"Someone Just Got Whacked": The Neighbor Who Heard Keith Caneiro Die

Dennis Corpora is a light sleeper. He lives in Colts Neck, New Jersey, about two to three miles from where Keith Caneiro's mansion once stood. On the night of November 19th into the early morning of November 20th, 2018, something woke him up.

Gunshots.

Not the occasional shots you sometimes hear in rural New Jersey. These were different. Corpora lay in bed, processing what he'd just heard, and said something to himself that he's apparently been embarrassed about ever since.

"Someone just got whacked."

Those were his exact words. He told the jury today that he knew, in that moment, that something terrible had happened. He grabbed his phone, took a screenshot of the time, and made a mental note: if something happened, he wanted to know exactly when he heard it.

He remembers that time as 3:20 something.

The Timeline That Could Convict Paul Caneiro

Here's why Dennis Corpora's testimony matters so much. The prosecution has built their case around surveillance footage from multiple locations. Let me walk you through what they've established:

1:29 AM: Paul Caneiro's own home security system shows him approaching the camera in his garage. At 1:30 AM, the recording stops. Paul later claimed he turned it off because it was slowing his WiFi. Investigators discovered the system was hardwired, not connected to wireless internet.

~2:07 AM: A neighbor's surveillance camera on Tilton Drive captures a vehicle leaving Paul's neighborhood.

~3:20 AM: Dennis Corpora hears gunshots. Takes a screenshot. The CAD report shows his 911 call was logged at 3:33 AM.

~3:48 AM: A vehicle appears on surveillance footage on Willowbrook Road, near Keith's house.

~4:08 AM: A vehicle matching Paul's white Porsche Macan returns to Tilton Drive, heading toward Paul's house.

5:01 AM: Fire is reported at Paul Caneiro's Ocean Township home.

Do you see it? The gunshots Corpora heard fall right in the middle of the window when surveillance shows a car leaving Paul's house and returning two hours later. The prosecution's theory is that Paul drove eleven miles to his brother's mansion, killed Keith, Jennifer, and the two children, set a slow-burn fire, and drove home.

Dennis Corpora may have heard the moment Keith Caneiro died.

What the Defense Exposed

The defense went after this testimony hard, and they scored some points.

First, the screenshot. Corpora says he took a screenshot of the time on his phone. He told prosecutors about it. He told detectives about it. But when they asked him to produce it? He couldn't find it. He said he searched "endlessly" through his phone. It's gone.

Second, the phone records. Here's where it gets interesting. The defense asked Corpora directly: Did anyone ever ask you to check your phone records through Verizon to verify when you made the 911 call? No. Did anyone ever subpoena your phone records? Not that he knows of. Did anyone ever show you your phone records and say "here's the exact time of the call"? No.

The prosecution has a witness who heard gunshots at a critical time, took a screenshot to document it, and neither the witness nor the investigators can verify the exact time. The CAD report says 3:33 AM. Corpora insists he remembers 3:20 something. That's a 13-minute gap that nobody bothered to close.

Third, the hunting question. When Corpora called 911, he didn't say "I just heard someone get murdered." He asked if hunting was allowed in the middle of the night. But on the stand today, when the defense asked if the shots sounded like a rifle or shotgun, Corpora said "absolutely not." He knew it was a pistol. So why ask about hunting if you knew it wasn't a hunting weapon?

What This Means

Look, I'm not here to tell you Paul Caneiro is guilty. That's for the jury to decide. But I am here to tell you that this testimony is some of the strongest evidence the defense has to overcome.

The surveillance footage shows a car leaving and returning. But you can't see who's driving. You can't see inside the vehicle. The defense made that point clearly during earlier testimony.

What Dennis Corpora provides is something different. He provides the gunshots. He provides a witness who heard something happen during that window. He provides corroboration that whatever left Paul's house that night went somewhere and did something violent.

The missing screenshot and the unverified phone records are problems. Real problems. But they don't change the fact that Corpora heard what he heard, called 911 twice that night because he couldn't shake the feeling that something terrible had happened, and hours later, Keith Caneiro was found dead on his front lawn with five bullet wounds.

If I'm the defense, I'm worried about Dennis Corpora. This is the kind of witness who sticks with a jury. Not because he's polished. Not because his story is perfect. But because he's just a guy who heard something in the middle of the night and trusted his instincts enough to call it in.

"Someone just got whacked."

He might be the reason Paul Caneiro gets convicted.

📺 WATCH THE FULL TESTIMONY Colts Neck Neighbor Testifies on Gunshots During Window Car Left Paul Caneiro's Home