JULY 2013
A Clear Lake nightmare revisited Quadruple murder was 10 years ago this month By Mary Alys Cherry
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t will be 10 years this month, but few Clear Lake residents will ever forget when a quiet summer day turned into a nightmare for four recent high school graduates just beginning their lives. It was July 18, 2003 when the four – Tiffany Nichole Rowell, 18; Rachael Ann Koloroutis, 18; Tiffany’s boyfriend, Marcus Ray Precella, 19; and his cousin Adelbert Nicholas Sanchez, 21 -- were brutally murdered in Clear Lake’s Brook Forest subdivision as they enjoyed a pizza party at Tiffany’s home on a quiet cul-de-sac while her father was out of town. A former Clear Lake High classmate of the two girls and Sanchez, Christine Marie Paolilla of Friendswood, is serving a life sentence after being found guilty of capital murder. She was 17 at the time of the murders and ineligible for the death penalty. The ghastly murders went unsolved for three years despite a $100,000 Crimestoppers reward – leaving the community to live with the fear the killer(s) might strike again. But it was a Crimestoppers tip that eventually led police to Paolilla and her former boyfriend, Christopher Lee
Snider, who had once lived in El Lago and attended Seabrook Intermediate before moving to Kentucky. Police said Paolilla told them she and Snider went to the house in the 3700 block of Millbridge that afternoon looking for drugs and money and how they killed them, and how Snider had forced her to participate. When Snider heard she had been arrested and there was a nationwide manhunt on for him, he committed suicide in Greenville, S.C., leaving Paolilla to face the charges alone. During those three years, the two killers parted company and Paolilla went back to Clear Lake High to complete her senior year and graduate – no one suspecting that Tiffany’s and Rachel’s best friend could do such a dastardly deed. Afterwards, she entered a drug rehab program in Kerrville, where she met her future husband. At first, life was good. She had a big trust fund she received from her father, who was killed when she was four, but soon the memory of that afternoon on Millbridge Drive began to gnaw on her. Before long, both she and her husband were dipping heavily into heroin. As they grew closer, she gradually confessed her role in the crime to him, he later testified. The heroin apparently made it easier to digest. Meanwhile, the Houston Police spent thousands of hours chasing every possible lead. Because the autopsies showed all four victims had cocaine in their systems, and there were reports that both young male victims were selling drugs, police felt the murders were drug related. But outside of neighbors reporting that they saw a young couple dressed in black going to the home that day, there were few leads. The man was described as blond, accompanying a woman with a nylon cap over her hair and carrying a big black bag. Snider, who spent his high school years in prison in Kentucky for robbery, came back to the Clear Lake area and had looked up his old friend, Christine. And, police testified, when he found out she was friends with both the girls and the two young men who were selling Prosecutor Rob Freyer, right, points to Christine Paolilla during her capital murder trial as drugs – though only on a small scale Defense Attorney Mike DeGeurin waits his turn. She received a life sentence for the Clear -- Snider assumed they would find an Lake murders.
Defense Attorney Mike DeGeurin shows the jury photos of Christopher Snider, who commited suicide in Greenville, S.C., as police searched the country to arrest him for the Clear Lake murders.
abundance of drugs and money at the home. Paolilla told officers that Snider had two guns, that he pointed one at the victims and demanded money and dope. He also made her take one of the guns and then he just started shooting. Then, he put his hand on hers “and the gun just started going off multiple times,” one officer testified she told police. We’d like to think these four teens didn’t die in vain. The story frightened both parents and teens all around the Bay Area. Most everyone felt their murders probably could be blamed on drugs. But it all happened a long time ago, and memories grow dim. This would be an excellent time for parents to bring the subject up in a casual way with their children, perhaps at a dinner table discussion -letting them know what can happen to those who flirt with drugs. These kids weren’t heavy users, but they all did drugs. That afternoon they were just having a pizza party, yet death came calling, invited or not. Any of us can become a crime victim, but we certainly help increase the chances by doing drugs. Let us hope our kids will be smart, and we will never experience such a nightmare again.
Mary Alys Cherry Publisher
JULY 2013 | Bay Area Houston Magazine
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