HOUSTON, Texas (KTRK) — Thirty years after a Houston jeweler was murdered in a multimillion-dollar diamond heist, the man convicted of killing him is set to get an execution date.<\/p>\n
Reinaldo Dennes has been on death row for nearly three decades for a 1996 deadly robbery scheme that left jeweler Janos Szucs dead and security guard David Copeland wounded.<\/p>\n
Dennes was brought back to Harris County last month, and a judge is expected to sign his execution order Friday. The state is asking that his execution be scheduled for Nov. 19.<\/p>\n
While the murder case ended in a conviction and death sentence, one mystery has endured for decades. What happened to more than $3.5 million worth of diamonds stolen from Szucs’ safes?<\/p>\n
The diamonds have never been recovered.<\/p>\n
Never-before-released video, obtained by ABC13, shows Dennes walking into a police lineup in February 1996. The then-40-year-old was suspected of orchestrating what investigators described as a carefully planned inside job.<\/p>\n
A month earlier, on Jan. 24, 1996, Houston police were called to a shooting inside an office building on Richmond Avenue. There they found Copeland with gunshot wounds.<\/p>\n
Police believed the gunman stepped off a lobby elevator, shot Copeland and fled, taking evidence from the security booth that investigators hoped would have helped identify the shooter.<\/p>\n
“The suspect managed to take two VCRs from the security booth and managed to get out of the building, and we don’t have any leads,” an officer told Eyewitness News at the time.<\/p>\n
And there was more in the building that police had not yet found.<\/p>\n
Around 11 p.m., Szucs’ wife called police because her husband had not returned home. Officers went up to his seventh-floor office and found him shot to death.<\/p>\n
Szucs was remembered at the time as more than just a businessman.<\/p>\n
“He was a great benefactor to the Hungarian community and to the cultural association and a prominent businessman in Houston, and we heard with great regret and shock this news,” one community member told ABC13 after his death.<\/p>\n
Investigators discovered Szucs’ safes had been cleaned out. More than $3.5 million in diamonds and approximately $200,000 in cash were missing. The killer also took a five-carat diamond pinkie ring that, according to court records, Szucs reportedly always wore.<\/p>\n
“It’s just cold-blooded,” said Don Smyth, the retired prosecutor who handled the case.<\/p>\n
Investigators eventually focused on Dennes and his brother, Jose Alberto Dennes. They learned from an informant that Dennes approached him to make a firearm silencer based on a sketch he had.<\/p>\n
The brothers also worked in the same building, were in the diamond business, and had been inside Szucs’ office before, according to Smyth.<\/p>\n
“Kind of an inside job,” Smyth said. “They knew what kind of security he had.”<\/p>\n
Police also determined Dennes had developed a romantic relationship with a cleaning employee in the building who helped the men gain access to the building.<\/p>\n
Investigators said the housekeeper, Estrella Martinez, opened the door and let them inside around 7 p.m. that night. Her other assignment, according to police, was to distract the security guard.<\/p>\n
For her role, she was paid $5000, the investigation revealed.<\/p>\n
Copeland survived the shooting and later testified that Dennes told him, “I have something I want to show you,” just before pulling the trigger, according to court records.<\/p>\n
Some of the money was spent on a sports car, but by the time the case came together, the diamonds were gone.<\/p>\n
“We know that nothing has been recovered,” Smyth said. “We know somebody’s got the money.”<\/p>\n
Nearly three decades later, that remains the case. Court records estimate the stolen diamonds, adjusted for inflation, would be worth approximately $7.2 million today.<\/p>\n
“Wow,” Smyth said when told the current estimated value. “Somebody got a deal, I guess.”<\/p>\n
Dennes was convicted of capital murder and sentenced to death in 1997.<\/p>\n
In December 2020, the U.S. Supreme Court denied his last appeal and Dennes became eligible for execution. An attorney for him declined to comment.<\/p>\n
In a statement to ABC13 about the length of time Dennes’ case has lingered, the Harris County District Attorney’s Office said that “cases can take many years, even decades, to reach this point for a variety of reasons, including changes in office leadership, new Supreme Court decisions, or the need for additional factual investigation when appropriate” but they remain “committed to ensuring justice.”<\/p>\n
Now 70, Dennes has been returned to Harris County from death row on a bench warrant as the state moves toward carrying out that sentence.<\/p>\n
Prosecutors filed a notice of execution order, execution order and death warrant in June. Dennes is expected to appear at the hearing Friday.<\/p>\n
“I don’t know how the state of Texas could have presented a better case without a confession,” Smyth said. “We closed the circle on it.”<\/p>\n
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