A Surrey woman serving a life sentence for the slaying of her mother has now been ordered to stand trial for the murder of another woman.
Gloria Crystle Zerbinos was found guilty last fall of second-degree murder in the 2012 stabbing death of her mom, 43-year-old Pangiota “Yota” Zerbinos.
Gloria is now serving an automatic life sentence, with no chance of parole for 12 years.
Last summer, however, Gloria was also charged with a separate count of second-degree murder, in connection with a November 2013 homicide at Alouette Correctional Centre for Women in Maple Ridge, where she was being held awaiting trial for her mom’s murder.
April Peregooda, 51, was found unresponsive in her cell at the prison on Nov. 22, 2013 and pronounced dead in hospital. Another inmate was arrested but not immediately charged.
After a preliminary hearing held this week in B.C. Supreme Court – the details of which can not be reported due to a publication ban – Gloria was ordered to stand trial for second-degree murder. The 31-year-old’s next court date on the matter is scheduled for March 17.
Court records also show she is charged with an assault that took place at the Alouette centre in June 2013. Her trial on that charge is scheduled for May 9 in Port Coquitlam Provincial Court.
During the trial and sentencing for her mother’s murder, the court heard Yota had become increasingly afraid to be alone with her daughter because of her erratic and paranoid behaviour, but had gone to Gloria’s basement suite to drop off laundry on the day she was killed. Yota was found in the suite that evening with multiple stab wounds and a knife still in her chest. Gloria was arrested two days later at a strip club in Vancouver.
No motive was established for the murder, but lawyers said Gloria suffers from a psychotic disorder and had also abused drugs and alcohol. Prosecutors also said she had displayed volatile and delusional behaviour in jail, accusing authorities of poisoning her food and trying to gas her.
