New Twist In Chakalos Murder
Lawyers Seek Woman Called ‘Mistress Y’
Lawyers for Nathan Carman are offering an alternative theory in the murder of his 87-year-old grandfather, John Chakalos, that involves a 25-year-old woman who they say spent the weekend with Chakalos at a Connecticut casino just days before his death.
In court documents filed in Rhode Island, federal court attorney David Anderson seeks to interview a woman referred to as “Mistress Y” about the weekend she spent with Chakalos at Mohegan Sun, the $3,500 he gave her for breast enhancement surgery, and a 19-minute phone call she had with Chakalos on the night of the murder just as Nathan Carman was leaving his grandfather’s Windsor home.
John Chakalos, Carman’s grandfather, was killed in his home on Dec. 20, 2013 — shot several times in the back of the head at close range. At the time, Windsor police focused on Nathan Carman and tried unsuccessfully to get an arrest warrant charging him with the murder.
Carman’s aunts — Valerie Santilli, Elaine Chakalos and Charlene Gallagher — are now trying to get a New
Hampshire judge to rule that not only did Carman kill his grandfather that December night or early morning but also that he killed his mother three years later by deliberately sinking his boat on a fishing trip out of Rhode Island in September 2016.
Linda Carman is presumed dead after the boat sank off the coast of Long Island. Nathan Carman was rescued eight days later floating in a life raft off the coast of Martha’s Vineyard.
The aunts have filed a petition seeking to have a New Hampshire judge rule that he killed them both. The ruling would bar him from inheriting millions of dollars from Chakalos’ estate.
The new documents allege that “Mistress Y” worked for a company that managed an apartment complex in Keene, N.H., owned by Chakalos. The documents claim that Chakalos routinely gave her as much as $800 every time they met.
The Courant has made several attempts to reach “Mistress Y” but she has been unavailable for comment.
Boston attorney Dan Small, who is representing the three aunts, released a statement Monday about the new court documents, calling them shameful.
“Nathan’s shameful attack on his grandfather today shows there is no depth to which he will not sink to avoid producing his gun, which is the probable murder weapon,” Small said.
“Now he is trying to cast blame on his own aunt, even though she willingly took and passed a police lie detector test, while Nathan refused, and she cooperated fully and honestly with the police, while Nathan lied repeatedly, including about this very gun. Every day that passes in these legal proceedings shows even more clearly that Nathan’s behavior is calculated, evasive, and ultimately, guilty.”
On the weekend of Dec. 13-14, 2013, the new court filings allege that John Chakalos and “Mistress Y” spent the weekend together at Mohegan Sun. In an interview after the murder, the woman told Windsor police he gave her $3,500 for breast enhancement. She denied having sex with him.
She told police that she did have a conversation with Chakalos on Dec. 19, 2013, that lasted about 20 minutes and was “sexual in nature.” She said they made plans during that phone call to go to New York City together over Christmas.
The timing of that phone call is a key issue for Carman’s defense. He has said that he left his grandfather’s house just as he started talking to the mistress and that in fact John Chakalos paused the conversation with her to say goodbye to Nathan.
The documents say that “Mistress Y” was aware that Chakalos kept large stacks of $100 bills in his house that he liked to pull out and count and that she could have planned a robbery herself or inadvertently told someone else about the money in the house.
“Evidence from “Mistress Y’ dramatically alters our preconceived notion of what 87-yearold grandfathers do with their spare time. The fact of the matter is that living alone in a house in which he kept large amounts of cash placed John Chakalos at risk,” Anderson wrote.
“Mr. Chakalos’ lifestyle and activities prior to his death made him a target for a robbery and/or murder by some unknown person,” Anderson wrote.
Besides the alleged mistress Anderson also wants to depose a next-door neighbor to Chakalos, and Valerie Santilli, one of the aunts.
The neighbor told police that she heard a loud bang at about 2 a.m. on the morning of Dec. 20 followed about an hour later with tires from a car squealing as it left the street. The witness raises the possibility Chakalos was murdered during that time frame, which contradicts the Windsor police public statements that he was murdered between 3 and 4 a.m.
The timing of the murder could possibly exonerate Nathan Carman because video surveillance around his apartment building indicates he was at his Bloomfield apartment until almost 3 a.m. He also is seen prior to that shopping at a local Stop and Shop after leaving his grandfather’s house.
“Simply stated if John Chakalos was shot at 2 a.m. then Nathan Carman clearly was not the murderer,” Anderson said.
Windsor police have identified Nathan Carman as the main suspect in the murder of his grandfather. Police have said he was the last known person to see his grandfather alive, discarded the GPS system from his vehicle and the hard drive from his computer the morning after the murder, and refused to take a polygraph test.
There also is the question of a missing Sig Sauer rifle that Nathan Carman purchased just weeks before his grandfather’s murder.
Attorney’s for his aunts have said the gun matches the caliber of bullets used in the Chakalos homicide. State police recovered pieces of several bullets and sent six samples to the forensic laboratory for testing.
State police forensic experts concluded in a January 2014 report that at least two of the bullet fragments came from a “.30 caliber class boat tail jacketed bullet” and at least one bullet was a hollow point bullet. The report doesn’t specify what types of guns could have been used.
It concludes “if any .30 caliber class firearms are developed in this case they should be submitted to the laboratory” for further examination. A Sig Sauer rifle fires either .308 caliber bullets or a 7.62 mm cartridge.
The federal case in Rhode Island started as an insurance claim but has rapidly turned into an investigation into the grandfather’s murder. Anderson filed the documents to try and convince a judge to allow him to conduct the depositions.
The insurance company has refused to payan $80,000 policy, instead arguing in Rhode Island federal court that the boat sank because of Nathan Carman’s own doing. Carman has acknowledged removing the trim tabs from the boat and filling the holes with an epoxy. The insurance company is claiming the changes he made to the vessel made it sink.