship ended.</p><p>Yisrael, prosecutors allege, put Samuel Vacante&#8217;s body in the trunk of his vehicle and took it to Penn Forest Township in Carbon County, where it was dumped in a clearing. Investigators found the corpse &#8212; wrapped in a tent and overrun with maggots &#8212; six days later.</p><p>The Vacantes&#8217; son, Brandon Vacante, was recalled to the stand earlier Friday and identified several of his father&#8217;s belongings, including the tent, to jurors. He testified earlier in the week that he, too, received similarly odd text messages from his father&#8217;s phone the night of the murder.</p><p>Lisa Vacante tried calling Samuel Vacante after receiving the messages, but received another message saying &#8220;banged my mouth off a tool cabinet.&#8221;</p><p>Later that night, Yisrael texted her from his phone and claimed he had been at a nightclub in New York City with a friend &#8212; an alibi shot down Friday when the friend, Kevin Eberle, took the witness stand.</p><p>&#8220;Just go (expletive) Sam and have a happy life,&#8221; Yisrael said in one message.</p><p>&#8220;He&#8217;s (expletive) missing. There&#8217;s blood,&#8221; Lisa Vacante replied.</p><p>She broke down on the stand as she read the messages aloud.</p><p>&#8220;I think he&#8217;s fine,&#8221; Yisrael said in another text.</p><p>The trial is expected to last into late next week.</p><style>
.neFileBlock {
	margin-bottom: 20px;
}
.neFileBlock p {
	margin: 0px 0px 0px 0px;
}
.neFileBlock .neFile {
	border-bottom: 1px dotted #aaa;
	padding-bottom: 5px;
	padding-top: 10px;
}
.neFileBlock .neCaption {
	font-size: 85%;
}
</style>
<div class='neFileBlock'>
<div class="neFile"><img class="neImage" src="https://www.timesleader.com/wp-content/uploads/2016/12/web1_Yisrael_Eleazar_toned-10.jpg">
<div class="neCaption">Yisrael </div></div><div class="metaInfo"><photo0>https://www.timesleader.com/wp-content/uploads/2016/12/web1_Yisrael_Eleazar_toned-10.jpg</photo0><caption0>Yisrael </caption0><photoCredit0></photoCredit0></div><div class="neFile"><img class="neImage" src="https://www.timesleader.com/wp-content/uploads/2016/12/web1_IMG_4969.jpg">
<div class="neCaption">Lisa Vacante leaves the Luzerne County Courthouse Friday after she testified in her estranged husband&#8217;s homicide trial. Vacante, 53, was romantically involved with the suspect, Eleazar Yisrael, prior to the murder. </div></div><div class="metaInfo"><photo1>https://www.timesleader.com/wp-content/uploads/2016/12/web1_IMG_4969.jpg</photo1><caption1>Lisa Vacante leaves the Luzerne County Courthouse Friday after she testified in her estranged husband&#8217;s homicide trial. Vacante, 53, was romantically involved with the suspect, Eleazar Yisrael, prior to the murder. </caption1><photoCredit1>Joe Dolinsky | Times Leader </photoCredit1></div><div class="neFile"><img class="neImage" src="https://www.timesleader.com/wp-content/uploads/2016/12/web1_IMG_4970.jpg">
<div class="neCaption"></div></div><div class="metaInfo"><photo2>https://www.timesleader.com/wp-content/uploads/2016/12/web1_IMG_4970.jpg</photo2><caption2></caption2><photoCredit2>Joe Dolinsky | Times Leader </photoCredit2></div></div>
<div class="metaInfo"><bylineMeta><p>By Joe Dolinsky</p><p>jdolinsky@www.timesleader.com</p></bylineMeta></div><div class="metaInfo"><shirttailMeta><p>Reach Joe Dolinsky at 570-991-6110 or on Twitter @JoeDolinskyTL</p></shirttailMeta></div>

Victim’s estranged wife/suspect’s girlfriend takes witness stand in murder trial