Share and Follow
In a chilling turn of events, the serene life of a Florida couple came to a tragic end as investigators unveiled a calculated scheme behind their disappearance from their idyllic Singer Island residence.
“This was not a crime of passion,” highlighted Investigator Mike Waites from the Florida State Attorney’s Office during a segment of Oxygen’s A Plan to Kill on March 29. “This wasn’t an impulsive act. It was a premeditated crime.”
Janette Piro, 45, and Christopher Benedetto, 42, were living the dream on Florida’s tranquil Singer Island until they vanished without a trace in November 1998.
Concerned family members, alarmed by the couple’s sudden absence, requested a police welfare check on their home on November 16.
“When the police entered the house, everything appeared normal,” Waites recounted. “There was no sign of a break-in or struggle, yet items that should accompany them on any trip—like Chris’ medication, wallet, and cell phone—were left behind.”
“The police go in the house, nothing is out of place,” Waites explained. “There’s no sign of a burglary, struggle or anything, but they do notice things that should be with the couple if they’re on a trip like Chris’ medication is still there, Chris’ wallet is still there, Chris’ cell phone is there.”
Investigators also learned that the couple had failed to show up to a planned dinner with their neighbors five days earlier. Mail began piling up at their house and the couple didn’t answer their phones either. Eventually, the concerned neighbors called the couple’s relatives.
Janette Piro and Christopher Benedetto Whereabouts Emerge From Marina
After learning that the pair was missing, the couple’s brother-in-law Michael Koblan—who was married to Janette’s sister and was Chris’ frequent fishing buddy—traveled from his New Jersey home to investigate the disappearance. Chris’ brothers Paul Benedetto and George Benedetto, who were police officers in New York, also came to Florida to offer their assistance in the baffling case, which was also profiled in Oxygen’s Deadly Waters with Captain Lee.
Michael told the neighbors that after speaking to someone at the marina he learned that Chris and Janette had gone to the Bahamas with another couple on their boat, but the story didn’t sit right with those who knew them.
“When I heard that Chris and Janette went to the Bahamas with some friends during hurricane season and they left without telling anybody I felt that couldn’t be true,” neighbor Ben Demonstranti said. “Chris and Janette wouldn’t do that, so I knew that story was bogus.”
Chris Benedetto’s Brothers Make Grisly Discovery at Couple’s Home
Feeling they’d reached a dead end, Paul and George were tidying up the couple’s home on Nov. 22 before returning to New York when they looked inside a bait freezer in the garage and found Janette’s body stuffed inside.
“One of the brothers opened it and he let out a primal scream of shock and horror,” retired U.S. Prosecutor Steve Carlton recounted. “Instead of seeing frozen fish, he saw, much to his horror, a frozen body.”
An autopsy later determined that Janette had ligature marks around her neck and was killed by manual strangulation.
“To me, it wasn’t a random crime. It was a personal crime,” Waites said. “The person’s behind you and gripping down on this rope and we noticed that there’s no scraping on the nails, so it was somebody she knew, somebody that she was comfortable with, because they were able to get up close and personal.”
Surprising Suspect Emerges in Chris Benedetto’s Disappearance
With Chris still unaccounted for, investigators considered the possibility that the former construction worker had killed his wife and then gone on the run, but everyone who knew the couple insisted they had been deeply in love.
After breaking his back, Chris had received a settlement of more than $1 million and retired to Florida, where he spent most days fishing; however, investigators were unable to find any bank activity in his accounts after Nov. 11.
The date also coincided with a report from Chris’ neighbor Ben. He told investigators that he witnessed a vehicle pull up at the couple’s home around 8 a.m. that day, before seeing Chris and another man go out on his boat. Hours later, however, only the stranger returned, driving off in Chris’ truck.
After hearing Ben’s account, authorities processed Chris’ boat and realized there was no anchor line or even an anchor. Ben also identified the man he’d seen that day as Michael after seeing him get out of a detective’s car during the search for the missing couple.
“He looked at me and he gave me the bone chilling, most frightening look I’ve ever seen in my life,” Ben remembered. “It just set shivers up my spine.”
Although Michael seemed like an unlikely suspect given his close friendship with the couple, investigators learned that he’d borrowed over $150,000 from Chris for his trucking business, which later filed for bankruptcy. Ultimately, Michael had only been able to pay back $50,000 of the loan, investigators said.
Investigators Link Michael Koblan to Fake Alias
Through financial records authorities learned that Michael had opened an American Express card under the name “Mike Kerry,” which he used to purchase a plane ticket from Newark, New Jersey to West Palm Beach, Florida the day before the couple vanished.
He’d also signed into a hotel using the fake name, but signed the guest registry using his actual address in New Jersey. FBI agents were able to match the handwriting on the registry to Michael, confirming that he used the alias to try to pull off the crime.
As Waites explained, “I believe Mike Koblan couldn’t repay the loan, so he decided to kill Chris and Janette.”
Investigators concluded that Michael killed Chris on the boat and then knocked his body overboard, before returning to the house where he strangled Janette with rope from the boat.
The final piece of evidence was Janette’s missing 4-carat princess cut diamond ring. Phone records showed that Michael had called a New York jeweler while in Singer Island. The jewelry store’s owner Larry Hoffman later confirmed that he’d purchased the ring from Michael a few days later for $25,000, cutting the stone into several smaller diamonds.
Investigators convinced the jeweler to call Michael and tell him he received a subpoena in Florida to testify. Larry, who agreed to wear a wire, then captured Michael discussing the sale of the ring when he came into the store to discuss.
Michael was later convicted of two counts of murder, one count of murdering a federal witness and one count of interstate stalking of a federal witness, bringing justice to Chris and Janette.
He was sentenced to life in prison in 2005 and died two years later of a heart attack.