Pawel Gumienny, a former project manager for Fotis Dulos’ company Fore Group, testified Tuesday that after New Canaan mom Jennifer Farber Dulos disappeared, Michelle Troconis said “I’m gonna kill the (expletive) b—- when she turns up” and that although he was suspicious of his boss, he was also afraid to lose his job.
Gumienny took the stand Tuesday in the trial against Troconis, Dulos’ former girlfriend, and testified that he gave in to Dulos’ pressure to change the seats in his red Toyota Tacoma pickup truck because he was worried about providing for his family if his employment with Dulos’ company, or his green card, were threatened.
Investigators allege Dulos drove Gumienny’s red Tacoma to New Canaan on the morning of May 24, 2019, and then killed Farber Dulos, his estranged wife, at her home in New Canaan. The truck has dominated a good portion of the testimony so far in Troconis’ trial, which is on its 18th day.
In the days after Farber Dulos disappeared, Gumienny said Dulos took the Tacoma to a car wash and pushed him to remove the seats in it and put them somewhere no one would ever find them. He suggested replacing them with seats from a junkyard and later, his own wrecked Porsche.
Dulos was worried about investigators finding a hair in the truck that would link him to his wife’s disappearance, Gumienny testified. Farber Dulos has never been found but has been declared legally dead.
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State prosecutor Sean McGuiness asked Gumienny, who has been given immunity in the case in exchange for his testimony, if he ever asked his boss if he killed Farber Dulos.
He said he didn’t.
“It wasn’t in my head that he was capable of doing something,” he said. “And I just didn’t want to lose my job.”
When McGuiness asked why he thought he would lose his job, Gumienny said, “Because he would get angry with me.”
Gumienny also testified that Dulos urged him not to talk to police, suggesting they might back him into a corner and potentially bring up his citizenship. Gumienny, 43, moved to the United States from Poland in 2000. He is married with two children who are now teenagers, he said.
Gumienny said he went to a junkyard with Dulos to look for seats and eventually replaced the seats in his truck with seats from Dulos’ Porsche, which the jury has seen pictures of, to appease Dulos even though he was becoming “suspicious” of his boss. But he kept the seats that were in that truck the day Farber Dulos vanished.
“Were you concerned at this point that those seats may have been used in a crime?” McGuiness asked.
“I had my doubts, but at this point, I still couldn’t get it in my head that Dulos would go and do something to Jennifer,” he said.
The jury has heard testimony about DNA samples taken from the truck that were linked to Farber Dulos.
Gumienny’s testimony spanned several hours Tuesday and covered multiple elements brought up to the jury in the state’s case so far, from the Tacoma to Dulos’ shaved head.
He also told the jury about comments he said he heard Troconis make about Farber Dulos, who was entangled in a divorce and custody battle with Dulos when she disappeared.
Troconis was dating Dulos and living with him in his home at 4 Jefferson Crossing in Farmington in May 2019. She is charged with allegedly conspiring with Dulos to murder Farber Dulos and helping him cover up his crimes.
Gumienny said that Troconis threatened to kill Farber Dulos after Troconis and her daughter’s photos were shown on the news in connection with the investigation of her disappearance, which prompted a far-reaching search and widespread news reports.
He also testified about one conversation with Troconis, when Dulos was talking about a dog the family had that was ill and needed to be put down. Gumienny said on the stand that he remembered Dulos commenting that Farber Dulos wouldn’t let their five children come to visit the dying Labrador named Beckham.
“She should be buried right next to this dog,” he recalled Troconis saying.
Gumienny then asked if he could say “bad words” while on the stand. McGuiness said yes.
“She said, ‘That b—- should be buried right next to this dog’.”
Red pickup truck seen on day of Farber Dulos’ disappearance at center of testimony in Troconis trial
When he took the stand just after 10 a.m. Tuesday, Gumienny told state prosecutors that he was nervous. He said he was also nervous after Farber Dulos disappeared when Dulos pressured him about the seats.
Gumienny testified that in the weeks leading up to Farber Dulos’ disappearance, he had been driving Dulos’ Ford F-150 Raptor, as he often used company trucks for work.
He said that his Tacoma was stored at Dulos’ home on Jefferson Crossing and was having mechanical issues, including leaking oil and trouble starting. He said he had asked Dulos not to drive it because he was worried about him getting into an accident on Gumienny’s insurance.
But Dulos drove it, he said. “He wouldn’t listen, he’d drive it anyways.”
Right before Farber Dulos disappeared, Gumienny said Dulos called him and said they needed to move the truck to a Fore Group-owned property at 80 Mountain Spring Road. Gumienny said he didn’t ask why it needed to be moved, but figured that maybe he didn’t want it leaking oil in his garage.
McGuiness asked him if that was the “first and only time” Dulos asked him to move the Tacoma, and he said yes.
Gumienny testified that on May 24, 2019 he woke up at his home in Simsbury and drove to a job site in New Canaan. It was his wife’s birthday, and he spent a part of that drive on the phone with a mutual friend of theirs talking about plans for a celebration.
He also spoke with Dulos, who told him not to come by the Fore Group office at 4 Jefferson Crossing because he had a meeting scheduled with his lawyer about his divorce.
He said it was the first time Dulos had given him advance notice about such a meeting.
After going to New Canaan, he said he went back to 4 Jefferson Crossing at about 4:30 or 4:45 p.m. He said he did not see Dulos, Troconis or any vehicles, so he called Dulos. The two had planned for Gumienny to get his Tacoma back that evening. He said Dulos didn’t answer.
Gumienny said he went into the home to look for his keys. He didn’t see them but spotted an iPhone charging.
He said he then went to another Fore Group property in Avon, and then to the home on Mountain Spring Road.
When he got to the Mountain Spring Road house, he said he saw Dulos and Troconis. Dulos, he said, was standing next to his Chevrolet Suburban that had a storage container affixed to the top of the SUV.
McGuiness asked how the pair looked. Gumienny said they both looked surprised for a second.
Gumienny said he noticed that Dulos had shaved his head. Gumienny said that in May 2019, he wore his hair “exactly the same way.”
“I made a comment about his hair,” he said. “What (are) you doing? You shave your head, you wearing dirty work clothes? You trying to be as handsome as me?” he said he joked.
He said Dulos just smiled.
“He told me they were cleaning,” Gumienny testified. “He told me Michelle was cleaning the windows and he was cleaning some stuff outside.”
McGuiness asked him how long he had known Troconis at this point, and he said two to three years.
“Isn’t it true in all those years you never saw her cleaning a project sight?” he asked.
“I don’t recall it,” Gumienny answered.
He also testified that he did not see any cleaning supplies or garbage bags. He said he didn’t look into the Suburban or the Jeep Cherokee Troconis was near.
Gumienny said he and Dulos made a plan to drive back to 4 Jefferson Crossing, then back to Mountain Spring Road so he could get the Tacoma.
They made that plan “because there was four cars and three people,” he said.
When he got into the Raptor to head back to the other house, he spotted the keys to his Tacoma hanging from the key slot on the passenger side door. He didn’t take them because he knew he’d be right back. But when he got back, he said the keys were gone.
“Were they on the property?” McGuiness asked. Gumienny said no. He asked Dulos about it.
“He said that Michelle has the key,” he said.
“So he knew that she had the keys?” McGuiness followed.
“That’s what he told me, yeah,” Gumienny said.
Gumienny said Dulos offered to let him keep the Raptor for the weekend and leave the Tacoma there. Gumienny wanted his truck because it had a longer truck bed to bring his dirt-bike home.
McGuiness then asked further about Troconis taking the keys.
He said he did not know Troconis was going to take the keys. Dulos called Troconis about the keys, Gumienny said. Troconis came back to the property, and Dulos gave Gumienny the keys then all three left. Gumienny said he didn’t notice anything unusual in his truck and did not see anything that appeared to be blood.
Gumienny later said he saw Dulos and Troconis next on May 28, 2019 at 4 Jefferson Crossing, when Dulos asked to see his phone and commented on Farber Dulos being missing.
He said Dulos asked him where he was the day she disappeared and suggested that he write down his schedule from the day in case the police asked.
Investigators found similar timelines in the Jefferson Crossing house, which Troconis has said she and Dulos wrote at the advice of a lawyer to know where they were that day. Investigators have dubbed them the “alibi scripts.”
Gumienny said he refused to write a timeline.
“I was surprised. I said, ‘If police are going to ask me, I’m going to pull out a piece of paper and read it to them?’ ” he testified.
Gumienny testified that Dulos had also taken his truck to a car wash, which he had never done before.
“I just couldn’t hold it anymore. I just went off on him and I said ‘What’s up with my truck, why did you clean it?’ He smiled at me and said ‘Because you were never gonna do it.’ ”
Gumienny said he asked him again and Dulos told him “Don’t worry, there’s nothing going on” but that he had gone to Farber Dulos’ house and hugged her and that police might find a hair in the truck, which he allegedly said could be used to destroy his name and business.
Guminenny also testified that he retained an attorney, Lindy Urso, in 2019. Urso was recommended by one of Dulos’ lawyers, he said.
Urso declined to comment on his client’s testimony during the lunch break on Tuesday but was present in the courtroom while Gumienny was on the stand.
The jury was excused from the courtroom twice on Tuesday when attorneys went back and forth about surveillance video of a bicycle, a hooded sweatshirt and a bucket. And also about testimony from Gumienny about Dulos asking about potential surveillance cameras at Farber Dulos’ New Canaan home.
Troconis’ defense attorney, Jon Schoenhorn, again made the argument that that evidence would be relevant to a trial for Fotis Dulos, not his client.
He argued that “I can’t cross-examine a deceased person” and moved for a mistrial.
McGuiness said the testimony spoke to whether Dulos was plotting Farber Dulos’ murder in advance, asking about potential surveillance cameras months before she disappeared.
Judge Kevin A. Randolph denied the motion.
Court adjourned for the day around 4:30 p.m. Tuesday with Gumienny still on the stand. His testimony is expected to continue in Stamford Superior Court on Wednesday morning.
