An inquiry into the enigmatic death of a Las Vegas journalist reached a dramatic conclusion when the presumed murderer died during a fiery police pursuit in the Utah desert.
This unsettling chain of events began earlier this month when freelance journalist Matthew Kelemen, aged 56, was found dead and placed inside a box within a storage container in Sin City.
His decomposing body was found on May 20 when an employee discovered a ‘foul-smelling odor’ coming from the storage container.
The authorities have yet to announce an official cause of death, but Keleman’s sister, Mikki Zeferatos, shared with the Las Vegas Review Journal that investigators suspect he was hit from behind with a hammer.
As cops looked into the gruesome death, they discovered Kelemen’s roommate Joseph Del Rivo, 63, had hired the storage container through a luggage storage app called Bounce.
Del Rivo had dropped the box with Kelemen’s remains inside at the facility days before, and employees reportedly found the decomposing journalist when a moving company came to pick up the storage container.
As investigators zeroed in on Del Rivo, that same day the suspect was involved in an unrelated police chase when he led the Utah Highway Patrol on a daring pursuit.
The chase ended when Del Rivo flipped his vehicle off the highway and it exploded in a fireball, killing the murder suspect hundreds of miles from where his alleged victim had been found dead hours before.
Las Vegas freelance journalist Matthew Kelemen (pictured) was found dead on May 20 stuffed into a box in a storage container after allegedly being bludgeoned by his roommate with a hammer
On the same day that Kelemen’s decomposing remains were found, his alleged killer and roommate Joseph Del Rivo was involved in a high-speed chase with Utah police that ended with his death in a fiery crash (pictured)
Kelemen’s family say they last heard from the Las Vegas journalist shortly before his death, when his brother Steve said he told him he was getting ready to move out of his living arrangement with Del Rivo.
‘He’d only lived there for about six months, but he kept telling my brother what a strange guy this was,’ Zeferatos said.
‘He said he was really uneasy living there. ‘The guy was a disgusting slob,’ were his words.’
Kelemen’s sister recalled her brother told his family that he planned to tell Del Rivo that he was unhappy with their dynamic, but warned them that he was ‘worried about how he’s going to react.’
Zeferatos said investigators told her that the Bounce app that Del Rivo allegedly used to try and transport her brother’s body is typically used by businesses to transport goods and store them short-term.
He was found in a box inside a large crate, which she believes may have been one of Kelemen’s guitar amplifiers.
‘Matt played the guitar and he had amplifiers, and it was a big black box,’ she said.
Kelemen’s family said he was a talented guitarist and believe the box he was stuffed inside was for one of his guitar amplifiers
The journalist’s family said before his death, he had been complaining of Del Rivo’s hygiene and described him as a ‘disgusting slob’
Utah police said they tried to pull Del Rivo over when he was caught speeding over 90mph, before he accelerated to over 140mph on the pursuit until he swerved out the way of a spike strip and crashed into a fireball
Investigators said Del Rivo used an app called Bounce in an attempt to move Kelemen’s body from a storage container, but the remains were discovered when employees found a ‘foul-smelling odor’ from inside the facility
Utah authorities said the chase that ended in Del Rivo’s death unfolded around 5:45pm when a trooper saw him speeding down Interstate 70.
Cops said in a press release that Del Rivo drove up behind the squad car at ‘over 90mph’, before accelerating further when the trooper activated his sirens and tried to pull him over.
Del Rivo reached speeds of over 140mph as he led the trooper on a chase for around 10 miles, while other troopers began deploying spike strips down the interstate.
The murder suspect’s front tires were destroyed by the spike strips during the chase, however authorities said he still tried evading police and drove with flat tires for another three miles.
The chase eventually came to a dramatic end when a second set of strip spikes were laid on the highway, and Del Rivo attempted to swerve out of the way.
He lost control of the vehicle and flipped it off the interstate, which killed Del Rivo as he was ejected from the car before it exploded into a fireball.
Kelemen was a well-known freelance reporter in the Las Vegas area and had been published in a number of outlets since he moved to the city in 2003, and was most recently published shortly before the Memorial Day weekend
Kelemen was a well-known freelance reporter in the Las Vegas area and had been published in a number of outlets since he moved to the city in 2003.
He had been a staff writer at the now-closed 944 and City Life magazines, and was most recently published in Las Vegas Magazine in a preview for the Memorial Day weekend.
Zaferatos said the discovery of her brother’s body was ‘horror-movie stuff’, and said her family has suffered a ‘rough couple of days.’
‘I’m barely holding it together,’ she said.
