What They Did For Love

This story originally aired on Feb. 25, 2006.

Toni Dykstra and Carlo Ventre met in sunny southern California in 1994 and fell in love. Soon after, a daughter was born — but Carlo and Toni's relationship soured, leading to an international custody battle and charges of kidnapping.

Some four years later, Toni ended up dead in Carlo's Rome apartment. He said it was an accident; her family says it was murder.

Would Carlo be charged in the killing? And what would happen to the couple's young daughter? Correspondent Bill Lagattuta reports on the investigation and heated legal battle that continues to this day.

In 1998, Santina, Carlo and Toni were all in Italy, but they were not traveling together and their time there was no Roman holiday. In fact, Toni Dykstra would not leave Italy alive.

Her mysterious death would become an international incident and leave her family searching for the truth.

The big question is what had gone wrong between Carlo and Toni, whose love started with such promise.

And while this story would end in Italy, it began half a world away in the Los Angeles harbor community of San Pedro, Calif.

It was in San Pedro, in 1994, that 46-year-old Italian businessman Carlo Ventre met 25-year-old American single mom Toni Dykstra at a restaurant.

"She was very exuberant, very easygoing, happy person and I invite her to dance and we dance and we exchange phone numbers. She called me the very next day," recalls Carlo.

"She thought he was real nice, charming and sweet," explains Toni's identical twin sister, Teri Martinez. "And [he was] interested in the kids and the family."

Carlo had been living in the United States for 12 years and was the president of a plumbing manufacturing business.

"He was so nice and sweet to her," says Teri, who was also her sister's best friend.

"Teri and Toni told each other everything. They giggled, they laughed, they whispered," remembers their stepmother, Betty Dykstra.

"Teri was more the quiet one. Toni was always out there messing around," says the girls' father, Milt Dykstra.

The twins had even married two brothers.

Toni had two daughters, but the marriage didn't last. Now a single mom, she planned to go back to school to become a paralegal.

"She was a very proud mother and very determined to better herself and better her life so that she could give more to her children," says Betty.

Everything seemed to be changing for the better for Toni in December 1994, when she met Carlo Ventre.

"At first she didn't say too much. And then she told me that she had met this man and that he was so nice and he was sweet to her. He would play the guitar on the phone. He was really charming," recalls Teri.

And it wasn't just Carlo's charm that attracted Toni.

"I believe she fell in love with me because she realize how much I did care for the children," says Carlo.

After only three months, Toni got pregnant.

Toni and her daughters soon moved in with Carlo, and in November 1995, baby Santina was born.

"She called me from the hospital to tell me that she had a baby girl. We were excited. But after that, communication stopped," remembers Teri. The Dykstras say Carlo was keeping Toni and Santina away from them.

Suddenly, what should have been a happy time quickly turned into a nightmare.

"I would call on the phone and he would say 'Don't call here anymore,'" says Teri.

The Dykstras say Carlo became obsessed with the child, who he considered his more than Toni's.

Betty says Toni even told her she was not allowed to breastfeed her own child, "because he didn't want that baby to love her."

Teri says Carlo started acting more aggressive towards Toni. "More possessive, more jealous, and things started getting really bad," she claims.

Carlo insists it was Toni who was the problem. "I wish that my daughter would have been attached to her mother. And that her mother was a stable person," he says.

Carlo says it was Toni who was abusive to him, and maintains that he even filed police reports against her.

While Carlo says Toni was abusive and occasionally violent, the Dykstras say that's not true.

Asked whom one should believe, Carlo says, "I think you should believe the facts."

Toni and Carlo had a final blow-up; Carlo kept Santina and locked Toni and her two older daughters out of the house. But even then, the Dykstras claim he continued to threaten Toni.

"He would tell her he would take Santina to Italy and she would never see her again," says Teri.

Less than a year after Santina was born, they went to family court in California and came to a temporary agreement to share custody of Santina. Until a final deal was reached, Carlo was forbidden to take Santina to Italy without notice.

But on Jan. 16, 1998, without warning, Carlo did just that, boarding an international flight with 2-year-old Santina and returning to Italy.

"She was in tears, she was crying. The thought of never seeing your daughter again. It's too much. That's too scary," recalls Teri.

Toni was frantic. She told friends Carlo had silently taken their daughter to Italy and had no plans of returning.

"She called me Saturday morning at home. She said 'They're gone, they're gone,'" says Toni's close friend Marlene Greteman.

Toni was helpless. For months, she didn't know where in Italy Santina was and only talked to her daughter when Carlo put the little girl on the phone.

"Toni was crying and shaking in abject terror after talking to Carlo Ventre," says Toni's friend and mentor, attorney Alan Skidmore.

Asked what she was afraid of, Skidmore says, "Her life. Losing her life."

Skidmore says when Carlo got on the phone he would threaten Toni if she tried to win custody of their daughter.

Marlene says Carlo threatened to have Toni killed if she went to court to apply for custody and says Toni took those threats seriously.

Despite Carlo's alleged threats, Toni took her case to family court in Los Angeles and was awarded full custody of her daughter. But the battle was only half over. Carlo, an Italian citizen, was now living in Italy with Santina, which meant Toni would have to take her case to an Italian court.

Toni wasn't a lawyer and didn't speak Italian. Nevertheless, she decided to represent herself and worked with Alan Skidmore to get a court date and help prepare her case.

"She sat in my office knowing her life was in danger but there was no option for Toni. She was going to go get her baby," he remembers.

Borrowing money from her parents, Toni bought two tickets — one for her and one for Santina — and made her first trip to Rome alone.

Friends and family were worried for her safety. "The last thing I said to her on the phone was 'Toni be careful. This guy could kill you,'" Milt remembers.

They couldn't go with, her but they knew Toni was in touch with the U.S. embassy, which put her up at a nearby convent for her safety.

The day after her arrival, accompanied by a translator from the embassy, Toni made her case to the Italian court.

Skidmore says Toni didn't know what to do when she got into court but that she followed her gut instinct. "She went in and just told her story and she came out of that courtroom with a win," he says.

On July 17, 1998, an Italian court ruled in Toni's favor, declaring that Carlo had violated an international law on kidnapping. Santina was to be handed over to Toni and returned to the United States immediately.

But when Italian police arrived at Carlo's apartment to take custody of Santina, Carlo told them she had unexpectedly fallen ill.

"Carlo said that she had pleurisy, which is a lung infection, and he was going to take her to the hospital," says Teri.

Doctors said Santina wouldn't be able to leave the country until she recovered. Until then, Toni was forced to cross paths with Carlo as they both visited their child in the hospital.

Teri says her sister was "very scared at that point."

Finally, the time had come for Toni to collect her daughter and fly home. Santina had recovered from her illness and Toni had tickets for both of them to travel. But this is where things went terribly wrong. The afternoon before the flight, for reasons unfathomable to her relatives and friends, Toni went alone to Carlo's apartment.

"Carlo Ventre is an extremely manipulative individual. He could have told Toni any number of things to get her to his apartment," says Skidmore.

And this is what he told 48 Hours. Incredibly, Carlo says, while Santina was recuperating in the hospital, Toni was trying to rekindle their love affair.

"I think she wanted me back in her life and by me being in Italy, I was out from her life," says Carlo.

On July 28, 1998, Carlo says they were at his apartment preparing to return to America together, as a family.

Carlo says the reason Toni was coming to the apartment was to wash the baby's clothes and pack for the trip.

He says Toni was doing laundry. When they started arguing, he claims she went outside to the yard and then suddenly, out of nowhere, attacked him.

"I see this ax in front of me and I was shocked. I didn't know what happened," he says.

As he fought to defend himself, Carlo says, he pushed Toni. She fell, hitting her head hard on the floor.

"She hit, I believe, the temporal side of her head. Then all of a sudden blood was coming out of her ear. I think — I don't know what to do. I believe I was getting crazy," says Carlo. "I think I called the police."

By the time police arrived at the scene, 29-year-old Toni Dykstra was dead. There was evidence of a struggle. A hatchet lay a few feet from Toni's body.

Detective Domenica Salis, who was one of the first cops on the scene, says Carlo was very agitated.

Det. Salis soon discovered that Carlo's first call was not to the police. The detective says Carlo called his lawyer before contacting the authorities, and says Carlo never called for medical help.

Carlo says he was shocked. "I mean, I didn't believe the mother of my daughter was dead just because of such a stupid accident."

Toni's friends back in the United States, waiting for her triumphant homecoming, got a shocking phone call instead.

"Impossible, impossible. We had just talked to her. And she was coming home," remembers Marlene.

The U.S. Department of State called Teri, who, in turn, called her parents.

"It was just total disbelief that this man would go so far as to kill the mother of his child," says Betty.

Carlo told police he acted in self-defense and showed them wounds he says he suffered when Toni attacked him.

"I'm not a violent person. I'm innocent," says Carlo.

Police took Carlo into custody, but an Italian court decided there wasn't enough evidence to charge him and released him within days.

One week after her sister Toni's death, Teri went to her sister's house and took on the painful task of sorting through Toni's belongings.

Among her sister's belongings were precious memories, including some of Santina's shoes and a lock of the baby girl's hair.

Then she found a small notebook, which she realized was her sister's diary.

"Going to kill me …going to put acid on my face so no one will love me. Said he would kill me and chop me into little pieces," Teri read from Toni's diary.

Toni's own words revealed her fears for her life.

"He kicked me to get me out of the room. He would stand in front of the door so I could not get in. I would hear my little baby cry," Teri read from the notebook.

While Teri packed up her sister's things, Toni's case remained open in the Italian courts. And Carlo, the man she believes murdered her sister, was walking the streets of Rome, a free man.

Teri says the initial decision by Italian investigators to believe Carlo makes her really angry. "Because he had threatened that he would kill her and he would get away with it," says Teri. "That's what happened."

Teri was determined to get justice for Toni, so she turned to someone who had been her sister's hero: high-profile California attorney Gloria Allred, who agreed to take the case for free.

Asked why this case struck a chord with her, Allred says, "Because this mother tried to do everything right. She really felt that the system would help her and the system failed her. This should not happen to any other mother."

Allred's first victory was getting the U.S. courts to charge Carlo with kidnapping Santina. Her next mission was to convince the authorities in Rome to charge Carlo with Toni's murder.

"Everything was a battle. Just innumerable phone calls, letters, meetings," Allred explains.

Despite her efforts, the Italian investigation was at a standstill. Allred was left with many questions about what happened in Carlo's apartment the day of Toni's death.

There was an autopsy performed on Toni's body by the medical examiner in Rome. It lists the cause of death as "unico momento traumatico" — a single traumatic moment, in which her head came in contact with a hard object. Trouble is, that conclusion and many details in this report seem to raise more questions than they answer.

48 Hours had California forensic pathologist Joseph Cohen review the Italian autopsy. He says the "unico momento traumatico" was the fatal blow that ended a prolonged and violent struggle.

"One that involves perhaps punching, perhaps kicking, perhaps falling, striking other objects, getting up again," says Dr. Cohen.

Carlo claims he accidentally pushed Toni and she hit her head on the floor, but Dr. Cohen says there's more to the story. "The injuries to Toni Dykstra are suggestive of two or three or more impacts," he says.

Remember, too, that Carlo never called for medical help; Det. Salis said she made that call.

Cohen says the delay may have made the difference between life and death.

"Could she have been resuscitated and survived? It's possible," says Dr. Cohen.

Allred wasn't getting any answers and now she had another concern: 3-year old Santina had been in foster care since her mother's death. Except for periodic visitation from Carlo, she was alone in Italy and Italian authorities were considering putting her up for adoption.

But Toni's parents felt they should have custody of the child and wanted Santina home with them in California. But just like Toni, they had to go to Italy and appeal to an Italian court to win custody of their granddaughter.

"Milton and Betty stepped up to the plate. They wanted Santina, so we did everything we could to try to make that happen," says Skidmore.

Attorneys Skidmore and Allred went with Milt to Italy to plead their case to the court of minors. Milt was granted permission to spend some precious moments with Santina at her foster home.

But social workers had arranged Carlo's visit too closely to Milt's, leading to an angry confrontation outside the foster home.

The Italian courts were taking their time deciding Santina's future, and for now, Milt and his attorneys left Rome empty-handed.

"We felt like we hit a brick wall. We felt that we were getting nowhere," remembers Skidmore.

But back in Los Angeles, the Dykstras weren't giving up.

"My wife, Betty, and I have agonized over this for a year and a half and we want our granddaughter back," says Milt.

Finally in November 1999, 15 months after she took the case, Allred scored a major victory.

An Italian court ruled that Santina should be returned to the U.S. to live with the Dykstras and that a California judge would make the final decision on her custody.

On Nov. 9, 1999, in the middle of the day, Italian authorities picked up Santina from school and put her on a plane with Allred.

In Los Angeles, there was an emotional reunion, as Santina was turned over to her grandparents.

"Milt brought her over to me and said, 'This is your grandmother.' And when he put her in my arms. It was just the most awesome feeling in the world to have this child and feel that she was finally safe," remembers Betty.

But the battle for Santina was far from over.

"We felt like she was home and we were very grateful — we were ecstatic and very hopeful for the future," says Betty.

Back in Italy, Carlo was alone and he was fuming mad, both at the Dykstras and at their attorney, Gloria Allred.

"She's a woman without heart. She will walk over the dead body of her mother to achieve what she wants to achieve. That's what I believe Gloria Allred is," Carlo says.

"She says in no uncertain terms that she's not gonna rest until she gets you," Lagattuta said.

"She already did got me. She ruined my life and the life of my daughter. What else does she want?" Carlo replied.

Allred says she wants "Carlo to know this system is going to make him accountable."

While the Italians were still investigating Carlo's role in Toni's death, a Los Angeles court was about to decide who should have custody of Santina. Carlo says when he heard about it, he knew he had to be there, in spite of the fact that he was wanted for kidnapping in the U.S.

His daughter was with Toni's parents, the Italians were not prosecuting him for murder, and there was a warrant for his arrest back in the United States. All Carlo had to do was stay put and stay quiet and get on with his life in Italy.

But Carlo could not resist one more fight. He bought a plane ticket, and got on board a jet bound for Los Angeles.

But when he landed in Los Angeles, he was met by FBI Special Agent April Brooks. "I introduced myself. Told him why I was there — that he was under arrest," she explains.

With Carlo now facing trial for kidnapping, it was unlikely he would get custody of his daughter, but he had a back-up plan.

Carlo asked his brother Gianfranco Ventre, who was living outside Las Vegas with his wife and four children, to file for custody of Santina.

A court-appointed psychologist interviewed Santina and both families.

"She came back with a flat-out recommendation that the best interests of the child would be served by giving her to Betty and I," says Milt. "And that it would be detrimental to the child to take her away from us," Betty adds.

But that's exactly what happened. The judge, citing the Dykstras age and what he said was Milt Dykstra's intense hatred of Carlo, ordered that Santina should live with Carlo's brother.

Milt and Betty, who got twice-monthly visitation with Santina, say the ruling stunned them. Adding to their heartbreak, the Dykstras were ordered to immediately hand their 4-year-old granddaughter over to Carlo's brother.

"We had to give her up in the middle of the street in downtown Los Angeles. Tore our heart out," remembers Betty. "It was a nightmare day. You never get over losing a child."

Carlo once again had what he wanted most. Santina was living with his brother and while he was awaiting trial for kidnapping, Carlo could see Santina on a regular basis.

One year would go by and Carlo Ventre pleaded guilty to kidnapping and was sentenced to 364 days in federal prison. Meanwhile, Allred and the Dykstras were hatching a plan to ban Carlo from the United States forever.

"I had been writing to the INS suggesting that they needed to hold a deportation hearing to determine whether or not Carlo should be deported because he had been convicted of a felony and that he should be taken into custody pending the hearing," says Allred.

The immigration authorities agreed to look at Carlo's case. So when he was released from prison, immigration authorities moved him to a detention center while they decided whether to deport him. And that's where Carlo allegedly hatched a stunning plan.

"The plan was that for approximately $100,000 there would be an attempt to kill Milt and Betty Dykstra," says Allred.

From behind bars, Carlo was allegedly planning the murder of Milt and Betty Dykstra, and it was all caught on tape by a confidential informant.

Authorities have not released the tape, but Allred is familiar with the contents of the transcript.

Asked how he was supposed to be killed, Milt says, "It was supposed to look like a botched home invasion robbery where they were going to break into the house and kill both of us."

"They were going to shoot us," Betty adds.

Also part of the alleged plan was kidnapping Santina and taking her overseas.

But Carlo says it was a setup. "Yes, I was set up. I was entrapped. But the matter of fact, I never solicit anything."

"Did you or did you not say to this informant, I want you to kill the Dykstras, shoot them, and make it look like a robbery?" Lagattuta asked.

"Absolutely not," Carlo said. "The voice was disrupted. It's not my voice. We don't know if even was me talking."

In November 2002, an immigration judge ordered Carlo deported. Still in custody, Carlo fought the decision for three long years.

Finally, in July 2005, with the charges of solicitation to murder still pending, Carlo agreed to leave the United States. The Americans were all too happy to send Carlo home. Why? Because Italian prosecutors were now ready to charge him with the murder of Toni Dykstra.

Asked if he was worried about what would happen in Italy, Carlo says, "I'm not worry because I believe I'm honest. And I believe that I'm innocent. And I believe that justice is going to prevail."

Carlo is now back in Italy, thousands of miles from the one person he cares most about: his daughter Santina.

Daily phone calls are the only contact Carlo has with his daughter, now 10, and still living with Carlo's brother outside of Las Vegas.

"After I hear her voice, and find out if she's OK, then I can start to keep going from my day. And live for another day," says Carlo.

And these days Carlo has a lot on his plate, preparing for his day in court.

Italian prosecutor Giancarlo Capaldo initially believed Carlo's story of self-defense. But after a full investigation, he now believes that Carlo carefully planned Toni's murder to keep her from taking Santina back to America.

Capaldo says he wanted to charge Carlo years earlier but he couldn't because Carlo was in the United States, fighting deportation.

A hearing was scheduled to determine whether Carlo should be charged with murder.

Allred flew to Rome for the hearing. She wants to make sure the court considers all the evidence in the case, including Toni's diary.

"Her diaries show that she had a real fear that he might kill her," says Allred.

But Carlo insists Toni's death was an accident. Asked if he murdered Toni, Carlo says, "I did not. I didn't murder Toni."

And Carlo is optimistic about being vindicated. "I think if they look at the facts — yes, I should be cleared," he says.

The hearing lasted less than an hour; when it was over, the news was no news — Carlo's attorney had asked for a continuation.

Carlo had hired a new attorney, prompting the court to postpone the hearing.

On the street, Allred's frustration with the postponement boiled over. "Carlo, are you going to tell the truth? Did you kill her?" Allred asked Carlo.

Allred says she was outraged that Carlo was going home free. "An absolute outrage that he should not be in custody."

Three months later, all the parties headed back to court again.

This time, the court decided to charge Carlo with murder, with a trial date set for March 1, 2006.

The long-awaited news was a relief for Toni's family in California.

Carlo is free for now — but if convicted, he could spend the next 21 years behind bars.

"I'm not worried because I do believe because I was there and I know what happened that I am an innocent man," Carlo said.

For Milt Dykstra the news does nothing to diminish the pain of losing his daughter. "It's just — it's an everyday thing — it doesn't ever go away," he says,

Toni's two older daughters are being raised by her ex-husband in California.

Teri is hoping that one day, Santina will learn the truth about her mother.

"That her mom gave everything that she had and that she loved her so much," says Teri. "And that her mom's not there with her but she gave everything she had to get her."