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Five years before New York City<\/a> was terrorized by the \u2018Son of Sam\u2019 killer David Berkowitz <\/a>back in the 1970s, a teenage girl was gunned down on a Bronx<\/a> street \u2013 and now, a retired detective believes her killing could be linked to Berkowitz, as he calls for the case to be reopened. <\/p>\n Mike Lorenzo, whose father worked the Berkowitz investigation, told The New York Post<\/a> that the 1970 murder of 16-year-old Margaret Inglesia bears striking similarities to the crimes that would later make Berkowitz one of the most infamous serial killers in American<\/a> history.<\/p>\n \u201cThis is a case that needs to be reexamined,\u201d said Lorenzo, who is working with Son of Sam expert Manny Grossman, to urge the NYPD<\/a> to reopen the decades-old case. Lorenzo spent 20 years with the Yonkers Police Department before retiring in 2008.<\/p>\n \u201cThis was Son of Sam before Son of Sam.\u201d<\/p>\n On October 18, 1970, around 2 a.m., Inglesia was walking home from a party when she was shot on East 169th Street between Morris and Grant avenues in the Morrisania section of the Bronx. She was shot once in the front and twice in the back as she lay dying, according to a witness report at the time.<\/p>\n open image in gallery<\/p>\n \u2018Son of Sam\u2019 killer David Berkowitz terrorized NYC in the late 1970s, but a retired detective believes his rampage might have started even earlier (Getty)<\/p>\n Her killing was the only fatal shooting in a string of six attacks carried out by an unidentified sniper on the same block over a two-month span that year. No arrests were ever made.<\/p>\n But Lorenzo and Grossman believe Berkowitz, who was 17 at the time, could have been the one responsible. <\/p>\n From June 1970 to June 1971, Berkowitz worked about a mile away from the attacks, at his father\u2019s business, Melrose Hardware, before leaving to join the U.S. Army.<\/p>\n They also point to evidence uncovered after Berkowitz\u2019s 1977 arrest, including 100-yard shooting targets found in his home, as sign he may have been honing long-distance shooting skills before his notorious killing spree.<\/p>\n \u201cWhy would he have 100-yard targets? He\u2019s not a hunter,\u201d Lorenzo pointed out.<\/p>\n The theory comes with notable differences. Berkowitz\u2019s confirmed attacks between 1976 and 1977 were carried out at close range, using a .44-caliber revolver, often firing through car windows. The Bronx sniper used a .22-caliber rifle. Still, Lorenzo argues the similarities outweigh the discrepancies.<\/p>\n \u201cIt wasn\u2019t right next door to the father\u2019s shop but it wasn\u2019t 20 miles away or in another borough and it fits his M.O.,\u201d Lorenzo said. \u201cIt\u2019s the same thing as the Son of Sam killings but just a different kind of gun. Shooting into a car is sniping too.\u201d<\/p>\n New York City<\/a> in the 1970s was already unraveling \u2013 financially strained, crime-ridden, and fearful. But between July 1976 and August 1977, that fear escalated when a faceless gunman stalked young women and couples across the Bronx, Queens, and Brooklyn.<\/p>\n open image in gallery<\/p>\n Between July 1976 and August 1977, Berkowitz stalked young women and couples across the Bronx, Queens, and Brooklyn (Netflix) open image in gallery<\/p>\n Calling himself the \u2018Son of Sam,\u2019 the killer taunted police and the media with handwritten letters and random violence (Netflix)<\/p>\n Calling himself the \u201cSon of Sam,\u201d the killer taunted police and the media with handwritten letters and random violence. Berkowitz, a Yonkers postal worker, was eventually identified as the shooter who murdered six people and wounded seven others, including teenagers and young couples sitting in parked cars.<\/p>\n After more than a year of false leads and mounting panic, a parking ticket near the scene of the final shooting led police to Berkowitz\u2019s car and he was arrested on August 10, 1977. <\/p>\n He was convicted in 1978 of six counts of second-degree murder and seven counts of attempted second-degree murder, and sentenced to 25 years to life. Now 72, Berkowitz remains incarcerated at Shawangunk Correctional Facility in Ulster County.<\/p>\n open image in gallery<\/p>\n Now 72, Berkowitz remains incarcerated at Shawangunk Correctional Facility in Ulster County (Copyright 2021 The Associated Press. All rights reserved.) open image in gallery<\/p>\n Wendy Savino survived a 1976 shooting in the Bronx after being struck five times while sitting in her car (NBC News)<\/p>\n Lorenzo said the Bronx sniper case had troubled him long before he began working with Grossman on other Son of Sam-related investigations.<\/p>\n \u201cI really think there\u2019s something in those files,\u201d Lorenzo said.<\/p>\n The two have previously helped uncover a previously unknown Berkowitz victim \u2013 Wendy Savino, who survived a 1976 shooting<\/a> in the Bronx after being struck five times while sitting in her car.<\/p>\n \u201cI found out about Wendy because I found the sketch she did of her shooter that was an exact match of Berkowitz,\u201d Grossman told The Post. \u201cThen I found a police report that showed her shooting had all the characteristics of a Son of Sam shooting.\u201d<\/p>\n He then cold called Savino and says she told him that she had identified Berkowitz as her shooter in 1977 right after his arrest. \u201cShe never forgot his face,\u201d he added. <\/p>\n The findings were later brought to now-retired NYPD<\/a> First Grade Detective Robert Klein, who concluded Savino had been shot by Berkowitz, despite Berkowitz denying the crime during a prison interview, police sources said.<\/p>\n![\"\u2018Son](\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/12\/david-berkowitz.jpg\")
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