State court denies convicted killer’s appeal

The killer of a man shot in the back in Luzerne County, then wrapped in a tent and dumped in Penn Forest Township, has lost his bid to get out of prison.

Eleazar Yisrael, 32, formerly of Hazleton and now in the state prison on Camp Hill, had appealed his conviction on the 2015 death of Samuel J. Vacante, 52, in Butler Township.

The state Superior Court panel composed of judges Jack A. Panella, Victor P. Stabile, and Senior Judges William H. Platt on Tuesday denied Yisrael’s appeal.

In his appeal, Yisrael argued that prosecutors presented insufficient evidence to support the conviction.

Yisrael’s arguments center around his claims that prosecutors failed to link him, either through DNA evidence or otherwise, to the crime scene and the murder weapon,” Panella wrote.

The judge pointed out that during the trial, prosecutors presented evidence that at the time of Vacante’s death, Yisrael was involved in a relationship with Vacante’s estranged wife Lisa.

Police saw Yisrael walking in the direction of Vacante’s home the same day that Vacante went missing. They found a trail of Vacante’s blood in the garage, and Vacante’s vehicle missing.

Police found both Vacante’s blood and Yisrael’s fingerprints inside the vehicle.

Vacante’s body was found near Yisrael’s previous residence, and his alibi for the day Vacante disappeared was unsupported, Panella wrote.

“Here, the circumstantial evidence, when viewed in the light most favorable to the Commonwealth, supported the Commonwealth’s theory that Appellant walked to Vacante’s house, committed the murder, placed Vacante’s body in the trunk of Vacante’s car, and drove Vacante’s car, with his body in the trunk, to the wooded area and dumped it there,” Panella wrote.

According to court testimony, in the early morning hours of Aug. 31, 2015, Butler County police saw Yisrael, in camouflage-patterned clothing, walking along South Old Turnpike Road towards Drums. They stopped him for a safety check, but let him go.

Later that day, police responded to a report by Lisa Vacante that her estranged husband had gone missing from his home in Drums.

Vacante’s home was about two miles from where police stopped Yisrael earlier that day.

At Vacante’s home, police found his car missing and a strong smell of bleach in the garage.

Vacante’s son, Brandon Vacante, led the officers to a trail of blood, and various items including a grey hooded sweatshirt, rags soaked in bleach, Clorox toilet bowl cleaner, a blue latex glove, a .22 caliber rifle, and a fired .22 caliber shell casing.

Brandon told police that he had been receiving disturbing text messages from Vacante’s cell phone, and noted that it was unusual for Vacante to store either clothing or the rifle in the garage.

Police were able to track down Vacante’s phone, but did not find Vacante or his car.

Two days later, they found the car two blocks from the home Yisrael shared with Lisa. The registration plate had been removed and the vehicle identification number blacked out.

Officers discovered Vacante’s blood in the trunk, Yisrael’s fingerprints in the car, and a Wal-Mart receipt dated Sept. 1, 2015, the day after Vacante went missing.

Police on Sept. 3, 2015 found various items identified as Vacante’s, including a gun, binoculars, ammunition, tools, watches, mail, a compact disc made for Vacante by his girlfriend, and the key fob for his car in Yisrael’s house.

Two days later, a passerby discovered Vacante’s body, wrapped in a tent, in a wooded area of Penn Forest Township, where Yisrael used to live.

An autopsy revealed that Vacante’s cause of death was a small caliber gunshot wound to the back.

Yisrael was arrested and charged with criminal homicide, robbery, burglary, tampering with or fabricating physical evidence, and abuse of corpse.

He was convicted and sentenced to the mandatory term of life imprisonment for his first-degree murder conviction, as well as an aggregate consecutive sentence of 14½ to 29 years for his other convictions.

Yisrael filed a post-sentence motion challenging the sufficiency of the evidence presented at trial. The trial court denied the motion, and Yisrael appealed to Superior Court.