Kriti Mehrotra
It was July 5, 2012, when 29-year-old high school teacher Simeonette Mapes-Crupi was found heinously murdered inside her own New Springville home in Staten Island, New York. As chronicled in NBC’s ‘Dateline: Secrets of the Sliding Door, she had actually been pushed down a flight of stairs before being stabbed 15 times, leaving her loved ones baffled to the core. Though arguably the worst aspect was that it soon came to light that her perpetrator was none other than the man she once trusted the most, her husband, 30-year-old Jonathan Crupi.
Jonathan Crupi Was Not Faithful in His Marriage
While it’s unclear precisely when Jonathan Crupi first came across Simeonette Mapes, we do know they were both college students pursuing their dreams of becoming educators. Therefore, thanks to their similar ambitions, shared core values, and parallel way of thinking, they soon fell head over heels in love before ultimately deciding to tie the knot in July 2007. The couple subsequently got their own place to officially start this new chapter together, shortly following which Simeonette even landed a job as a social studies high school teacher in Brooklyn.
Unfortunately, Jonathan failed his initial teacher’s exam and had to pay $25,000 out of pocket just to take it again, only to pass this time around before evolving into an English teacher. Yet, the couple wasn’t perfectly content with their standing, so they chose to enroll at the College of Staten Island for their respective Master’s degrees in the hopes of later securing better opportunities. It honestly appeared as if they had a near-idyllic relationship with mutual care, love, respect, trust, and understanding, yet Simeonette’s murder revealed that was not the case at all.
According to reports, Jonathan and Simeonette were not in a good place in the summer of 2012, as she discovered he had been getting involved with sex workers on the regular. In fact, as per their loved ones, the couple had even left a party early on the 4th of July, owing to the latter admitting she was not feeling well upon processing something her husband had done. Little did anyone know she would be found dead hours later, leading officials to believe they’d gotten into an argument after she confronted him regarding his trysts, culminating in her demise.
Jonathan Crupi Was the Prime Suspect for His Wife’s Murder From the Get-go
Jonathan was actually the one to call 911 at around 2:30 pm on July 5, 2012, telling the dispatcher, “I just came home, my wife is dead… Oh my God. I think my house was robbed.” However, when the authorities arrived at the scene, they noticed not only the fact that Simeonette had been brutally killed but also that the “robbery” seemed staged more than anything else. That’s because they found no sign of forced entry except an ajar sliding glass door in the back, and there were bank cheques, cash, credit cards, her engagement ring, and other valuable items left behind.
Jonathan was subsequently questioned, as per routine, during which he claimed that he had left home at 7:30 in the morning to run some errands and pick up school supplies. Investigators were able to corroborate through surveillance cameras as well as a receipt that he had arrived at work on time after leaving the local shop where he had his vehicle inspected. Yet, the next part of his alibi was deemed utterly false – the school supplies he claimed to pick had already been moved days prior, and there was no record of him subsequently going to a nearby Home Depot.
Furthermore, when detectives analysed the DNA present on the ajar sliding door, they only found two profiles – while one was Jonathan’s, the other was of a then-unknown female. This is when they looked deeper into the couple’s marriage, just to find out that the husband had frequently been cheating on his wife of nearly 5 years with sex workers under the alias of Mike. As if that’s not enough, they also uncovered that on July 2, Simeonette had discovered that he had not attended classes for his Master’s, let alone earn the degree, even though she had paid for all of it. In other words, he had lied and betrayed her in arguably the worst of ways, driving officials to zero in on him further.
Jonathan Crupi is Currently Serving 25 Years to Life Behind Bars
It was only when investigators executed a search of the couple’s home that they were able to gather concrete evidence against Jonathan, including a secret throwaway cell phone. That’s what he used to set up meetings with sex workers, and a simple look into it verified that he had even arranged one at 12:45 pm on that fateful day – the time he claimed to be at Home Depot. With this as well as the incriminating search history on his laptop, with phrases like “how to throat slash,” “how to clean up a crime scene,” and “what destroys DNA,” he was arrested in November 2012.
Jonathan was actually taken into custody from his parents’ Brooklyn home, where he’d been staying since the incident, before being charged with murder and criminal possession of a weapon. However, it wasn’t until June 2015 that he stood trial for the charges against him, during which the prosecutors argued he had heinously killed his wife after she had confronted all his deceptions. On the flip side, the defense seemingly continued to maintain that Simeonette’s murder was the result of a robbery gone wrong, but to no avail.
After five weeks of testimonies and a couple of hours of deliberations, the jury found the 33-year-old guilty of second-degree murder, for which he was later handed down 25 years to life in prison. This verdict made it clear that Jonathan had indeed killed his wife by stabbing her in a fit of rage before setting the scene as a robbery and having an intimate rendezvous with a sex worker. Only then did he return home to call 911. So, today, at the age of 43, he remains incarcerated at the maximum-security Clinton Correctional Facility in Dannemora, New York, where he is expected to remain until at least 2037 when he becomes eligible for parole.
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