Town Shocked By News Of Their Good Neighbour
Sydney Morning Herald
Friday December 9, 2005
MAITLAND, Florida: They called him Rigo, speaking in whispers and shock outside a home illuminated by television lights and sudden national attention.
To neighbours, he was a jogger, an immigrant, a cyclist, a loving husband. He was the man who always waved hello. And to the frightened woman talking through a mail slot in a red door, Rigo was her "darling son-in-law". She slid out his photograph, showing a smiling Rigoberto Alpizar against a star-filled background. In the hours after Mr Alpizar's name flashed across television screens, friends, neighbours and family members struggled to understand how someone so nice could be the same man who authorities said claimed to have a bomb at the Miami airport. "I can tell you he was very proud to be living in America," said his brother-in-law Bradley Jentsch, from Sheboygan, Wisconsin. "He was very, very proud to become an American citizen and to vote." Mr Alpizar moved to the US about 20 years ago after growing up on a farm near Golfito on the Pacific coast of Costa Rica, according to his in-laws. He and Anne Buechner, his wife of more than 18 years "regularly jogged and rode bicycles together through their Maitland neighbourhood". "He always said, 'Hi, how is your day?" said Alex McLeod, 16. "He was always nice." Reports that Mr Alpizar was mentally ill puzzled longtime neighbour Louis Gunther. The friend he knew never showed any signs of a mental illness or aggression towards anyone. Shortly after Thanksgiving, Mr Alpizar and his wife left on a trip sponsored by their church to work with children in Colombia, said Mr Gunther, who was taking care of their house while they were gone. The couple made regular trips to Mr Alpizar's childhood home in Costa Rica after the death of his mother to spend time with his ageing father, Mr Gunther said. Knight Ridder
© 2005 Sydney Morning Herald