Three months ago this evening, 45-year-old Paul Bilodeau puzzlingly was shot to death while working at his desk at a lonely construction site in Fox Hills.
A consultant by trade, Mr. Bilodeau, a bachelor, was hired last year as City Hall’s on-site project manager to protect the city’s interests while the new Fire Station No. 3 was being built on broad Bristol Parkway in Fox Hills.
Public Works Director Charles Herbertson never had a doubt City Hall tapped the right man. He performed his duties, Mr. Herbertson said, with admirable tenacity.
Then why or how could this have happened?
Investigators Stalled
Capt. Cerres Black, in charge of the Police Dept. investigation, says his detectives are nearly as stumped this morning as they were two days after New Year’s when workers found Mr. Bilodeau’s riddled body lying in the doorway of his office.
What about motivation?
Police say they have not uncovered one.
Ninety days along, it is no clearer 90 days later whether the victim’s assailant sneaked in from Mr. Bilodeau’s reportedly spotless private life or from his more normal professional life — or, longest shot of all, that he may have been knocked off randomly.
The latter theory carries the lightest weight, sources say. The killer could nt logically have just stumbled onto his victim. He practically would have had to go looking for him.
There is hardly any pedestrian traffic around the construction site, especially after dark. It is believed — though not confirmed — that all of Mr. Bilodeau’s personal effects were in order.
Starting with his 77-year-old mother, Margaret, Mr. Bilodeau’s family says that he lived a life of rectitude.
A Conundrum
They describe him as a poster-child kind of son who devoted huge amounts of his spare time to family, especially his parents, was reliably of good cheer, was as true and loyal of a son in middle age as he was in his youth.
He figured out his career early, plunged with vigor and without hesitation, and relatives say that not a page of his personal life was out of place.
With no suspects in view, police are not saying whether they believe his personal life was as orderly as those close to him stoutly maintain.
Colleagues say work was the central focus of Mr. Bilodeau’s life. They were not surprised that he returned to his office on the fateful Friday night after enjoying an early-evening deli dinner with his favorite uncle.
What may be perplexing authorities is why Mr. Bilodeau came back to work in Fox Hills when he had planned to drive to Camarillo to visit his parents, a normal Friday night ritual.
Was his life so orderly that anyone observing him would know months in advance where Mr. Bilodeau would be at any hour of the week?
There appeared to be a certain fastidiousness about the schedule he followed.
Police are frustrated that they cannot break through and find a likely motivation.
They are pretty much convinced that the killer intended all along to see Mr. Bilodeau in the trailer.
They wonder whether the two men were friendly with each other and then an argument broke out, ending unintentionally in one man’s death.
Another possibility — likelihood? — is that the assault was premeditated.
The killer stealthily entered the grounds, found his prey, the victim heard him, struggled, and that is how Mr. Bilodeau‘s body ended up half in, half out of the doorway.
Maybe.
