A case nearly three decades old which revolves around what is thought to be the worlds’ biggest pearl is being brought into the lime light yet again in a Denver courtroom. The tale is one of murder shrouded in mystery, toped off with a several million dollars.
The Pearl of Allah, a fourteen pound wonder of nature, is currently in residence over in a bank vault in a Colorado Springs Bank. It may finally get to have the dust blown off it once again, now that a Denver federal has agreed to re-open the case, which aims to properly distribute the gains from the sale of the nine inch wonder.
Our story begins back in 1934, when a diver found this gigantic pearl shaped like a brain in a clam off the Philippines coast. Unfortunately, he drowned attempting to bring it to the surface.
A Denver Post article published back in 2007 has said that the pearl eventually came to be owned in part by one Joe Bonicelli, the proprietor of a bar in Colorado Springs. Then in 1975, Eloise Bonicelli was murdered by some intruder in their residence. The police later found that the demise of Eloise Bonicelli was contracted by none other than Joe Bonicelli, with the help of a scrupulous business man, Tom Philips who – surprise surprise – was also a part owner of the pearl. The two rascals hired a barber named Delfino Ortega, to kill both Mrs. Bonicelli and Phillip’s Wife.
It appears that Phillips managed to get himself immunity at the trial if he went on the stand against Ortega, the Colorado Springs Gazette announced back in 2005.
Joe Bonicelli passed on back in 1998, and his share of the Pearl of Allah switched over to his second wife, who he was briefly attached to back in 1980, and his daughter from that same marriage, one Nicolina Bonicelli. The children from his first marriage, Michael Bonnicelli, Gwendolyn Garris and Donna Fuller, then were made aware of the fact that their father and Philips were behind the untimely demise of their mother, and filed a wrongful death suit against the estate of both their father and Phillips. Back in 2005, a jury of their peers awarded them the princely sum of $32.4 million.
Nicolica Bonicelli appealed this outcome, stating that the lawsuit was not only filed too late in the game, but also it was an exorbitant amount. In 2007, The Appeals court of Colorado upheld the original ruling. Nicolina Bonicelli commented that by upholding the original ruling, the Court was in fact letting her and the citizens down.
At the time of this decision, the pearl had an appraised value of some $60 million.
Joe Bonicelli’s children from his first marriage were very pleased by the first ruling, and added that they intended to set up a foundation to help abused children in their mother’s name.
Of course, the case is still as muddled as ever, and is complicated by the fact that the principal owners and investors have all passed on..
The world awaits to see the outcome and the final resting place of the “Pearl of Allah”.ä