| Murder. April 15, 1998. Thread | later | earlier Subject |
a dream about Craig
A 30-year-old card dealer from Camarillo, described as having a hot temper and a pile of gambling debts, turned himself in in the shooting of a colleague, Ventura police said Saturday.
Michael Gawlick, a dealer at Ventura's Ash Street Card Club, was charged Friday by the district attorney's office with the murder of 36-year-old Craig W. Gronenthal, a floor manager at the club.
Gronenthal, a Ventura resident, was shot twice in the head at 11:30 p.m. Wednesday as he was counting receipts after closing the club, police said. He was also waiting for Gawlick to stop by and pay a debt, police said.
Gronenthal was found soon after the shooting in the "cage" of the card room, which is in the basement of the Elks Club in downtown Ventura. A large-caliber gun used in the shooting has not been recovered, police said.
Gawlick, who had worked at the club on and off over several years, including the last seven months, surrendered about 10 a.m. Friday to a border guard in Nogales, Ariz., after returning from Mexico, said Ventura Police Lt. Don Arth.
Gawlick is being held without bail in Nogales and is expected to be extradited to Ventura within 10 days, police said.
A military-style funeral service will be held for Gronenthal, an ex-Marine, at 10 a.m. Tuesday at St. Mary Magdalen Church in Camarillo. He will be buried next to his father, who was in the Navy, in the Santa Clara Catholic Cemetery in Oxnard.
At the Ash Street club Saturday afternoon, a hostess who knew both the victim and suspect said she was too distraught to comment. But a card player and a dealer at the Player's Poker Club on Ventura Avenue, where Gawlick also was known, said Gawlick had several gambling debts.
Police said Gawlick owed money to the Ash Street club and to Gronenthal. He had left the club Wednesday to get the "couple hundred dollars" he owed Gronenthal, Arth said.
Gawlick did not show up for work the next day, and friends told police they had not seen him since the shooting.
Sal Martinez, one of Gawlick's former employers in Rosamond in southern Kern County, said Gawlick was fired from his casino in 1996 after walking off the job the night of a card tournament.
"He had some kind of temper," Martinez said. "The floor manager was going to put him to work and he responded real nasty."
Another Player's Poker Club employee who did not want to be identified said that Gawlick was often quiet, but acted "volatile" when upset.
Bob Burgum, the floor manager of Sal's Town who hired Gawlick in 1995, said Gawlick did not have a history of steady employment and that his then-wife worked at a fast-food restaurant to support their three children.
"He didn't ever owe this club any money," Burgum said. "But I know he was having a hard time making it." Burgum said he last saw Gawlick when Gawlick returned to the casino last year to apologize for walking out and unsuccessfully sought another job.
The victim's mother, Eleanor Gronenthal, said Saturday that she had a premonition years ago that she someday would bury one of her three sons. About three weeks ago, she said, her youngest son said he had a dream about Craig.
"In his dream, he said he was jittery about going down into the card club. And he saw yellow police tape all over the place," she said.
Artist/Author: Craig Gronenthal August 25, 2017 | | http://articles.latimes.com/1998/apr/19/local/me-40904 | |
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