PORTLAND, Ore. — For decades, a woman worked to overturn her father's conviction for the murder of her mother. Though it seemed an insurmountable task, that all shifted earlier this month; in a civil trial, a Clark County jury found a different man responsible for the murder.
Former KGW reporter and anchor Ashley Korslien documented the beginnings of this story back in 2022, through the podcast series "The Yellow Car." She spent months researching and reporting on the case through the eyes of Pooneh Entezari Gray.
Pooneh's world changed on May 1, 1989, Korslien reported. As her mother, Effie Entezari, left for work just before 6 a.m., someone approached her in the parking lot of her Vancouver apartment complex and shot her in the head at point-blank range. No witnesses came forward, except for one neighbor who reported seeing a yellow car slow down, then speed away from the area where Effie's body was found.
Police arrested Pooneh's father, Mike Entezari, a professor at Portland Community College. Mike and Effie were in the middle of a contentious divorce, he had no alibi during the time of the murder, and police found a gun in his car of the same type used to kill Effie.
A jury found Mike guilty of Effie's murder, and he served 16 years in prison on a 25-year sentence. He maintained his innocence up until his death in 2019.
For Pooneh, the evidence never added up. Mike did not drive a yellow car like the one recalled by the witness, and investigators never found Effie's blood on his clothing or the supposed murder weapon. And as DNA technology advanced, it further complicated the picture of Effie's murder.
According to Pooneh's attorney, there was a mix of DNA on Effie's sweater. But missing entirely was Mike's DNA. Instead, they found DNA of the person that they came to believe really killed her.
In the time since "The Yellow Car," Pooneh brought a civil wrongful death suit against a man named Viktor Pell. The Oregonian reported that DNA and ballistics evidence implicated Pell, and that he had bragged about working for the Shah of Iran's secret police.
Earlier this month, a Clark County jury found Pell guilty on a nonunanimous 10-to-two verdict, which is allowed in civil cases. They awarded Pooneh more than $4 million.
"It was great. I couldn't believe it. I mean ... I was in shock. Very excited that we got that verdict," Pooneh recently told The Story's Pat Dooris. "The jury's verdict went a long ways to making what happened — a wrong that happened 35 years ago to my mom — right."
"I think it sent a message," Pooneh added, talking about reviving the criminal case that put her father behind bars. "And we'll see. We'll see what the powers that be do with that message."
Though Pooneh won millions of dollars from the civil trial, she's been pouring time and money into exonerating her father for years now. She estimates she's spent more than $3 million over the last three decades, and she said she's not done.
"There's still quite a bit of work to do in this case," she said. "We still need to look into what happened to my dad, right? Because he was wrongfully incarcerated, and so what I'm hoping is going to happen next is we will be able to meet with the DA's office and talk that out and see what they want to do about.
"And I think that ... I mean, for me it's not only important for them to look at what went wrong in my dad's case, but it's also important that they look at it from the standpoint of what can we do to prevent this from happening in the future, because so many things went wrong."
Dooris reached out several times to the Clark County Prosecuting Attorney's office, and they issued the following statement Monday:
"The Clark County Prosecuting Attorney's office will examine all of the evidence presented at the civil trial against Victor Pell. That the civil jury returned a non-unanimous verdict, that the burden of proof at a civil trial is by a preponderance of the evidence which is a lower burden than the beyond a reasonable doubt standard in criminal trials, and that Victor Pell was unrepresented at his trial are among the relevant factors this office will consider when weighing the evidence and deciding how to move forward."
Pooneh feels she's kept the promise she once made to her mother to find her killer and hold that person responsible. And even if her father isn't alive to see exoneration, she's still determined to clear his name.
"You know, ideally I would love for them to arrest Mr. Pell and charge him criminally. He is 87 years old, so I don't know what the logistics would be of that," Pooneh said. "I would like Mr. Golik (the Clark County prosecutor) to begin looking into what went wrong on my dad's case. I mean, I think the jury sent a pretty loud message, but I do think an exoneration of my dad is warranted, even though he has since passed.
"And you know, a lot of counties have prosecutorial misconduct review boards, so cases like this can be brought forward. And I'm hoping that he will take the role in setting up something like that so other families who've been harmed have a venue of coming forward."