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The Yellow Car, Episode 8: Resolve

Pooneh says it’s not so much about clearing her father’s name as it is for getting justice for her mom

Ashley Korslien

Effie Entezari Estate

Published: 2:15 PM PDT August 17, 2021
Updated: 7:37 AM PDT August 18, 2021

For 32 years, Pooneh Gray has been the driving force behind her mission to figure out who really killed her mom, Effie Entezari. She never believed that her father, Mike Entezari, shot and killed her in 1989. Mike was convicted of the murder and spent 16 years in prison. He maintained his innocence until he died in 2019.

From the beginning, Pooya Entezari, Pooneh’s brother, has been supportive of his sister’s efforts. But he isn’t one to speak publicly very often about what happened to their mother and father. 

He recently agreed to do an interview with us for the podcast, and shared how his mother’s murder affected his life. Pooya was just 14 when his mom died and 15 when his dad went to prison. 

"It had a terrible impact, to be honest with you. It pretty much destroyed my life, losing your mom at such a young age like that. It's very difficult. I kind of fell into a world of depression mixed with a little bit of alcohol and drugs just to help me deal with the pain, because I didn't know any other way to deal with it. So it was very traumatizing. It's affected my relationships with women as well. I have a hard time getting attached or getting close to women. Just pretty much, all the emotions you can think that somebody would go through, I went through them," Pooya said.

We asked Pooya to share what he remembers most about his mom and dad.

"I do remember my mom, she was a very beautiful woman. Very happy, at least from what I saw. I just remember her being very gentle and she loved children and she just was a good woman in general," he said. "And my father was an excellent violinist, a Persian violinist. And so I remember when I had a hard time sleeping as a child, he would sit there next to me and he would play his violin and it would soothe me so much that I would fall asleep. Both my parents loved me a lot and I loved them a lot. It's just very tragic that everything ended up the way that it did."

Like Pooneh, Pooya strongly feels that their father was innocent and that someone else killed Effie.

"I always thought he had nothing to do with it because he couldn't hurt a fly. I remember when my cat died, he cried for two weeks over it. He was a very gentle man and cared for others tremendously. A very emotional, very sensitive man. There's no doubt in my mind that he didn't do it. I never thought for one minute that he did," said Pooya.

Pooya said his dad would be blown away if he was alive today to see how far Pooneh has progressed with her independent investigation into Effie’s death.

"It seems like an impossible endeavor. She's had a lot of perseverance and she's done a lot of work to get us to this point. So I know he would be extremely proud," Pooya said.

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