Related story: Ex-husband's rage turns lethal

By Mark Arseanult
Journal Staff Writer

The story about the murder of Barbara Lombardi by her ex-husband was about getting enough information to build suspense, to overcome TV's advantage of same-day turnaround on a story that breaks in the morning.

Our archives gave me a head start that TV didn't have. It's not possible to live 50 years in this state without being mentioned in this newspaper, especially in obits and wedding notices. I learned that the killer, Russell Arlia, and his victim were once married, that they had divorced and that both were in the real estate business.

Knowing before anybody else that this was a case of domestic violence, I went straight to court, before the police press conference.

District Court had the records of the killer's pending criminal cases (harassment, domestic assault), leading up to murder.

Family Court had a restraining order, which included an affidavit written in Lombardi's own hand, telling of the creepy stuff her ex-husband had said to her.

Their divorce file bared the problems of the relationship and contained all sorts of personal details.

By the time I got to the midmorning press conference, I knew more than the police did about these people.

After a quick visit to the scene to get it straight in my head and to try to speak to neighbors, I came back with everything I needed. Then it was just a matter of lobbying for the latest possible deadline.

I tried to build suspense at the top of the story, opening with a line stating that Lombardi's ex-husband had run away five days before, when police found him at her house.

Then this line: "He posted $500 bail and came back. This time, early yesterday morning, he would not run.''

Later, I tried to create suspense with what the story did not say. There is a scene showing Lombardi's lawyer, Clinton Poole, at the court clerk's office. He had no idea his client had been murdered in the middle of the night.

Then this line: "Poole was printing a copy of Arlia's criminal record when he overheard the courthouse staff speaking about a murder.''

That's all the reader gets to see of this scene; the section ends with a section break. The reader is left to imagine Poole's reaction, his horror. In this case, their imagination is probably more vivid and chilling than anything I could have written.