Frank Garcia gets three more life terms for killing spree
For the second time this year, Frank Garcia on Wednesday listened to the people whose lives he shattered since his shooting spree on Valentine’s Day.
As he stood by the podium in a Monroe County courtroom, clad in a heavy green jail jacket and pants, Garcia remained emotionless during each of the three speeches, when the prosecutor described him as a sociopath and even when Judge Frank P. Geraci Jr. sentenced him to three life sentences without parole.
With Wednesday’s sentencing, the court wrapped up the second of Garcia’s two trials following murders he committed in two counties on Feb. 14. Monroe County Court jurors on Nov. 30 convicted Garcia, 35, of Hamlin, of first-degree murder in the slayings of Mary Silliman and Randal Norman and attempted first-degree murder in the wounding of Audra Dillon outside Lakeside Memorial Hospital in Brockport.
Norman and Dillon were driving by when they saw Garcia attacking Silliman, and the couple tried to stop the attack.
The three life sentences will be served concurrently.
Garcia was found guilty of two counts of first-degree murder and sentenced in August in Ontario County Court for killing Kimberly and Christopher Glatz of Canandaigua. The couple was killed execution-style in their home eight hours after the Brockport shootings. Garcia was sentenced to life in prison without the possibility of parole in those deaths as well.
According to prosecutors in both of Garcia’s murder trials, he shot all five victims during a rampage of revenge over being fired from two health care facilities after two women he supervised— Kimberly Glatz at Wesley Gardens and Silliman at Lakeside Beikirch Care Center — complained he sexually harassed them.
Dozens of people filed into Geraci’s courtroom Wednesday morning to witness Garcia’s sentencing. Those people in support of Norman and Dillon wore red, their favorite color, and many in support of Silliman wore green memorial shirts.
Silliman’s mother, Norman’s ex-wife and Dillon took turns telling the court how the slayings have affected their lives.
Mary Silliman’s mother, Theresa Silliman, said that her two younger children have needed consistent counseling and that their grades have dropped in school as a result of their sister’s death.
Kathleen Norman read a letter written by Norman’s 17-year-old daughter, Megan Norman. In the letter, Megan said that she and her father were best friends and celebrated each new year together.
“We always started and ended the year together. We started this year together but I’m ending it by myself,” Megan Norman said in her letter, adding that she won’t have a father to watch her marry or when she has children. “He (Frank Garcia) took that from his own children as well.”
After the sentencing, Megan Norman said she had her mother read her letter because she did not think she could keep her voice steady.
“He watched my dad fall so I didn’t want him to see me crumble,” she said.
Dillon said she feels guilty about surviving the shootings and apologized to the Silliman family for not being able to help Mary Silliman and to the Norman family for the pain they have gone through.
In her letter that she read, Dillon said she never gave much thought to the death penalty but after seeing what Garcia has done, she is angry New York state doesn’t have such punishments.
“I find it sickening that the man who committed this crime gets to smile at cameras, tell his family he loves them, live safely and securely with numerous rights,” she said about Garcia.
Outside of court, she said that she also feels guilty about not being able to stop Garcia. If she could have stopped him, she said, maybe the Glatz family wouldn’t have gone through what it did.
Monroe County Assistant District Attorney Douglas A. Randall spoke in length about Garcia and how he is a sociopath with a “grandiose sense of self.” Randall also said that Garcia is a pathological liar who continues to deny his involvement in the shootings.
Garcia’s attorney Joseph Damelio later said that Garcia does feel remorse for the Brockport deaths but has maintained his innocence throughout.
“He’s remorseful these people died. That doesn’t mean he’s taking responsibility,” he said. Damelio also said he advised Garcia not to address the court when Geraci gave him the opportunity to speak so he would not jeopardize his appeals process.
Garcia’s wife declined to speak after the sentencing.
CLVARGAS@DemocratandChronicle.com
