Dan Markel Case Analysis | The Illogical Nature of Murder for Hire

hello this is dr grande today's question is can i analyze the case of dan markell just a reminder i'm not diagnosing anybody in this video only speculating about could be happening in a situation like this if you enjoy this video please like it subscribe to my channel and consider supporting me on patreon i'll put the link to patreon in the description for this video first i'll cover the background of dan markell i'll move to the timeline of the crime then offer my analysis dan markell was born in toronto canada on october 9 1972 he earned a bachelor's degree a master's degree and then would go on in 2001 to earn a jd from harvard law school he worked as a law clerk and then joined a law firm who represented white-collar criminal defendants in 2005 he was hired by florida state university college of law as a professor he would marry wendy adelson in 2006 she was a law student who was seven years younger than markell they moved to tallahassee florida they had two sons and would divorce in 2013. their divorce was acrimonious the custody arrangement as ordered by the court was 50 50. wendy had wanted to move with the children to miami but markell had won a court decision that prevented this this takes us to july 18 2014. markell had just returned from running errands and going to the gym when he pulled into his garage he was on the phone at the time he told the person he was talking to that somebody unfamiliar was in his driveway a few moments later markel was shot to death he was shot one time in the head as he was seated in his car this was just before 11am initially the only information made public about the case was that markel was murdered and he was the intended victim of the crime about a year later the police would say they were interested in locating a silver toyota prius this takes us to may 26 2016. the police revealed they arrested a 34 year old man named sigfredo garcia and charged him with first-degree murder they indicated it was a murder for heyer involving garcia and another man 33-year-old luis rivera rivera was already in prison on unrelated racketeering charges the two had apparently driven from miami to tallahassee in a toyota prius they spent a couple nights in a motel before murdering markel based on witness statements video from security cameras cell phone records and their electronic toll system the police believe that garcia and rivera had followed markel in their vehicle on the morning of july 18 2014 only to eventually confront him at his home and shoot him the police would say that the murder for hire plot worked like this a man named charles adelson who was the brother of markell's ex-wife wendy along with donna adelson the mother of wendy and charles employed a woman named catherine mcbanawa as an intermediary to hire garcia and rivera magmanoa had been in a romantic relationship at different times with both charles adelson and garcia the police believe that wendy adelson wanted to be able to move to miami with her children and markel of course had won that court decision which prevented her from doing that magbanowa was arrested on october 1 2016 just three days later rivera cut a deal with the government he was sentenced to 19 years in prison in exchange for pleading guilty to second-degree murder he had already been sentenced to 12 and a half years for the racketeering and these sentences would run concurrent so by the end of the deal he only really added six and a half years he implicated catherine mcbanoa and garcia but he said he didn't know who hired them he only knew that the murder was because a lady wanted her two kids back all the adolescents deny any involvement in the homicide magbanoa and garcia would be tried together for murder and other charges the government treated charles and donna adelson as unindicted co-conspirators so they were not charged but the government is saying they were involved the government said that charles adelson had made arrangements to pay magbanoa garcia and rivera one hundred thousand dollars to commit the homicide garcia said that rivera had committed the murder by himself mcbanawa said that she had nothing to do with it but after looking at the prosecution's case she thought maybe wendy adelson had been involved in the murder garcia was convicted of first-degree murder and conspiracy he was sentenced to life in prison without the possibility of parole plus 30 years as far as magbanoa the jury could not reach a verdict she will be retried in 2021. now moving to my analysis dan and wendy had a relationship that their friends and family appeared to admire like they were an ideal couple they had it all they were happy affectionate apparently they called each other mr bear and mrs bear i suppose this was a method of inducing nausea and bystanders it's hard to see any other purpose for it their bare name fueled euphoria would not last at some point wendy who was described as quirky and charismatic believed that dan did not view her as an equal for example she wrote a book and he would not read it he was focused on his own career on a podcast she would say i thought i could beat the system and marry a man i lacked passion and love for interesting choice of words beat the system i wonder if she thought she could beat the system later on as well wendy apparently ambushed dan with divorce initially he wanted to reconcile but then she made it clear she wanted to take the children to miami after this he started filing motions in court in one filing he described how wendy initiated a pearl harbor-like separation he also demanded that wendy's mother donna could not have unsupervised visits with the children as upset as they both were about the divorce they both found romantic partners very quickly after markel was killed wendy suggested that the police should take a look at her new boyfriend like he could have been involved so that relationship soured pretty quickly it sounds like they didn't even make it to the bear name face maybe she just found him unbearable for this part the new boyfriend had a lot to say to the police about wendy and her family he talked about how disturbing the adelson family was how they were obsessed with markell the boyfriend even mentioned how wendy told him charles looked into having markell murdered something wendy adelson would deny in court the big question of course in this case is were the adelsons involved in markelle's murder the government appears to think that they were but there's not enough evidence to charge them we see the government talking about how mcbanua had received suspicious checks also there were phone calls between magbanua and the adolescence some circumstantial evidence but there is no smoking gun here the whole key to the case appears to be magbanua i'm surprised that the adelsons were involved mcbanima wasn't offered some type of deal to churn on them maybe she was perhaps she thinks it's in her best interest to take her chances at trial i don't know if the adolescents were involved but talking hypothetically about a structure like this where a family hires a person to hire other people to commit murder we see an interesting failure of logic the idea here is that the individual who wants the victim dead can mitigate their risk by hiring someone else who in turn hires the actual killer so the killer wouldn't know who the person who ordered the murder really was most murder for hire plots don't involve the person in the middle rather it's just an individual who wants another person dead hiring a killer directly even though this type of scheme removes the direct homicide risk for example gunshot residue on one's hand being caught on surveillance video having trouble putting together an alibi it introduces a new type of risk the killer's getting caught and talking which can lead to the intermediary talking there's other evidence as well to worry about including communication and payments there's always something to hide this type of plot only shifts the risk somewhere else it does not eliminate risk the people doing the hiring in this situation are trusting people who literally were willing to take money to commit homicide not a group known for being highly agreeable there's another logical problem with this type of crime we see that in a police interview of rivera he said that he was talking to garcia at one point and said they should just rob wendy so it was rivera's idea to simply rob wendy it's not clear if rivera knew wendy by name but he knew that there was a person who wanted to be able to move with her children from the point of view of the actual people pulling the trigger this route is more logical if all they want is money there are less risky ways to get it than to carry out a murder robbing someone in wendy's position the person who allegedly wants the victim dead would have been much more efficient because it eliminates the whole problem of a co-conspirator testifying against them and of course robbery is a lesser crime as compared to murder it's not like somebody in wendy's position could run to the police and say i was trying to hire these people to kill my husband and now they're trying to steal from me it's like calling the police and reporting that someone stole your 10 pound shipment of cocaine they're going to be legal consequences for that behavior the last part i want to cover here has to do with the purpose of the murder again allegedly it was so wendy adelson could move with her children murder is not necessary to meet this goal she could have just left with them now of course that would be another crime but again it would be less severe than murder furthermore there are other crimes that could have been committed that would accomplish the same goal like having garcia and rivera frame markel for some type of criminal action like making entry into his home and planting drugs or simply hiring someone to say markell attacked them it may not have been enough to result in a conviction or maybe not even an arrest but it may have affected the custody hearings criminals never consider harm reduction they never look at a situation and say can i commit a lesser crime and still accomplish my goal this makes me think that if this really was a murder for higher plot it was probably more than just moving with children it was probably about something like revenge the actual object was to have dan markell not be alive anymore not to simply accomplish some logistical goal outside of that this was a tragic case that really did not have to occur there are other ways to settle disputes outside of homicide and sometimes in divorces people don't always get their way sometimes people just have to accept that there are limitations to what can happen when people start thinking that anything is possible that can be dangerous those are my thoughts on the danmar cal case please put any opinions and thoughts in the comments section they always generate an interesting dialogue as always i hope you found my analysis of this topic to be interesting thanks for watching

Channel: Dr. Todd Grande

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Length: 11min 52sec (712 seconds)

Published: Sat Apr 03 2021