New accusation revealed in murder-for-hire indictment tied to developer Sergio Pino
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FBI investigating Sergio Pino
FBI agents raided the residence the well-known home builder as part of a investigation into his alleged connection to threats against his wife Tatiana Pino’s life. The pair are in a divorce dispute.
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Tatiana Pino was menaced by attempts on her life that included fentanyl poisoning, the ramming of her car with a flatbed truck and being chased by a gunman outside her home, according to federal prosecutors.
Now, a newly filed indictment includes a previously unknown detail — that prominent Miami-Dade developer Sergio Pino suggested one crew he hired to kill his estranged wife inject her with a “liquid substance” to make her death look like a “heart attack.”
Pino, 67, killed himself with a gun at his Cocoplum home after FBI agents came to arrest him on the morning of July 16, but he appears as an “unindicted co-conspirator” in the indictment charging six men with the murder-for-hire conspiracy and three others with related offenses.
The indictment, which was returned by a Miami federal grand jury this week, is the latest development in the FBI’s two-year long investigation into the late home builder’s attempts to kill his wife, Tatiana Pino, 55, as their marriage dissolved — including allegations of fentanyl poisoning, arson attacks, using a flatbed truck to ram the wife’s vehicle and ultimately deploying a hit man to threaten her with a gun in the driveway of her home in Pinecrest on June 23. The FBI raided Pino’s home and business in Coral Gables the following day.
Read more: Tatiana Pino’s life as a target: poisoned at home, followed from church, cars set ablaze
The freshest detail in the indictment, which follows a series of FBI criminal complaints and affidavits leading to the nine men’s arrests in recent months, revolves around Pino’s hiring of a second crew of men to kill his wife before a critical divorce trial this summer and then cover it up.
“Co-conspirator 1 [Sergio Pino] provided the second crew with a financial incentive to ensure the crime was not traced back to him,” according to the indictment. “Co-conspirator 1 suggested that the second crew should kill Victim 1 [Tatiana Pino] by injecting her with a provided liquid substance to make her death appear to be a heart attack.”
There are no other details about the alleged injection scheme in the indictment, though a source familiar with the plan to induce a cardiac arrest said it was abandoned in favor of trying to shoot Tatiana Pino outside her home while making it look like part of an armed robbery.
The indictment also states that the first crew of men in the murder-for-hire scheme planned to poison Tatiana Pino with cyanide and arsenic, in addition to fentanyl. The FBI had previously made a general statement about the planned use of “other drugs” to harm her.
Because of his death, Pino has not been charged with the nine other defendants. Pino’s defense attorney, Sam Rabin, declined to comment.
The indictment released Friday also says Pino “insisted on dealing exclusively with” the leader of the second crew “to conceal his involvement in this murder for hire scheme.”
The leader of the crew, Fausto Villar, a former felon who served six years in state prison for an armed robbery conviction, was working as a roofer for Pino when the developer hired him for the alleged hit job, according to FBI court records. In turn, Villar recruited an ex-felon he knew from prison, Avery Bivins, who served 12 years for drug dealing and attempted murder convictions, to coordinate the scheme to kill Pino’s wife, FBI records show.
Bivins then brought in a friend, Clementa Johnson, to execute the hit, and Johnson tapped his cousin, Vernon Green, to go to the wife’s home to threaten her with a gun after she returned from Sunday church services, according to FBI records. Green not only brandished the weapon as Tatiana Pino slammed the horn of her car and sped off into her backyard, but he also pointed the firearm in the face of Pino’s adult daughter, who came outside during the commotion.
Another member of the second crew is Diori Barnard, who is accused of providing back-up support.
On Friday, Bivins, Johnson and Green pleaded not guilty in Miami federal court. Their respective attorneys, Humberto Dominguez, Jordan Lewin and Richard Serafini, declined to comment after the arraignments, saying they just received indictment but have yet to see any FBI evidence from federal prosecutors Abbie Waxman, Brian Dobbins and Ignacio Vazquez.
Villar’s arraignment is on Monday. Barnard’s arraignment has not been set.
Read more: How a former felon helped FBI build case against developer in murder-for-hire scheme
In addition to those five men, Bayron Bennett, who worked as a hired hand on Pino’s yacht, is also charged with the murder conspiracy.
At Pino’s direction, Bennett coordinated the first attempt to kill the developer’s wife last year, according to the indictment. The crew included three other defendants — Michael Dulfo, Jerren Howard and Edner Etienne — who are charged with lesser offenses, such as stalking Tatiana Pino and torching three vehicles belonging to her sister.
In August of last year, Etienne rammed a rented Home Depot flatbed truck backwards into Tatiana Pino’s car after she pulled into her driveway, according to court documents. Etienne fled the scene.
“Co-conspirator 1 [Sergio Pino] directed Bayron Bennett and his crew in this scheme and insisted that Bennett deal exclusively with Co-conspirator 1 to conceal his involvement in this murder for hire scheme, the indictment says.
To distract attention away from the threats on his wife, Pino also directed Bennett to have his crew torch his own vehicle in September 2023, “thereby generating a false police report,” and “further solicited individuals to shoot a firearm at his property [in Cocoplum] — all in an effort to conceal his involvement in the murder for hire scheme,” according to the indictment.
Pino also used the first crew with a plan to poison his wife with cyanide, arsenic and fentanyl, the indictment says, though it does not provide further details.
At a July 17 news conference after the FBI’s attempt to arrest Pino at his home, U.S. Attorney Markenzy Lapointe said the first crew “actually obtained fentanyl to assist Pino in his effort to kill his wife.”
“Our investigation has shown that the target of the fentanyl poisoning was his wife,“ FBI special agent Jeff Veltri told reporters.
“It was for a prolonged period of time that she was exposed to fentanyl and other drugs,” Veltri said, but he declined to say how they were administered to her, including whether Pino or others tampered with her prescription medication.
This story was originally published August 2, 2024 at 1:45 PM.
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