Monday, Jan. 10, 2000 | 10:15 a.m.
Zane Michael Floyd was planning to commit suicide on the day he is alleged to have raped an outcall entertainer and then shot five people in a supermarket rampage, killing four of them, prosecutors maintain in court documents.
Those crimes, Deputy District Attorney Bill Koot contended, were fantasies Floyd decided to fulfill in anticipation that his life would end on June 3, "not unlike an individual who is granted a last meal before his execution."
While police said Floyd, a former Marine and nightclub bouncer, put his 12-gauge shotgun to his head as he exited the market that, by then, was surrounded by police, he couldn't pull the trigger.
Neither could he bring himself to provoke police to shoot him. He eventually surrendered after the bloody massacre inside the Albertson's supermarket at Valley View Boulevard and Sahara Avenue.
"Since Floyd did not have the nerve to inflict upon himself that which he inflicted upon his victims, and since the police would not accommodate his wishes, we have the benefit of his explanation for his conduct that morning," the prosecution documents state.
In a statement to Metro Detective Paul Bigham, Floyd said he couldn't aim at police "because he had too much respect for them because he himself wanted to be a police officer," Koot noted.
Within minutes of Floyd's arrest, police obtained a tape-recorded statement from him in which he admitted "I just went to shoot people -- running and shooting at anything that moved."
When asked why he chose the violent and deadly course, Floyd described himself as a "f ... ing loser" and explained, "I got nowhere to go in life, dude."
"You know, I'm a bouncer -- I'm 23 and I just moved back in with my f ... ing parents," Floyd said in his initial statement.
Floyd also indicated he was despondent because the Marine Corps trained him as a killer, yet never gave him a chance to kill. The feelings were compounded after he was told he was not eligible for re-enlistment. The Corps limits the number of Marines who can re-enlist in certain fields, such as infantry, in order to keep promotion opportunity steady for those who make the service a career.
"I went through all that s ... , teaching me how to shoot people and kill people," he said to police. "It's not like the Marine Corps' fault. They didn't like turn me into a killer, you know. I mean, that's what you gotta do. I mean, I was a machine gunner."
The defendant explained to Bigham that he had joined the Marines because he wanted to know what it was like to kill.
"I've always just wanted to know. Call me crazy, psychotic, whatever, I've just always wanted to know what it's like to shoot someone," Floyd said. "Ever since I was a little kid -- ever since I saw my first war movie -- I've always just wanted to go to war and kill people and that's the only reason I joined the Marine Corps."
Floyd told police that while he was honorably discharged from the Marines "I was basically forced out. I had no chance of re-enlisting. It would have been denied."
Koot's court documents noted that Floyd also talked about his drinking and gambling problems and his gambling losses just hours before the early-morning shootings.
"I lost the rest of my money like I usually do," he said. "I mean, I'm so far in debt, dude. The blackjack tables are calling me."
Floyd's statements were included in the prosecution's court documents opposing a bid by defense attorneys to separate the charges of raping the outcall dancer and the multiple murder counts.
Deputy Public Defender Douglas Hedger argued in a court motion that a jury's knowledge of the alleged sexual assault incident shortly before the murder likely would prompt a conviction on the murder charges.
Hedger stated that the charges involve two separate incidents that are not connected closely enough to warrant a single trial.
But Koot countered that both incidents were part of the purported pre-suicide fantasy. Floyd told the 20-year-old outcall entertainer about his "quest to kill as many people as possible" once their hourlong sexual encounter was over, Koot's response stated.
The prosecution argues that the jury should hear the entire story involving both events.
The defense contends that "during the course of the sexual assault, the defendant's mind drifted in and out of reality. During this drifting, the defendant allegedly made comments about the military and killing people."
District Judge Jeff Sobel is scheduled to rule on the legal issue -- and other issues including whether the case should be moved to another jurisdiction because of the publicity the case has drawn -- on Feb. 7.
Floyd's trial currently is set for March 6.
The prosecutor's motion noted that Floyd used the same shotgun to threaten the dancer as he used in the murders.
"At one point, he ejected a live shotgun shell from the chamber of his shotgun and stated that her name was on it," Koot's motion stated. "The dancer was convinced she was going to be killed."
The woman, who characterized the alleged sexual mistreatment of her as "cruel," told police that before Floyd let her go -- telling her that to shoot her with the shotgun might have attracted police -- he vowed to kill the first 19 people he encountered, the court documents state.
He had changed into his Marine camouflage and was last seen by the woman as he walked toward the supermarket a half-mile from his home.
"He told her that she had 60 seconds to run and get out of his sight or she would be one of the persons he was going to kill," Koot stated.
The store's surveillance video shows Floyd wearing a robe over his fatigues to hide the customized weapon that he later called a "sweet shotgun," but throwing it off before he fired a round of 00-buckshot into the back of Thomas Michael Darnell, Koot's motion continued.
The second to be killed was Carlos Chuck Leos, the frozen food manager, followed by the store supervisor, Dennis Troy Sargeant, 31.
Lepe Acquino Fabian, one of the store's cleanup crew, was a target but the shotgun blast at him missed.
Three rounds were then fired at Zachart Emenegger, 21, after he was chased through the store's aisles in the produce section, the surveillance video shows. Two of them hit their mark from close range as Emenegger pleaded for his life.
Court documents alleged that after firing the shots, Floyd commented to the fallen man, "Yeah, you're dead."
But Emenegger survived and has been undergoing rehabilitation and continuing medical treatment.
The last victim, according to court documents, was Lucille Alice Tarantino, who worked in the salad bar and was shot in the head despite her pleas for mercy.
The prosecution has indicated that the videos and the observations of the store's bookkeeper, Christine Goldworthy, from her second-floor office overlooking the market will be a major part of the its case.
Goldworthy placed the first 911 call and court documents state she was "extremely traumatized by the events, believing all the while that she would surely be one of the defendant's victims."
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