Prosecutors say shooting ended couple’s troubled relationship

Erica D. Johnson

Thursday, March 18, 2004 | 9:39 a.m.

Opening arguments got under way Wednesday in the trial of a former attorney charged with gunning down his ex-wife in their Summerlin home in December 2000.

Alfred "Chip" Centofanti III faces murder charges in the shooting death of 25-year-old Virginia "Gina" Eisenman. The couple's divorce was made final in the days leading up to the slaying.

During opening arguments before District Judge Donald Mosley, prosecutors said the shooting was the culmination of a turbulent relationship that included previous domestic disputes.

Deputy District Attorney Becky Goettsch told jurors that Centofanti was a jealous and controlling husband who constantly accused his wife of having an affair.

Goettsch said tensions reached a boiling point on Dec. 5, two weeks before the slaying, when Centofanti pulled a gun on Eisenman.

"He puts it to her head and pulls the trigger," Goettsch said. "Click, click, click, nothing happens.

"He tells her, 'Beg for your life. I will kill you, the kids and myself,' " Goettsch said.

That wasn't the only time Centofanti threatened to kill his wife, Goettsch said.

In November 2000, when Eisenman began considering divorce, Centofanti warned her to think better of the idea, Goettsch said.

"The defendant told her, 'I'll kill you before I give you a divorce,' " Goettsch said.

Prosecutors say Centofanti followed through on that threat during a confrontation at the couple's home on Dec. 20, 2000. Eisenman was shot seven times at close range.

Defense attorneys do not contest that Centofanti killed Eisenman. But in a lengthy opening argument, they painted a much different picture of the young wife and mother.

During the Dec. 5 incident, defense attorney Alan Bloom said, it was actually Eisenman who pulled a gun on Centofanti. Centofanti wrested the gun away from Eisenman, Bloom said.

Police arrested Eisenman after the incident and charged her with battery constituting domestic violence.

Centofanti was "very afraid, shaken," Bloom said. "This was not the woman he married."

Bloom said Eisenman had a history of drug abuse and gang violence during her childhood in San Diego, Calif., and the couple had only been married for a year when Centofanti realized his wife had not changed.

Bloom said Eisenman rarely took care of her 9-year-old son from a previous relationship or the 4-month-old son she shared with Centofanti because she was too busy partying with friends.

Bloom said it was Eisenman's refusal to spend time with her children that led to the Dec. 20 dispute and ended in her death.

Centofanti was watching television and his parents were upstairs with the baby when an angry Eisenman burst through the door and began to attack him, Bloom said.

"If he (Centofanti) had any clear thought it's that if she gets past him she's going to kill the baby and his parents upstairs," Bloom said.

Bloom said his client remembers little about what happened next, with the exception of "seeing the rage of a person more violent than he'd ever seen in his life."

Police arrested Centofanti at a neighbor's home shortly after the killing. He presented the gun to police wrapped in a towel.