MONTREAL – Before he was found guilty of the murder of his nine-year-old daughter, Luciano Frattolin did not testify in his defence. But with the jury out of the room, he said he wanted to.
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MONTREAL – Before he was found guilty of the murder of his nine-year-old daughter, Luciano Frattolin did not testify in his defence. But with the jury out of the room, he said he wanted to.
MONTREAL – Before he was found guilty of the murder of his nine-year-old daughter, Luciano Frattolin did not testify in his defence. But with the jury out of the room, he said he wanted to.
On Aug. 10, Frattolin was found guilty of second-degree murder and concealment of a human corpse in the death of Melina Frattolin.
A New York jury convicted Frattolin of having killed his daughter on July 19, 2025, the last day of a weeklong trip to the United States. The girl’s body was found the next day near Ticonderoga, N.Y., about 400 kilometres north of New York City. The autopsy found she died from asphyxia due to drowning.
The question of whether Frattolin would testify remained up in the air until the last morning of the trial. A few days earlier, Judge Tatiana Coffinger spoke directly to Frattolin about the possibility.
The prosecution had just rested their case and the jury had left the room. Coffinger explained to Frattolin that, because he had the right to be presumed innocent in this case, he had no obligation to testify during the trial.
As she outlined the ramifications of this decision, he interrupted her.
“I trust people easily. And I trusted the cops,” he said.
