She tried to leave her jealous lover – and he threw her body into the sea
Anne Marie Fahey was 30 years old, worked in the Delaware governor's office, and was trying to put her affair with Thomas Capano, a married lawyer, behind her. In her diary, she described Capano as a jealous, controlling, and manipulative man, but even after repeated attempts to end the relationship, he would not let her go. In June 1996, she disappeared after going out to dinner with him in Philadelphia.
On June 27, 1996, Anne Marie Fahey went out to dinner with a man she knew well: Thomas Capano. He was a well-connected lawyer, married, and a father of four daughters. She was 30, worked as the secretary to the governor of Delaware, and had been trying for a long time to cut ties with him. It was the last time anyone saw her alive.
Fahey grew up in an Irish family, and her life was not easy. By the age of 20, she had lost both her parents and remained very close to her five brothers and sisters. Those who knew her described a funny, witty, warm woman with a presence that could not be missed. She was a well-known figure in the city of Wilmington, and used to frequent a local Irish pub — where they remembered her as someone who had an answer for everything and a big laugh. But behind that smile, in the last years of her life, hid a relationship that was becoming dangerous.
Capano was 16 years older than Fahey. He was a successful professional, a well-known lawyer, and a man who knew how to present himself as soft, charming, and generous. According to reports, he also knew exactly how to enter the life of a vulnerable woman and convince her that he understood her better than anyone. The affair between Fahey and Capano lasted three years. It started with romantic gestures, gifts, and expensive restaurants. She told him about her eating disorder, and he, for his part, wrapped her in attention. Slowly, he began to take control of her schedule, her decisions, and her emotional life. Every time she tried to distance herself, he found a way to return. The connection gradually became a suffocating relationship.
In her diary, she described how he controlled her life, was jealous of her, and refused to accept the fact that she wanted to move on. In 1995, Capano separated from his wife and began dating other women as well. Fahey, for her part, began to explore the possibility of a new life of her own. She met a businessman named Michael Scanlan, and the relationship between them began to get serious. But Capano was not ready to let go. In February 1996, she wrote to him in an email that he had scared her over the weekend. She wrote that his repeated calls, every half hour, were making her distance herself from him even more. A few months later, in her diary, she was much sharper: "I finally closed the chapter on Thomas Capano. What a crazy, controlling, manipulative, insecure, and jealous person." This was also the last entry in the diary.
On June 29, 1996, Fahey did not arrive for a dinner planned with her family. Her sister, Kathleen, drove to her apartment and discovered that her car and belongings were there — but she was not. Soon, the police discovered that she had gone out to dinner with Capano a few days earlier. A waitress at a restaurant in Philadelphia said she looked serious and sad. The lawyer, on the other hand, claimed she was only upset because she had received a serving of calamari. Capano admitted that he had an affair with Fahey, but according to him, after the dinner, he took her home and did not see her again.
Investigators heard his version, but as the days went by, the missing woman's family became convinced that he knew more than he was willing to say. People who knew about their relationship also told disturbing things. Fahey's hairdresser told investigators that once, when Anne Marie tried to break up with him, Capano grabbed her by the neck inside the car. According to the testimony, she had to jump out of the vehicle to get away from him. In the absence of a breakthrough in the case, the FBI joined the investigation. A search of Capano's home revealed bloodstains, and later the stains were matched to Fahey's DNA profile. Still, for more than a year, the authorities did not have enough evidence to arrest the lawyer. The body was not found, there was no clear crime scene, no weapon, and no eyewitness who saw the moment she was murdered. Capano, a sophisticated and experienced lawyer, continued to deny any connection to her disappearance.
Everything changed in the fall of 1997. The FBI arrested Capano's brother, Gerry, on suspicion of drug and weapons offenses. During his arrest, Gerry began to cooperate with the investigation into the disappearance of Anne Marie Fahey. According to him, Thomas came to him on the morning of June 28 and claimed that an unidentified couple was blackmailing him and threatening his daughters. Gerry asked him if he did it, and Thomas nodded. Then, the two went out on Gerry's boat to an area in the Atlantic Ocean off the coast of New Jersey, known among fishermen as "Mako Alley." It is an area located about 112 kilometers from the coastline, and a popular place for fishing for mako sharks. There, according to Gerry, his brother threw a large cooler into the water. But the cooler did not sink. It just floated on the surface of the water. Gerry shot at it in the hope that the holes would cause it to disappear into the depths. That didn't help either. According to his testimony, Thomas opened the cooler, tied an anchor to what was inside, and threw the contents into the sea. Gerry said he saw a human foot and part of a shin.
About a week after Fahey's death, fishermen found the cooler floating in the sea. They plugged the holes and used it to store fish, and only more than a year later, when the story of the cooler was published, did they realize what might be in their hands and handed it over to the FBI. The cooler was the evidence that connected the story. Even without a body, it gave the prosecution something tangible to present. Together with the brother's testimony, the diary, the blood, and the testimonies about the violent relationship, the case against Capano strengthened. Capano was arrested on November 12, 1997.
His trial began in October 1998 and quickly became one of the most publicized trials in Delaware. During the trial, Debbie MacIntyre, one of Capano's lovers, also testified. She said that he asked her to buy a gun for him a few weeks before Anne Marie disappeared. When it was Capano's turn to take the witness stand, he tried to change the story. He first claimed that he did not know what happened to Fahey, and then said in court that she was shot by mistake. According to him, MacIntyre found out about the affair with the governor's secretary and threatened to end her life. He claimed that during an attempt to take the gun from her, a bullet was fired that hit Fahey. Capano later claimed that he hid Fahey's body in an attempt to protect MacIntyre. But the jury was not convinced. In January 1999, Thomas Capano was convicted of murder and sentenced to death. His sentence was later commuted to life imprisonment without the possibility of parole. Capano died in prison in 2011 at the age of 61. Anne Marie Fahey was never found.
