LIHU‘E, Kauai — Daniel Bonanno’s ex-wife, her new fiancé and her mother all said in court documents that they received written and telephone death threats from Bonanno while he was in prison on O‘ahu.
Bonanno was found dead Monday on the Garden Island - apparently slain - the day after he was relesed from Halawa Correctional Center.

The threats are contained in three separate cases wherein Marianne Trombley (Bonanno’s ex-wife), Derreck A. Tobin (Marianne Trombley’s fiancé in 2007) and Nancy Trombley (Marianne Trombley’s mother) sought temporary restraining orders wishing for the court to order Bonanno to stay away from them and stop calling, writing and harassing them.

Nancy Trombley said Bonanno began sending her threatening letters in September 2007, blaming her for his divorce and threatening Marianne Trombley with physical harm and death, Nancy Trombley said in her hand-written filing for a TRO against Bonanno.

Bonanno is “very smart,” wrote Nancy Trombley, “and I know he will try to carry out his goals of revenge on myself, my daughter and Derreck.”

Fifth District Judge Trudy Senda granted the TRO in November 2007, and it was served on Bonanno in December 2007 while he was held at Waiawa Correctional Center on O‘ahu, court records show.

Tobin in his TRO filing said Bonanno wrote and telephoned that, upon his release from prison, he would get a weapon and cause injury or death to both Tobin and Marianne Trombley.

The calls and letters were received by Tobin from 2006 to November 2007, and like the ones received by Marianne Trombley and Nancy Trombley the letters and recordings of the voice-mail messages were turned over to state sheriffs, according to the TRO documents.

Senda approved Tobin’s TRO, which like Nancy Trombley’s was for a period of three years, through Dec. 17, 2010. Bonanno was served with Senda’s order in the Tobin case Jan. 24, 2009, also at Waiawa Correctional Center, according to court records.

In another TRO filing that was never granted, possibly because Marianne Trombley was at the Federal Detention Center on O‘ahu at the time, Marianne Trombley wrote that she was receiving threatening letters and phone calls from Bonanno, and that she had been physically abused by Bonanno when the two were together.

A fourth Kauaian, Terrence Pantohan, filed paperwork seeking a TRO against Bonanno in 2004, but the case never moved forward and a clerk in the Lihu‘e state courthouse said that TRO case file had been destroyed because of its age.

Bonanno's body was discovered with apparent injuries at around 7:30 a.m. Monday in a vehicle on Loop Road near the top of Kuamo‘o Road in Wailua Homesteads, county officials announced earlier this week. On Tuesday, following an autopsy, KPD announced that it had opened a homicide investigation.

Bonanno had been released Sunday from Halawa Correctional Center on O‘ahu, where he had been serving a five-year prison term for a second-degree theft conviction.

Repeated attempts to garner further information from county officials regarding Bonanno’s injuries, the status of the investigation and if KPD has any persons of interest or suspects in custody have been unsuccessful.