(^36) The last word
The infamous ‘Dine-and-Dash Dater’
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maître d’ she’d been ditched. Soon the wait-
ress was sitting in her date’s empty chair,
crying. “I wish I could take care of your
bill,” she sobbed. “I’m so sorry.” But Moon
had no tears to cry. She paid the $250 bill
and marched out, imagining the cost of the
meal in emergency room hours.
By the time she reached home, Moon was
fuming. When Paul sent her a text message
asking “Hi. How are you?” she exploded.
She called a girlfriend who persuaded her to
put the word out. It was late at night when
Moon angrily typed a Facebook status
update: “Here are the pics of the man who
ditched me at dinner.... Please share on your
FB and tell the story so this loser doesn’t do
this to others!” But it was too late. Her post
went viral, and her inbox filled with other
victims of the same man. His name was
not Paul Azini, as he had told Moon, but
Gonzales. He’d told women he was an NBC
sports editor, a sports agent, and that he
worked for the Lakers. Gonzales was seem-
ingly everywhere.
Television stations, a producer from Steve
Harvey’s radio show, and a Canadian pod-
cast all contacted Moon for interviews.
Victims shared other media requests on
Facebook messenger. News anchors soberly
issued bulletins warning viewers of the
“handsome” bandit’s modus operandi:
Gonzales quickly enticed women into a
dinner date, ate like a king, then bolted,
deleting his dating profile on the way out.
US Weekly and CNN called him the “Dine-
and-Dash Dater.”
Just days after his date with
Moon, Gonzales finished a
crème brûlée at the Yard House
in Long Beach. He held up
two fingers, and told Irene
Rodriguez that he “had to go
number two,” before escaping
into the night. “I just sat there
dumbfounded,” she recalled, “I
was mortified, embarrassed.”
Two years later, in the spring of
2018, he was still at it, leaving
Tina Martinez to pay for his
filet mignon at Smitty’s Grill in
Pasadena. Even when Gonzales
was arrested, for a “snip-and-
ditch”—he fled a barber’s
shop with the smock still tied
around his neck—police found
no outstanding warrants. His
dates were too ashamed to
report his dining misdeeds. Had he created
the perfect crime?
O
N APRIL 13, 2018, Detective Victor
Cass was summoned to his ser-
geant’s office at the Pasadena Police
Department. The 49-year-old investigator
was handed an anonymous Crime Stoppers
report concerning an incident at Buca di
Beppo, an Italian chain restaurant in nearby
Glendale. An onlooker had noticed a male
diner abandon his date and filled out an
online report. Cass is slim, with tidy black
hair, and holsters his Glock 9mm beneath
sharply cut designer suits. Divorced in 2003,
Cass is also a veteran of online dating.
When the detective typed “dine and dash”
into Google, to brush up on the law, he was
surprised to find hundreds of news reports
about one local man named Paul Gonzales.
“He had, like, fans, and they were like,
‘Hey, he’s not doing anything wrong,’”
said Cass. Some websites called Gonzales
“scummy” and “Douchebag of the Week.”
“This guy was not on any police depart-
ment’s radar,” said Cass, “yet he was one of
the most wanted men in America.”
Two weeks after Cass was handed the
Crime Stoppers report, Carol Meredith, a
model from Santa Clarita looking to break
into acting, was arriving for a first date
with a match from Bumble. “Mike” told
her he was a sports agent, but later said
he worked in advertising. He ordered a
carne asada and a glass of iced tea, while
Meredith ate her chile relleno. Then, when
Mike slipped away to use the restroom, he
Paul Gonzales found women through dating sites, then made them pay for his lobster and steak, said journalist
Jeff Maysh in TheDailyBeast.com. To catch and convict him, a police detective had to get inside his head.
The ‘Dine-and-Dash Dater’ liked to order lobster and filet mignon.
O
NE EVENING IN the
spring of 2016, Mar-
jorie Moon slipped
off her scrubs and washed the
emergency room out of her
long, blond hair. She stepped
into a dress and high heels,
transforming herself from a
tired trauma nurse into a hot
date. The 47-year-old divorcée
from Los Angeles was inun-
dated with offers from men on
matchmaking websites, who
often compared her to the
Friends actress Lisa Kudrow.
For Moon, dating involved rac-
ing home from 12-hour shifts
while wrangling babysitters.
“I’d been under a lot of stress,”
she explained. “Just single-mom
stuff and whatnot. I have five
kids.” Scheduling often killed
off any romance. Then she matched with
a man named Paul on the dating website
PlentyOfFish.
Smooth-talking Paul shared her love for
fine dining and invited her to the Tam
O’Shanter, one of L.A.’s oldest eateries.
“I’m going to go with or without you,” he
told her, removing any indecision. Soon she
was driving across the city, full of hope that
Paul, 43, could be ‘the one.’ He had sent her
videos of his two adorable young sons and
said he was the CEO of the LA Fitness gym
franchise. But as Moon handed her car keys
to the valet, she saw her date arrive on foot.
She wondered, “Does he not have a car?”
Paul’s dyed-black hair was thick with gel,
and he exuded short-guy energy. As he held
open the restaurant door, his light green
eyes sparkled.
“Look how beautiful she is!” said Paul, as
the waitress seated the couple. Then, loud
enough for everyone to hear, he boomed: “I
don’t deserve to be with her! She’s so gor-
geous!” Paul edged his seat closer to hers,
then got to work on the menu. Moon said
he ordered: “A salad, chicken, fish, and
two lobster tails on the side.” When Paul
finished, he summoned two more lobster
tails. After rounding off the meal with a
devilish chocolate soufflé, Paul declared that
he wanted to date Moon “exclusively,” then
stepped outside to make a phone call. “A
few minutes in, I had a funny feeling,” she
said. He never came back.
Hot with embarrassment, Moon told the
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