Some eight years after the gruesome stabbing death of celebrity hairstylist Fabio Sementilli, 49, by two men at his Woodland Hills home, one of the convicted killers, who was involved in an illicit affair with the victim’s wife, testified at her trial last week that she had no part in the conspiracy to kill her husband and collect some $1.6 million in life insurance, The Los Angeles Times reported.
The 49-year-old victim was found bleeding to death on his patio on Jan. 23, 2017, by his daughter, Isabella Fabio, who called 911 while desperately trying to save her father.
Robert Louis Baker, 62, a former porn star and convicted sex offender, pleaded guilty to first degree murder in the case and was sentenced to life in prison without parole. His accomplice, Christopher Austin, a parole officer in Oregon, was convicted of second-degree murder for his role in the killing.
Scheduled for sentencing next month, he’s facing up to 16 years in prison for the murder and personal use of a knife.
According to Austin’s testimony, he and Baker entered the couple’s unlocked front door and found Fabio sitting on the back patio, a location he reportedly regularly made business calls from.
In The Times reporting, Austin testified that he opened the patio door, grabbed Fabio by the mouth to muffle any screams while Baker stabbed him.
The victim was later found to have seven sharp force wounds to his face, jawline, chest, neck and thigh.
Baker and Austin then fled in the victim’s Porsche and abandoned it about five miles away.
Prosecutors, however, allege that the now 52-year-old Monica Sementilli, Fabio’s wife, who has pleaded not guilty to the charges of murder and conspiracy, was the primary driver of the plot to have her husband killed, the goal being to collect the life insurance payout and avoid a messy divorce, according to The Times.
Baker and Monica, who have admitted to being lovers, met at West Hills L.A. Fitness where Baker was a racquetball coach.
Despite Baker’s recent testimony that he murdered the celebrity stylist because he wanted Monica for himself and that “She had nothing to do with it,” Austin, the prosecution’s star witness, testified that it was the stylist’s wife who left the front door of the home unlocked for the two men.
Austin further testified that while he never heard directly from Monica, Baker referred to her as his “girl,” said that she and Fabio were in an abusive marriage, that she wanted her husband gone and that the killing was for the insurance payout, The Times reported.
About a month after the murder, police were able to tie Baker’s DNA to blood evidence at the scene in Woodland Hills. A previous conviction for lewd and lascivious conduct with a minor in 1993 meant his DNA was on record.
Investigators also realized that the home’s security recording system, which was well hidden, had been removed after the killing. A forensic technology expert, according to The Times, testified that he recovered instructions from Monica to Baker on how to find the security DVR, tying the pair together in the alleged murder plot.
It was Facebook posts and bank records that ultimately tied the two men together. Baker reportedly bought a ticket for Austin from Anchorage to L.A. before the slaying and gave him a roll of gold coins afterwards.
After becoming suspects, investigators surveilled Monica and Baker for weeks, seeing them together at bars, a comedy club, on a trip to Las Vegas and riding together in cars.
The pair were pulled over in June 2017 in Monica’s black Mustang, with Baker behind the wheel.
Placed in the back of the police car together, a video recording system, according to The Times, reportedly captured Monica telling Baker, “deny everything and don’t talk.”
As for Monica’s defense during the trial, co-defense counsel Blair Berk said in opening statements that there is zero evidence her client plotted to have her husband murdered and that she had been “duped into believing that Robert Baker” didn’t commit the murder.
