A Broward Sheriff’s deputy visited Mary Gingles’ home on a Sunday in December after her husband left a strange bag in her garage, according to an incident report, an encounter that Sheriff Gregory Tony said could have resulted in her husband’s arrest before she was killed.
Nathan Gingles is now charged with three counts of first-degree murder, accused of shooting Mary, her father, David Ponzer, and a neighbor, Andrew Ferrin, in February, a little over a month after the Dec. 29 report.
The details of the encounter were redacted from an earlier report released by the Sheriff’s Office. On Wednesday, BSO released the unredacted report, which shows that Deputy Daniel Munoz had spoken to Gingles specifically about a suspicious backpack her husband left in her garage after he broke into her home and that she had uploaded photographs of its contents into evidence.
Munoz, Deputy Brittney King, and Sgt. Travis Allen are all named in the report, Munoz as the responding officer, King as the investigator and Allen as the supervisor. All three are among the eight deputies suspended over the triple murder.
Munoz arrived at the Tamarac home about 3:30 p.m. on Dec. 29, in reference to a request for an informational report. He spoke to Mary Gingles, who told him about their “difficult divorce,” that she felt controlled by Nathan, that he sometimes came to the house when she wasn’t there, despite the temporary injunction she had against him, and that she had previously called BSO about a tracker he put on her car, according to the report.
She then told him about how, two days earlier, she saw Nathan Gingles arrive at the house with a backpack, which she had just discovered. Mary Gingles had also called 911 at the time that happened, but by the time BSO arrived an hour later, he was no longer there.
“Gingles stated when she opened it, she saw very ‘weird’ items inside that made her concerned for her safety,” Munoz wrote in the report.
The report then lists some of the items: Saran plastic wrap, garbage bags, gloves, a small battery, rags, hand sanitizer, “possible flex cuffs,” and “other small random items.”
Some of the other items not listed in the BSO report included duct tape, booties to go over shoes, hair nets and a note reading “needle — air embolism, psych medications, waterboarding, Ela Shade,” according to Mary Gingles’ own petition in court, filed the next day. Her uncle, Frank Ponzer, called the backpack a “kill bag” in a previous conversation with the South Florida Sun Sentinel.
Gingles said she knew her husband had many backpacks but that she had never seen that one or its contents before and they made her “feel very concerned,” the report states. She also told Munoz that Nathan talked to their 4-year-old daughter about how he wanted to kill Mary, the report states, “but that he has never directly threatened her in person or through the phone. Gingles stated that she mainly fears that Nathan would do something since he has been abusive in the past.”
Nathan Gingles had threatened to kill Mary if she ever left him in the past and would sing songs about killing her while they were together, according to a previous petition she had filed for a domestic violence injunction. The report does not say if she mentioned these threats to BSO.
Mary Gingles told Munoz she planned to throw the backpack and its contents away, according to the report. The report does not say whether Gingles did in fact throw away the backpack or mention any attempt by BSO to take it into evidence. Later, however, Gingles uploaded videos and photographs of the backpack’s contents via a BSO citizens evidence link that deputies gave her.
She told Munoz she intended to get a restraining order the following day and that she wanted to use the report to help get the order.
Munoz left, handing her a BSO case card.
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