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State Police considered holding a press conference last night, but postponed it until this morning.
It is expected that what was termed a "missing persons" case will now be categorized as what it appeared to be all along -- a criminal investigation involving a dead college student.
"The police were there and toured the facilities," said Geri Rush, community relations coordinator of Waste Management Corp., which owns both the Tullytown and Grows Landfills across the Delaware River in Pennsylvania.
Yesterday, according to police sources, authorities were beginning to work on details of how to search the right spots of the massive landfills with the least amount of disruption to the normal work flow, which regularly includes dozens of large haulers waiting in line to get into the site to unload.
Law enforcement officials, who did not wish to be identified, said charges could eventually stem from one of two scenarios:
Fiocco might have died accidentally and had one or more persons take actions that caused his body to end up in the garbage dumpster outside his dorm.
Or, one or more persons might have caused Fiocco’s death and then disposed of his body.
Either way, authorities yesterday zeroed in on one particular garbage truck that had been under guard at the campus until it was moved yesterday afternoon to the State Police forensics headquarters in Hamilton.
State Police Sgt. Stephen Jones said there were no plans to search the two lakes on the TCNJ campus.
State Police Maj. James Fallon said Fiocco’s family has told authorities that the popular student with good grades had no history of running away or dropping out of sight.
Not that police ever thought that was the case here.
Law enforcement sources reiterated yesterday that they suspected foul play from the very beginning of their investigation.
A native of Gloucester County, 19-year old Fiocco was last seen early Saturday morning, according to Mercer County Prosecutor Joe Bocchini.
By Sunday night, authorities had been contacted by Fiocco’s classmates and told that the TCNJ freshman was "missing."
Within hours, the investigation focused on the garbage chute inside and the garbage dumpster outside ofWolfe Hall.
Students on the scene said police removed what appeared to be bloody items from a dumpster earlier in the week, and yesterday, one television station reported that tests on those items showed that the blood was Fiocco’s.
But, police have never acknowledged that any bloody items were ever taken in as evidence.
After days of on-again, off-again heavy police presence in and around Wolfe Hall, the dorm was back to business as usual yesterday, with the yellow crime scene tape removed.
The dorm had been evacuated Wednesday night for a walk-through by police and dogs, and by yesterday morning, the entire focus of the investigation had shifted -- for now -- to finding Fiocco’s body in the landfill and to re-examining garbage trucks and dumpsters for any remaining evidence of foul play.
Simultaneously, police and prosecutors will continue on their own paths of investigation which could eventually result in criminal charges.
Fiocco’s family did not return phone calls.
College president Dr. R. Barbara Gitenstein communicated with CNJ students via e-mail yesterday, and planned to meet with residents of Wolfe Hall and adjoining Travers Hall last night.
-- Staff writers Artemis Coughlan, Joe D’Aquila, L.A. Parker and Victoria St. Martin contributed to this report.
