Man Charged With Father's Murder Says He Found Him Already Dead, But Admits to Dismembering, Disposing Body

After his first trial for the murder of his father ended in a mistrial, a Florida man took the stand to describe, in his own words, what happened the night his father died, including how he dismembered and disposed of the body.

On Tuesday, James Scandirito Jr., 50, testified in his own defense and admitted to disposing of his father's body, but said he wasn't responsible for the 74-year-old's death.

"I didn't kill my dad," Scandirito told the court. "I love my dad."

On March 28, 2018, James said he and his father, James "Skip" Scandirito, were in his dad's Boca Raton, Florida, home. The 50-year-old used cocaine, but his father decided to pass because he had to be up early to meet a friend for golf.

During the over two-hour long testimony, the defendant described using his iPad and smoking cigarettes outside, away from his father, who didn't like the behavior because James' mother died of lung cancer. When he made his way back inside the home, he saw his father on the ground, and checked for a pulse but found none. On the ground near his father, James said, was the cocaine that the 50-year-old previously set up on the table.

"My first reaction was that he might have done a line of cocaine and just passed out onto the table," James said. "I didn't, I couldn't, imagine anything else that might have happened."

Having used a variety of drugs himself, Scandirito said he was "scared to death," and his drug-induced paranoia caused him to panic because he thought Skip died snorting his cocaine. Instead of calling 911, which he said he didn't want to do in his "current state," James decided to try to hide his father's death.

Since his father was too heavy to move on his own, James said he used a hand truck, purchased from a local Home Depot, to transport the corpse. His initial plan was to put his father's body on the hand truck and move the body to the bed, but he was unable to balance the body on the hand truck.

"I was breaking down and crying at that point. What the hell, what just happened? The whole enormity of the situation presented itself at that moment," James, adding, "I watch CSI, I'm sure someone could tell that I moved the body."

Ultimately, James decided it was best to dismember his father and dispose of the body somewhere outside the house. He duct-taped his father to the hand truck and after swaddling the body with tarps, he used a hand saw to cut off his father's extremities, which were hanging off the side of the hand truck.

As he was dismembering his father's body, James said he placed a garbage bag under each extremity, so when it was separated from the body, it would fall into the bag.

"I would take frequent breaks… smoke cigarettes and wish that this nightmare wasn't happening," James said... Eventually, I ended up putting [all of the bags] into suitcases."

With the body packed into multiple suitcases, James said he cleaned up the garage with paper towels and bleach.

After filing a missing person report with the police, he took a suitcase containing his father's head, arms and legs to a condominium complex and placed it in a dumpster. Two other suitcases were stashed in a shed at a closed golf course.

Investigators later found the suitcases, though the head and arms were never located, so a medical examiner could not determine exactly how Skip died.

During a conversation with investigators, James admitted he lied when he filed the missing person report.

"I made a bad decision and another bad decision," he said. "Horrible. It just kept snowballing."

Closing arguments took place on Wednesday and prosecutors argued that James killed his father for money. He was allegedly the beneficiary of Skip's accounts and assets, worth as much as $800,000, and prosecutors claimed James had financial problems. James testified he was surprised to learn, after his father's death, that the Skip had that much money.

Assistant State Attorney John Parnofiello said a reasonable person would have called the police but told the jury that James decided his life was more important than his father's.

"Hiding and destroying evidence is consistent with causing someone's death," Parnofiello said. "Not only does he want his father to die, not only does he want to inherit his father's estate, he wants to get away with it."

However, his attorney argued that his client didn't kill Skip, adding that his story checked out while the prosecution's story did not.

James's original trial ended in a mistrial after a defense attorney had a medical emergency that required her to be hospitalized. He has been charged with first-degree murder, which is punishable by the death penalty, but the Macomb Daily reported prosecutors won't seek it.