For more than a year, Ana Elisa Toledo complained to friends that her boyfriend mistreated her, she didn’t love him anymore and she wanted to move on.
The 24-year-old Brazilian au pair, at first enamored by Martin Novotny’s good looks and foreign background, told friends her affection was starting to fade.
Days after Toledo broke up with Novotny for the last time, her body was found in the basement of her host family’s Denver home.
Novotny, 23, is accused of stabbing Toledo more than 74 times last December. On Monday, Novotny is due in court for a formal arraignment. He faces life in prison if convicted of first-degree murder.
Novotny, a Czech citizen and a former au pair himself, told police he killed Toledo because he did not want to see her with another man, records show.
After the breakup, Novotny saw a picture posted on Toledo’s website of her hugging another guy, her friends said.
Toledo’s host family regrets that they did not intervene sooner, but they said they did not know their nanny’s life was in danger. They also said they did not want to pry into her life.
“I should have been nosier, but I guess it would not have helped,” said Martin Murphy, her host father. “We tried to give her space. … She did not know the time bomb she was dealing with.”
In Colorado, Toledo was counted as one of 19 women killed last year by a partner or spouse, according to Project Safeguard, a domestic-violence prevention organization in Colorado.
Just last month, there was another victim.
Pueblo police say 25-year-old Jennifer Behling’s boyfriend shot her 27 times while she was sitting on the toilet. Reports say Charles Martin Wilkinson, 33, had accused Behling of being involved in an online romance and was angry about it. Behling was found dead March 31.
In Toledo’s case, letters, photographs and online postings between her and Novotny show there was a lot of love in the beginning. But a handwritten letter she gave Novotny seven months before her death shows she was trying to solve the problems on her own.
“It’s too hard for me to write this letter, but I can not stand this situation anymore,” she wrote. “… I appreciate all the things you do for me … but kindness is something that is almost gone between us.”
Domestic-violence experts said Toledo’s death is a classic case of what can happen in an abusive and controlling relationship.
Many times, friends and family who witness problems don’t want to believe it could escalate to violence, said Randy Saucedo, advocacy director of the Colorado Coalition Against Domestic Violence.
“At first, people will say they never presumed this would happen,” Saucedo said. “But if they look deeper into it, they will see that there were very clear warning signs. It’s not just arguing. It’s arguing in public. Pushing someone in public. That is taking it to another level. Unfortunately, I have no doubt that the warning signs were already there.”
Friends of the couple said they argued constantly, but they also said they never anticipated it would end in her death.
Martin Labas, a friend of Novotny, said he remembers an occasion when the two of them spent an entire night arguing in a car outside a Halloween party.
Another friend, too distraught to give his name, said he watched Novotny shove Toledo into the bushes because she was teasing him.
“She cried. She left. They did not speak for another week,” the friend said. “She said, ‘You shout. You are rude.’ She was a tough girl, but he just cracked.”
During a jailhouse interview, Novotny declined to answer questions about how or why Toledo was killed.
“I loved Ana so much,” he told The Denver Post. “It was so special. She was from another country. People say we argued … but she was passionate. That is what I loved about her.”
Novotny said he eventually planned to marry Toledo, but would not say anymore about their relationship.
Toledo’s autopsy report shows she suffered before she died. She was stabbed repeatedly in the head, face, chest, back, stomach and legs as she struggled in bed. There were 17 wounds in her face alone.
Pat Brown, a criminal profiler and author of “Killing for Sport: Inside the Minds of Serial Killers,” said the anger and frustration that the killer was feeling reaches such a level that they cannot seem to stop stabbing.
Brown said it does not take long to stab someone 74 times – it can take as little as 20 seconds.
“It is a very short period of time where a person is going absolutely berserk,” she said.
Toledo’s wounds to the face also show extreme anger on the part of the killer, Brown said.
“The facial thing usually does mean they are trying to obliterate you. It’s like saying: ‘You will never, ever do that again to me.’ That is where the anger is. It’s very hard to stab people in the face. … It’s the point of intense hatred.”
Novotny’s former employer said he cannot imagine him carrying out a crime of such violence.
“I’ve been in the food business a long time, and you get people who have a bad day and take it out on customers, and he was just calm,” said Jason Merlino, Novotny’s former boss at the Subway on East Florida Avenue and South Colorado Boulevard in Denver. “He did not seem like the kind of person who would snap.”
Kathy Pakkebier, Toledo’s host mother, said her nanny was friendly and close to the family and occasionally provided details of her romance with Novotny.
There were signs of trouble, Pakkebier said, when Toledo told her one night, “I don’t love him. He gets angry.”
But even though Toledo might have grown weary of their arguments, she felt bad for him after a Thanksgiving breakup.
“He called her crying,” Pakkebier said. “It was a very volatile relationship. She said, ‘He can say mean things, but I know what buttons to push too.’ They were two fiery type of people.”
Staff writer Felisa Cardona can be reached at 303-820-1219 or fcardona@denverpost.com.
Staying safe
National Domestic Violence Hotline: 1-800-799-SAFE. This number will direct you to local assistance. It’s also a multilingual hotline.
The Ana Elisa fund helps provide money toward her younger brother’s college education:
Ana Elisa Toledo Memorial Fund
c/o First National Bank of Colorado
P.O. Box 18058
Boulder, CO 80308
