A Florida man, 61, massacred alongside five ranch workers in Costa Rica may have made enemies during his two decades in the nation after it was revealed he was sued by restaurant employees for severance checks after he closed down his restaurant and testified against a cop who shot his security guard dead.
The body of Stephen Paul Sandusky was found shot and burned in an incinerated pick up truck at his ranch in Llano Bonito de Buenos Aires de Puntarenas, Costa Rica.
Sandusky, who had been living in the Central American country since 2000, had reportedly recently moved out to the ranch in the hopes of living a quiet life.
He and his ex-wife, Costa Rican national Anne Valverde, raised two boys in the country who are now attending college in the US - the Floridian intended to return to his home country to be closer to them, she told Dailymail.com.
'Even though we were divorced, we always remained in a good relationship. As the father of our children, we had good communication,' Valverde told Dailymail.com
'The last day I saw him, I never thought they were going to do something so disastrous, so devastating to us.'
Joseph, one of Sandusky's sons, told Dailymail.com that his 'father was a great man who never got involved with anything of this nature.'
The body of Stephen Paul Sandusky, 61 (pictured) was found shot and burned in an incinerated pick up truck at his ranch in Llano Bonito de Buenos Aires de Puntarenas, Costa Rica
The father-of-two used to own a restaurant called 'Fishlips' in Dominical de Osa, but upset many locals when he closed the business down, between 2004 and 2005, without giving staff their final pay checks.
The former employees sued him for their severance pay and bonuses but he claimed in legal proceeding that he had fired the staff because they had stolen from him. It's not clear what, if any, proof he offered.
Stephen Paul Sandusky, 61, is pictured driving on his Llano Bonito property. He had been living in the country since 2000, according to Q Costa Rica
Police were initially investigating the massacre as a robbery gone wrong but now say that it doesn't appear that anything was taken. Costa Rica's Judicial Investigation Agency told Dailymail.com that expensive farming equipment was 'ready to be taken, but they didn't take it.' The agency said Sandusky's home (pictured) was in 'disarray,' and had a broken window, suggesting the intruders were searching for something
Afterward, according to Sandusky's lawyer Jorge Enrique Infante, the American moved to quiet Llano Bonito and began farming because he 'wanted to live in peace.'
'He was a very noble, kind, and generous person. He told me that he wanted to learn agriculture and that is why he bought the farm,' Infante told Q Costa Rica.
'He started with cattle and then he realized that he had a small profit. Years ago we stopped having a professional relationship but about a year ago I ran into him in a supermarket and we were talking. Yes, he told me that they robbed him a lot.'
Valverde echoed Infante, telling Dailymail.com that Sandusky began farming to 'live a calmer life.'
'Steve in general never liked problems. He always avoided a lot in having problems with the neighbors of Llano Bonito,' she said.
'If he could help them he helped them with the school, with anything else, he [would] help. He went to live on the farm to stay away from negative people.'
But the peace was short-lived after one of Sandusky's security guards on his Llano Bonito property, Édgar Humberto Rojas Blanco, was shot dead in 2006. His killer was a crooked former cop, whose name was only reported as Saldaña.
Blanco had called his boss, reporting that Saldaña had been stealing zinc sheets and when he had confronted him, the former officer threatened to shoot the guard. A short time later, Saldaña kept true to his word.
Sandusky was a key witness against Saldaña during the ex-cop's murder trial in November 2006 and helped put him away for 12 years.
Saldaña has since been released and it's unclear whether he made contact with Sandusky after leaving jail.
DailyMail.com is awaiting comment from the Buenos Aires Prosecutor's office regarding the 2006 murder trial.
Sandusky was one of more than 6,200 victims of a millionaire scam attributed to Osvaldo Villalobos, whose companies Ofinter and 'The Brothers' embezzled investors with the false promise of interest, according to La Nacion.
The ranch where the massacre took place is one of two that Sandusky owns in the Buenos Aires area, the publication reported.
Sandusky had listed the Llano Bonito property, where he and his employees were tortured and murdered, for $1.8 million in 2019 and left it without a buyer on the market for two years, listing agent Diego Quesada told The Independent.
'He wanted to go back to his family and he wanted to
