Robert Buli, convicted of murdering his teen girlfriend in Levittownwhen he was 16 in 1978, has died in prison weeks after he was denied parole.
Buli, 65, died on August 22. While the cause of death was not given, Buli said he had terminal cancer and only months to live, according to court testimony. He had twice petitioned courts and the state parole board to be released so he could return to Middletown to die at home, but was denied.
His death was confirmed this week in a text message from the Pennsylvania Office of Victim Advocate to Barbara Thomas, best friend of Buli’s victim, Diane Goeke.
Thomas, who was Goeke’s best friend at Neshaminy Maple Point High School, had waited years to get the call.
“When I saw the phone number pop up (and) saw area
code 717,” she said, “I started to shake.”
Buli is dead, she was told.
“I let out a huge scream saying ‘Yes!’ Finally justice has been served. This made my day which, from a personal standpoint, was not a good day. But I was relieved that part of this horror came to an end.”
Partly, but not fully. Buli’s accomplice, John Lekka, was released on good behavior in August 2023.
For Thomas, it has been nearly 50 grueling years of waiting and advocating to keep Diane Goeke’s killers in jail. She had promised Diane’s late mother, Mary, that she would do whatever it took to see that Buli and Lekka died behind bars. When the last of Goeke’s family died, Thomas became Diane’s chief advocate.
The murder was epically tragic and unnecessary, she said.
It was also a shock to Levittown.
Buli and Goeke were neighbors in the Cobalt Ridge section. They became boyfriend and girlfriend. They had a child together, which was given up for adoption. Buli broke off the relationship and, to get him back, Goeke told him she was again pregnant with his child. She wasn't.
But Buli decided that Goeke had to die, even betting a friend in the school cafeteria that he’d wager $5 that she’d be gone before the week was out.
He recruited Lekka, 17, another neighbor, to kill her. They lured Goeke into woods near their neighborhood. Buli placed Diane in a headlock and ordered Lekka to smash her skull with a 2x4. He swung on her like he was swinging a baseball bat, smashing her skull so hard the lumber broke in two.
They took turns bashing her with a metal pipe. Believing she was dead, they buried her in a shallow grave. Not long afterward, they bragged to an acquaintance about killing a girl in Levittown. They took the man to the scene but were disappointed to hear gurgling sounds coming from the grave as Diane struggled to breathe.
The pair pulled her from the grave, beat her, then dropped a large boulder-sized chunk of discarded concrete onto her head and chest.
The next day, school children on a nature walk with their teacher discovered the body when they saw a hand sticking up from the grave.
Assistant Bucks County D.A. Alan M. Rubenstein wanted the death penalty for both. But in September 1979 the killer pled guilty and struck a deal of life in prison without parole. The Supreme Court erased that, and both were re-sentenced, this time with a chance of parole.
Lekka told Bucks County Judge Rea Boylan that he would likely live in upstate Pennsylvania with a female pen pal and her family. Boylan turned down Buli for release. He petitioned the parole board this month and was turned down.
Barb Thomas has lived the last 48 years keeping vigil for her friend’s memory.
“If I could talk to Mary Goeke,” she said, “I would say we finally have some Justice for Diane but I’m sorry we did not have the same ending for John Lekka. But everyone tried to do what they could to keep him in jail and I kept my promise to you. Knowing Mary Goeke, she probably would feel bad to learn of (Buli’s) passing, because that just was the person she was -- good hearted and compassionate.”
But she has also lived with a kind of latent guilt. She and Diane worked at a restaurant, the Brass Ring, at the Oxford Valley Mall. The night of her murder, Diane called Thomas to switch shifts. Diane believed Buli wanted to meet to get back together.
“I still wonder if I never had switched working for her that night that maybe, just maybe, those two (Buli and Lekka) would have realized what they were planning to do was the wrong thing. That did not happen. This affected so many people. For me it’s like it happened yesterday, even though it’s decades later.
“I made sure Diane was not forgotten, no matter how it made me feel to relive this over and over.”
But it’s not completely over, she said.
“There is still one more person out there who committed this crime, so I will await that phone call someday,” she said. “When it happens then full justice for Diane will be complete. Hopefully I will still be around for it.”
JD Mullane can be reached at jmullane@usatodayco.com.
This article originally appeared on Bucks County Courier Times: Robert Buli, '78 Levittown teen killer, dead in prison at 65
