Search Targets Local Property
by Cindy Swirko
Sharif Sharif is long gone from Gainseville, where he raped a woman in 1983, but police still want to know if he left any murderous secrets behind.
Gainseville Police Sgt. Will Halvosa said detectives will likely use dogs trained to sniff out corpses and ground-penetrating radar to determine if Sharif killed and buried any women around the NW 35th Street home where he lived.
Halvosa said police reports from the Gainesville rape indicated Sharif had threatened to "bury" the victim but police had no reason then to investigate any possible slayings.
"Now that he has been convicted of one murder and is a suspect in others, there may be some reason to go back and take a look," Halvosa said. "We're not missing anyone from back then," he said, but there could have been some transients who fell had fallen victim to Sharif and were unreported. "Apparently he was real smooth at getting people to spent time with him."
The Gainseville rape happened in 1983, when Sharif was working as an engineeer at Crom Corp. and had moved into a home in the 2000 block of at 2036 NW 35th St.
Sharif hired a 20 year old woman as a live-in housekeeper. He beat and raped her on her first day at work. She told authorities he threatened to kill and bury her as he had other women.
Given his criminal history since leaving Gainseville - he's suspected of dozens of rapes and killings in Texas and Mexico - police here want to learn if he killed in Gainseville. He served six years of his 12 year sentence for the Gainesville case, then moved to Texas after his release.
The Gainseville rape victim, who has learned of Sharif's crimes in Texas and Mexico, has contacted authorities to remind them of the threats he made to her.
Police Capt. Sadie Darnell said the main purpose of checking the house would be to respond to the victim's concerns.
"It would attempt to determine if there is any basis for bodies being located in that yard," Darnell said. "The intent would be to put her mind at ease. I think she would be pleased to know of any law enforcement response and especially pleased to know of those two options of the dogs and the radar."
Halvosa said police may bring the dogs and radar to the home sometime this week.
Darnell said the "cadaver dogs" have been very successful in locating human remains. In one case, dogs found a body in Washington state that had been buried under snow for 18 years.
Darnell became involved in the Sharif case after he moved to Midland, Texas, following his release from a Florida prison.
A Gainseville woman called Darnell about a disturing oversight involving Sharif: He should have been deported after his conviction on the Gainseville case because he had earlier been convicted of sexual battery in North Palm Beach.
Responsibility for initiating deportation under such circumstances fell to the judicial system.
That woman, who did not want her name used, said she met Sharif through her son, who got Sharif to come to Gainseville to work after he was released from jail in Palm Beach County.
She said Sharif lived in their home. But she asked him to move out after he became belligerent when she asked him to clean a mess he made in the kitchen. Up to that point, he gave no hints of his violent tendencies.
"He lived here about four months and was always the perfect gentlemen. Never once did we sense anything about him," she said. "I was stunned when he was arrested. I have a lot of remorse now. We brought him here to Gainseville. That is our remorse."
Darnell ran head-on into the federal bureaucracy in seeking deportation. The case bogged down with the Immigration and Naturalization Service.
The order for deportation was in effect executed when Shatif left the US for Mexico.
"It was laborious - lots of phone calls to Texas, lots of written documentation back and forth," Darnell said. "I wondered if the deportation would ever occur because it was such a struggle. I didn't want it to fail at the GPD level. If it was going to fail, I wanted it to fail at some other level."
Brady Crom, whose family owned Crom Corp. at the time, said he was surprised to learn of the allegations that Sharif is a serial murderer-rapist.
Crom added he believes it is likely that Sharif has committed the crimes, but is not entirely convinced.
"Even when we were drinking he wouldn't say things that would make you think he could do something like that. But you could see that he had a short temper. I knew never to cross certain lines of conversation with him," Crom said.
"Anytime somebody's supposed to be a genius, you give them leeway, like, 'Oh, that guy's a genius, that's why he's quirky'. More than likely, he's guilty, but I don't know all the circumstances. But when you come down to it, how many mass murderers do we know? A mass killer doesn't go around bragging that he's a mass killer."
Copyright 1999 Gainseville Sun