SCRANTON, Pa. — The stretch of unseasonable warmth was nearly finished as dawn broke Jan. 26, 2017. Slate gray skies threatened rain.
On the sidewalk outside Ghigiarelli’s Restaurant — a pizza shop and part of Old Forge’s famous collection of eateries — the morning’s delivery of dough sat uncollected by business owner Robert Baron Sr.
Baron Sr. wasn’t there. For a long time, he wasn’t anywhere.
It would be more than six years before Baron Sr.’s remains would be found in a patch of woods not far from a borough softball field. It would be more than six years before police handcuffed suspect Justin Schuback and charged him with killing the restaurateur in a burglary gone bad.
On Monday, now more than seven years since the business owner was last seen alive, attorneys are scheduled to start selecting the jury tasked with hearing the case and deciding if Schuback took Baron Sr.'s life.
Schuback, 38, denies he killed Baron Sr., 58. He faces charges including first-, second- and third-degree murder. If convicted, he could potentially be sentenced to life in prison.
Newswatch 16 on Sunday reviewed court filings associated with the case to sketch a timeline of the last seven years. Here is the story so far.
Developing a suspect
Baron Sr. vanished late Jan. 25, 2017, when he drove his son, Robert Baron Jr., home and then returned to his restaurant, which housed an upstairs apartment. His family reported him missing the next day.
The scene police found inside Ghigiarelli’s suggested foul play — spattered blood, broken glass, a human tooth in the utility sink. They also found a looted cash register, an empty safe and signs that someone tried to clean the place up.
Baron Jr. suggested to the police Schuback may be involved, court records show. The two were friends and Schuback, a drug user, knew Baron Sr. kept large sums of cash in the restaurant.
Investigators also learned Schuback owed money to his drug dealer. However, shortly after midnight on Jan. 26, 2017, Schuback allegedly paid his drug debt in full and bought another 11 bags of heroin for $180.
As the police pressed on, suspicion of Schuback grew. His girlfriend at the time, Kourtney Rake, told them he left the house Jan. 25, 2017, between 9 p.m. and 10 p.m. and did not answer calls and text messages for hours inquiring after his whereabouts.
“Shhhh,” read a message at 1:27 a.m. “I’ll explain when I get there.”
When he came home at 3 a.m., he was sweating, muddy and out-of-breath, police said. Schuback explained to Rake he had been hiding out from the police because he had drugs on him. He cleaned himself up, took the drugs and went to bed.
DNA and the digital trail
Baron Sr.’s 2006 Hyundai Elantra — which vanished with its owner — reappeared soon after Baron Sr. went missing. At first, a man spotted it just before 7 a.m. Jan. 26, 2017, at the dead end of Connell Street. Then, disappeared again and resurfaced again on Howard Street, where authorities seized it.
Investigators went to work examining it for any clues.
A DNA profile obtained from Baron Sr.’s toothbrush matched DNA recovered from bloodstains found inside the Hyundai and in the restaurant, according to court filings.
Investigators alleged that software that separates DNA mixtures to help with identification showed that Baron Sr. and Schuback’s DNA were likely part of the same profile collected from the driver’s side door and steering wheel.
However, it was Schuback’s phone that they said led them right to Baron Sr. and helped break open the case.
Search warrants issued over the years to Verizon Wireless, Schuback’s phone carrier, furnished the district attorney's office with “range-to-tower” data that police used to piece together the phone’s location and movements early on January 26, 2017.
According to the timeline reported in court filings, Schuback’s phone was:
• At Ghigiarelli’s Restaurant — 12:39 a.m. to 1:45 a.m.
• Heading south — 1:56 a.m.
• At Pagnotti Park — 2:01 a.m. to 2:15 a.m.
The data helped lead the police to discovering Baron Sr.’s remains at Pagnotti Park. The “range-to-tower” information also showed Schuback’s phone around Connell Street, where a witness first saw Baron Sr.’s Hyundai, and then on Howard Street, where authorities ultimately found the vehicle.
The waiting, the discovery and the arrest
For years, Baron Sr.’s family held out hope for a break.
His face smiled from billboards and posters hung up around the region in hopes that someone would come forward with the information needed to bring him home.
However, the years passed and brought no conclusion.
In 2021, four years after Baron Sr.’s disappearance, his family shared surveillance video with Newswatch 16 they thought might be germane — footage of people blocks from the pizza parlor during the time Baron Sr. vanished.
In one clip, a man pulled a rolling suitcase behind him while holding a lit cigarette. It interested the family because they said a similar one was stored in the apartment above Ghigiarelli’s.
The family shared the clips with the investigators, but nothing seemed to happen.
Then, two years later, everything seemed to happen all at once.
The word came down in late March last year: human remains believed to be those of Baron Sr. were found in the woods near Pagnotti Park.
Once confirmed to be Baron Sr., the police arrested Schuback at his home and put him in handcuffs.
Lackawanna County District Attorney Mark Powell said advances in forensic analysis helped lead to a break in the case.
The news was greeted by Old Forge with a sense of relief. More than 100 people attended a vigil to honor Baron Sr.’s life.
Things were not over, however. For the detectives tasked with sorting out what happened, there was still work to do.
Two statements, two stories
Once arrested, investigators pressed Schuback for a confession.
Schuback, however, repeatedly denied that he killed Baron. About a half-hour into the interview, Schuback said he wanted a lawyer. The questioning continued anyway.
That prompted Lackawanna County Judge Terrence Nealon to bar much of the interview from being used. Even still, Schuback maintained he did not do it.
Schuback, however, allegedly had a different story for his cellmate in the Lackawanna County Prison.
According to a defense motion, Schuback’s cellmate gave Schuback some Suboxone — a buprenorphine and naloxone cocktail meant to ease opioid withdrawal symptoms. They claimed it was done to interrogate Schuback while he was under the influence.
“I did…I did it,” Schuback allegedly said.
According to court filings, Schuback allegedly disclosed he planned to burglarize the restaurant and steal money. He did not anticipate that Baron Sr. would be there, and the two argued. It escalated.
Schuback reportedly said he “racked” Baron with a metal object. Baron fell dead.
After, Schuback cleaned the restaurant and drove Baron’s body to a park to dispose of the remains. He gathered incriminating evidence into bags and a suitcase and burned it outside of the county, he reportedly disclosed.
Schuback’s cellmate brought the information to the county district attorney’s office. A few weeks later, a judge granted a request to modify his bail and let him leave the jail pending disposition on a burglary case.
Nealon ruled the statement may be used in court because Schuback’s cellmate was not acting as an agent of the prosecution at the time they spoke and thus did not violate Schuback’s rights.