Grant Amato: Family Annihilator — Talk Murder With Me

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No parents are perfect. But for the most part, they do their best.

Now don’t get me wrong - writing a true crime blog, I know very well that there are many parents who fail their children. Child abuse and neglect can manifest themselves in different forms, causing varying degrees of pain and trauma. Each case is different, and devastating in its own unique way.

This story is not, however, one of child abuse or neglect. In fact, it’s quite the opposite. The majority of parents love their children unconditionally. They hope that if they raise them in a loving, nurturing environment, they will turn out okay. That they will become responsible and productive members of society.

But what happens when children abuse that unconditional love? When you give your children everything, and it’s not enough?

The Amato Family

The Amato family lived at 2112 Sultan Circle in Chuluota, Florida. 61-year-old Margaret and 59-year-old Chad were married with three sons. Jason, the eldest, was Margaret's child from a previous relationship. Jason was adopted by Chad when he was 3-years-old. After they married, they had Cody in 1987 and Grant in 1989.

Left to right: Chad, Cody, Margaret and Grant Amato (source: Facebook)

Chuluota ("Choo-lee-oh-tah") is a derivative of the Creek Indian word "Chuluoto". The word has several meanings, including “Isle of Pines”, “Land of Lakes and Pines” and “beautiful place”. Chuluota was settled shortly after the Civil War, and is currently listed as a census-designated place and unincorporated community, located in Seminole County, FL. As of the 2010 census, Chuluota was home to 2,483 residents. It is about 25 miles east of Orlando, far enough away from the city to be classified as rural.

In 2019, the year this story takes place, Jason was living in Winter Springs, FL and working as a mortgage loan underwriter.

Chad and Margaret Amato worked hard throughout their lives and had done well for themselves. Chad was a pharmacist at CVS Health with a passion for computers, describing himself as a “self-taught computer guru". Margaret was senior operations manager at Nuance Transcription Services.

They lived in a spacious, four-bedroom home situated on a 2.9 acre plot of land. Chad and Margaret had recently bought a home in Tennessee, where they planned to move when they retired.

The Amatos were a tight-knit, football-loving family. They never missed a Florida Gators game.

After her family, Margaret’s greatest love in life was horses. In her free time, she could usually be found at Miracle Lane Stables, tending to Lady, a neglected ex-racehorse she rescued in 2009. Margaret was a kind, caring and gentle soul. She adored Lady, despite how many times she was bucked from the horse’s back trying to train her. Many people would have called it quits with Lady, but not Margaret. Jewel Tieben, Margaret’s neighbor, would later say:

“Margaret never gave up on Lady, and it blossomed into a wonderful relationship because she never gave up.”

When Lady died, Margaret continued to frequent the stables, helping to look after the horses and just be around the animals. They had a calming effect on her, which she sorely needed as the year 2018 progressed, and the situation at home became increasingly tense.

The Amato family home (source: Daily Commercial)

Grant’s Troubles Begin

Grant and Cody Amato did everything together. Not only were they brothers, they were best friends. They both attended Timber Creek High School where they were on the weightlifting team. When they graduated, they both enrolled in nursing school, hoping to ultimately specialize as nurse anesthetists.

The pair dreamed of buying matching BMWs and living in the family home in Chuluota, while their parents enjoyed retirement in Tennessee. It didn't work out this way, however.

Grant and Cody went to nursing school and qualified as nurses. But while Cody thrived as a nurse, Grant struggled. As planned, they both enrolled in a course to become nurse anesthetists. Cody passed the course, but Grant failed.

In June 2018, Grant was fired from his nursing job at AdventHealth Orlando for stealing medication, namely the anesthetic drug, Propofol. The drug is described as a "short-acting medication that results in a decreased level of consciousness and a lack of memory for events".

Notably, in 2009, propofol gained notoriety as one of the drugs used by Michael Jackson which resulted in his death, along with a mixture of benzodiazepines.

Grant was arrested and charged with grand theft. He was also accused of improperly administering medication to patients. When questioned by hospital authorities, he claimed he “administered the drug to patients because they were not adequately relaxed”.

As a result of his firing, Grant became increasingly isolated and depressed. He began spending endless hours in his bedroom on his computer. He slept all day and stayed awake all night, gaming and live-streaming. Along with his mental health, his physical health also deteriorated. His weight plummeted. He looked almost corpse-like with the dark circles under his eyes and deathly pale skin.

Online, Grant portrayed himself as a professional gamer and wealthy bachelor, who had his own place and drove a BMW. His friend group online was none the wiser. They did not know that in reality, Grant was a 29-year-old unemployed nurse who had recently been fired, lived with his parents, and drove a Honda Accord.

Silvie, Grant’s Obsession

Sylvia Ventsislavova, a Bulgarian webcam model who Grant referred to as “Silvie”, became the most important person in his life. Grant met Silvie on the live-streaming pornographic website, Cam Girls.

Every night, Grant would spend hours watching Silvie perform via webcam. Watching her cost 90 “tokens” per minute; Grant would buy 5,000 tokens for $600 each time.

It wasn’t long before Grant began showering Silvie with gifts, sending her items like clothes and sex toys. Grant viewed Silvie as his girlfriend. While she did not return these feelings, she did appreciate Grant’s generosity with his money.

But little did Silvie know, it wasn’t Grant’s money to spend. In reality, he was stealing from his father and brother. In just three months, Grant burned through $200,000 of his family’s money to satisfy his obsession with Silvie. He lied to his family, telling them that he was using the money to promote himself as a gamer on the live-streaming website Twitch.

There is one especially pathetic video that Grant takes of himself walking to the mailbox, begging Silvie to please send him a video of herself for free. You can watch the video here.

The Ever-Supportive Family

Grant Amato did not deserve the family he had. Despite months of lying and stealing, they continued to have his back.

Chad took out a second mortgage on their house to pay for the debt Grant accumulated, as well as his legal expenses for the grand theft charges he was facing for stealing the medication.

It came to Chad’s attention that Grant was in the process of fraudulently taking out a line of credit in his (Chad’s) name. He never reported it, however, because he did not want his son getting into more trouble.

Then, in December, Grant’s situation seemed to get a little better. The grand theft charges against him were dropped. Cody, Grant and another friend went on a trip to Japan, where they had been wanting to go for years. Cody paid all of his and Grant’s expenses for the trip, amounting to close to $10,000.

When Grant returned from the trip, he and his father began fighting almost every day over Grant’s lifestyle and the fact he didn’t have a job.

On Dec. 19, 2018, Grant left the house after a particularly bad argument. He texted his mother saying that he was “really tired of everything" and "just going to handle it his own way.”

Deeply concerned, Margaret reported Grant missing to the police, explaining that he had been having “strong feelings of worthlessness."

As it turned out, Grant had driven to his aunt, Donna Amato's, house in Apopka, Florida, about 42 miles west of Chuluota. Donna described Grant as looking gaunt and exhausted. While at Donna's, he spent the whole day sleeping and the entire night awake.

Not long after Grant arrived, Donna noticed mysterious charges when checking her bank account, from none other than the Cam Girls website, where Grant spoke to Sylvie. Donna called Chad, telling him what Grant was up to.

Chad pleaded with her not to press charges. Cody also spoke to Donna, telling her that he would pay her back all the money Grant had stolen from her.

Donna was flummoxed. Then, just when she thought things couldn't get any more strange, Chad Amato broke down crying on the phone. He told her about how much grief Grant had been causing them the last few months, and how much it had cost to pay back his debts. Donna would later tell detectives:

“He [Chad] told me on the phone … ‘Yeah, I’m going to have to work a few more years than I thought I’d have to. But it’s OK. I’ll do it for Grant – I don’t want him to go to jail.’”

On Dec. 22, 2018, Chad, Margaret, Jason and Cody staged an intervention. They came to Donna's house and told Grant he needed to get help. Chad, Margaret and Cody drove him to a rehabilitation center in Fort Lauderdale. Grant voluntarily enrolled in a 60-day program for sex and pornography addiction.

However, Grant dropped out of the program after about two weeks, on Jan. 4, 2019. Cody had committed to paying $15,000 for the treatment program.

The Ultimatum

On Jan. 5, Chad took Grant to the California Pizza Kitchen in Waterford Lakes for lunch and a talk. At the restaurant, Chad took a handwritten list of rules out of his pocket that Grant had to abide by if he wanted to continue living in the family home.

The rules dictated that Grant had to stop spending all night online and get a job. His parents would no longer pay his phone bill - his previous phone plan had been cancelled and Chad had set him up on a new plan that did not have data. He had to pay back debts to the family, and he had to go to therapy.

He was also no longer allowed to communicate with Silvie; if he was caught doing so, he would be kicked out of the house immediately.

While Grant had been in rehab, Chad had accessed his computer and gotten in contact with Silvie, telling her that Grant had been lying to her and that all the money he spent on her was actually stolen from his family. On learning this, Silvie was apparently no longer interested in communicating with Grant.

According to Grant, Chad had erased everything off of his computer and put a password on it, so he was unable to access it when he returned home.

If Grant did not agree to these terms, he had to leave the home, or enlist in the military.

The Murders

When Cody Amato did not come into work at Orlando Regional Medical Center on January 25, his coworkers were convinced that something was wrong. It was just totally out of character for him. One coworker said that in the last five years, Cody had not missed a day of work.

They called the police, asking if an officer could carry out a welfare check at the Amato home.

At approximately 9:17 a.m., Seminole County Deputy Todd Moderson arrived at the Amato home on Sultan Circle. Despite several attempts to get the attention of somebody inside, Moderson had no luck. After contacting his supervisor to tell them the situation and getting the go-ahead to enter the home, Moderson and another deputy pried open a side door with a knife.

Lying in the doorway between the home gym and the garage in a “semi-fetal position” was Cody Amato, dressed in his nursing scrubs. He had been shot below the eye. A handgun lay about five feet from his body.

The next body they came across was in the kitchen. It was that of Chad Amato; he was lying face up, having been shot twice in the head. He was wearing a holster on his hip with a handgun in it. Margaret Amato was in her office, slumped over her desk. She had been shot once in the head.

Grant Amato, however, was nowhere to be found, and his cellphone had been disconnected.

Grant Is Questioned

The next morning, Jan. 26, detectives tracked Grant down at a DoubleTree Hotel by putting out a bulletin for his car, a 1996 Honda Accord. They asked him to come to the station for an interview. He agreed.

At the interview, which was conducted by Detectives Daniel Anderson and EvaMarie Multari, a very laid back Grant talked about his passion for gaming and live-streaming and complained about his family.

Grant described Chad as an angry and overbearing man who was physically violent towards Margaret, Jason and Grant himself, (but not Cody), when they were younger.

He told the detectives that he had been spending a lot of his father’s money on talking to and watching Silvie, a Bulgarian webcam model.

Looking back on the amount of money he spent, money that was not his own, Grant admitted to the detectives that he had been foolish:

“Spending that amount of money, it’s idiotic. Especially when you’re not making it.”

He told the detectives that his father had “hacked” into his computer while he was in rehab and gained access to his phone records, as well as “personal things related to Silvie”. With this information, Chad told Silvie the truth about Grant - that he was unemployed, living with his parents and stole from them in order to talk to her and buy her gifts.

He said of his father, who had been nagging him to get a job:

“With him it was every single day, he’d come home from work and then he would just talk to me about the same exact thing, over and over again.”

Detectives found it striking that after three hours of being interviewed, Grant did not ask what happened to his family.

Laying On The Pressure

Around the three hour mark, the detectives produced the crime scene photos, displaying one on the table in front of Grant. At this point, he became visibly emotional.

Cody (left) and Grant (right) on their December trip to Japan (source: Orlando Sentinel)

“Did you leave the house with your brother Cody looking like that?” Multari asked.

She went on, laying more photos in front of him.

“Did you leave the house with your father looking like that? Or your mother?”

“No,” Grant whispered, tears rolling down his cheeks.

“Nobody else went into that house,” said Anderson.

Multari listed all the things Grant had told them that pointed towards him killing his family - Grant’s mental state, his debt, the fights with his father.

“Who left your family like this?” she pressed. “Tell us what happened.”

“We need the truth, you’ve got to tell the truth. It’s on the tip of your tongue,” said Anderson.

Grant repeated that he didn’t do it.

“Then who could have done it?” the detectives asked.

Grant responded:

“I don’t know. I’ve been getting blamed this last half year for everything, and I’ve been trying to move forward in a positive direction. Every day I’m reminded of all the trouble that I had caused. And I keep being told the same thing over and over again: that there’s nothing I can do to change it.”

Jason, Grant’s older brother, came to speak to him in the interrogation room. Grant still denied having anything to do with the murders. Jason wanted to give Grant the benefit of the doubt, but was struggling.

“Things aren’t adding up,” Jason said to Grant, “I’m really confused, Grant. It scares me that you want to leave here and not face up to what happened.”

He pleaded with Grant to tell him the truth. But Grant said nothing more. Before leaving, Jason said:

“I’m going to pray for you, brother, because I can’t pray for mom, dad or Cody anymore.”

I just want to note here that Jason Amato had a solid alibi for January 24. He was questioned as part of the investigation on Jan. 25, when detectives came to his workplace in Winter Springs, FL.

Jason gave a detailed account of his movements on Jan. 24. He had spent the day at work, returned at 6 p.m., and then went out to dinner with his long-term girlfriend Christina and her two daughters. He spent the entire evening with them and then got up in the morning to take the girls to school. Christina corroborated this account.

They also searched his car and home. They found no evidence to suggest he had any involvement in the murders.

Grant’s Account

Grant’s version of events went like this: on January 24, he had been at home all day preparing for a job interview. When his father got home from work, he became confrontational, as he found out that Grant was still talking to Silvie using Twitter on Margaret’s cellphone. This was true, but Grant insisted that his mother had given him permission to use her phone.

Chad grabbed him by the shirt and told him to get out of the house.

Grant packed his things. He and Chad stood in the driveway and talked for another hour and a half. Chad gave him a credit card to use for a hotel room that night. Then Cody came home. Grant briefly spoke to his brother. Grant said goodbye to Margaret, and Cody walked him out of the house. By this time, it was between 12 and 12:30 a.m. on Jan. 25.

When he last saw his family, he said, they were all alive.

Grant got in his car and drove to the local Publix grocery store. He used the store WiFi, so he could find directions to his job interview the following morning. He then fell asleep in his car. He woke at about 6:45 a.m. and drove to the interview.

Grant is Arrested

Despite Grant’s insistence that he was not responsible for killing his family, nobody believed him.

Amongst those interviewed during the investigation was Cody’s girlfriend, Sloan Young. She told detectives that Grant had stolen about $60,000 from Cody. He stole Cody’s guns so he could sell them, she added.

Sloan also told them about how Cody had expressed to her his fear that Grant was becoming increasingly unhinged and would quote unquote “kill everyone”.

On January 28, Grant was arrested and charged with three counts of premeditated first-degree murder. He pled not guilty to all three charges. While awaiting his trial, he was held at the Seminole County Jail on $750,000 bail. Barred from using funds from his parent’s estate, he was unable make bail.

The Trial

The Prosecution’s Timeline

Grant Amato’s trial began on July 23rd, 2019. If convicted, he could face the death penalty. The prosecution was lead by Assistant State Attorney Stewart Stone and Assistant State Attorney Domenick Leo.

There was no sign whatsoever of forced entry into the Amato home, and all the family’s valuables - PlayStations, televisions, computers and jewelry - were untouched, Stone told the jury.

Geraldine Blay, a digital forensic investigator with the Seminole County Sheriff’s Office, processed the electronic devices found in the Amato home. Her testimony was of vital importance to the prosecution building a timeline of what happened the day of the murders.

The prosecution’s timeline went as follows:

Grant Amato spent Jan. 24 at home with his mother, Margaret. Blay testified that the last time there was activity on her computer was 4:44 p.m.

With this information, the prosecution deduced that Grant shot Margaret around 4:45 p.m. as she sat at her desk.

At 5:25 p.m, the Health app on Chad Amato's iPhone recorded him taking 67 steps (presumably from his car into the house). Then for 27 minutes, there was no activity whatsoever on his phone.

This indicated to the prosecution that Grant killed his father as soon as he entered the house.

The first shot to Chad’s head did not kill him; there was a trail of blood on the floor which suggested he tried to drag himself, probably towards the phone, after being shot. He was shot in the head a second time, which killed him.

Geraldine Blay testified that at 5:52 p.m., Chad’s iPhone was unlocked and the settings on the phone were changed, so that the phone would stay unlocked. It remained unlocked until after midnight.

Grant then waited for Cody to return home from work. He left work around 9:15 p.m. on Jan. 24. Cody barely made it into the house before his brother shot him in the face.

Prosecutor Stone said to the jury":

“For over four hours, with the bodies of his dead mother and father in the house, the defendant waits for Cody to come home ... By any definition of the word ‘cold,’ these murders were cold.”

A neighbor of the Amatos, Jennifer Sawyer, testified that she heard gunshots between 8:30 p.m. and 9:30 p.m. She didn’t know exactly how many shots were fired, she said, but it was less than five.

At 11:32 p.m, a thumb drive with over 600 photos and videos of Silvie was inserted into Grant Amato’s computer. This thumb drive would later be found by investigators in the pocket of Grant's jeans in his car.

At 11:39 p.m, Cody's iPhone was connected to Grant’s computer, but the “trusting process” was not completed, suggesting whoever had connected the phone did not know the passcode. Three minutes later, the phone was put in “recovery mode”.

“Based on everything else that I examined, I believe the person was trying to wipe the phone,” Blay said.

At 12:08 a.m., Chad Amato’s USAA banking app was accessed using his biometric fingerprint.

“Based on your training and experience, are you aware of whether iPhones have been successfully unlocked with a deceased person’s fingerprint?” the prosecution asked Blay.

“Yes” she replied.

It was noted by investigators that Chad’s right index finger was less bloody than his other fingers, suggesting it had been wiped of blood. This information led prosecutors to believe that Grant used his dead father’s fingerprint to access his banking app.

At 2:54 a.m. Grant accessed WiFi. At 3:06 a.m, he paid $599.99 to reopen his Cam Girls account. Remember that during his initial interview, Grant told investigators that he had driven to the local Publix grocery store to use their WiFi after he was kicked out of the house.

The Crime Scene

Grant then went about trying to stage a murder-suicide scene, the prosecution told the jury. He wanted it to look as though Cody had shot his parents and then shot himself, which would explain the handgun laying near Cody’s body.

Grant strategically placed bullets around the murder scene, corresponding to the number of times each victim had been shot.

The prosecutor theorized that Grant put the holster with the handgun in it on Chad’s right hip, in an effort to make it appear that there was a confrontation between Chad and Cody. However, it was a cross-draw holster, meaning that Chad, who was right-handed, should have been wearing it on his left hip.

Crime scene investigator Christine Snyder said during her testimony:

"If you're carrying it the way that he has it, and you're right handed, you would have to pull it out awkwardly, point it at yourself then point it at someone else to fire it, which doesn't make any sense.”

Furthermore, people who knew Chad said that he did not walk around at home with a gun on his hip.

Snyder also testified that the bodies of Chad and Cody appeared to have been moved. Chad had been shot in the back of the head, meaning he should have been lying face down, but he was lying face up, suggesting he had been turned over.

There were two pools of blood beneath Cody, one larger than the other. The larger pool was closer to his ankles and feet, while the smaller pool was beneath his head, where he had been shot. This suggested he had also been moved, as the larger pool of blood should have been beneath where he had been shot.

The (Missing) Gun

Richard Ruth, a firearms expert with the Florida Department of Law Enforcement, testified that none of the guns found at the home, of which there were three, were used in the murders. Ruth also said that the bullets found near the bodies (which prosecutors asserted that Grant had planted) were not from the gun that killed them.

Cody Amato, the medical examiner testified, was not shot at close range. If he had committed suicide, his autopsy would have shown that he was shot at close range. Margaret and Chad were shot at close range. The medical examiner testified that the scene strongly indicated that all three deaths were a result of homicide.

Blake Turpin, a friend of Cody and Grant’s for more than a decade, testified that his 9mm Jericho handgun had been stolen from a closet in his bedroom. However, he did not realize it was gone until several months later, as he very rarely used it. When he realized it was gone, he reported it missing to the police.

About two weeks before the killings, Turpin said, he had Grant, Cody and another friend over to his house to hang out and play video games. At one point during the evening, Grant had excused himself to go to the bathroom. Grant knew where he kept his guns, Turpin added, and would have had to walk past his bedroom to get to the bathroom. Turpin said:

"I believed the missing gun was connected to this case, but I didn't physically see Mr. Amato leave with the gun. But it’s what I suspected based on his history of stealing.

Richard Ruth testified that Turpin’s stolen Jericho 9mm handgun has polygonal rifling, and the bullets that killed Grant’s family members had polygonal markings. However, since Turpin’s gun has never been recovered, he could not confirm that that gun was involved in the killings, he said.

The prosecution painted Grant as having spiraled into a depression after being fired from his job. He then began communicating with Sylvia Ventsislavova, a webcam model, and quickly became obsessed with her. Silvie had no idea who Grant was, believing he was a professional gamer, who owned his own place and drove a BMW. Leo said:

"He lost his job, he became depressed, has a contentious relationship with his father and his brother. He finds Silvie, and becomes consumed by her.”

His father tried to stop him from communicating with Silvie by giving him an ultimatum: stop contacting her or move out of the house. Chad also contacted Silvie, telling her that Grant had been lying to her and was not who he said he was.

On hearing this, Silvie was no longer interested in communicating with Grant and moved on with other clients (of which she had plenty). According to prosecutors, Grant hated his family for effectively ending his “relationship”.

But Grant kept sending Silvie messages on Twitter using Margaret’s phone behind Chad’s back. When Chad discovered this, he became enraged and threw Grant out of the home. So Grant retaliated by executing his father, mother and brother.

Grant’s Letter

Also used in the prosecution's case against Grant was a letter he had written to his online friends - six men he spent much of his time online chatting with, who were part of Silvie’s “chat room”. Grant had told them the same lies about his life that he had been telling Silvie.

In the letter, which was composed sometime between when Grant left rehab on Jan. 4, 2019 and the murders on Jan. 24, 2019, Grant came clean, telling his friends that everything he told them about his life was made up: he lived with his parents, was not a professional gamer, he was unemployed and did not drive a BMW.

He also expressed his anger towards his family, for a number of reasons. Firstly, he was upset that they had made him go to rehab. But what he resented the most was that they had spoken to Silvie and revealed the truth about him.

He wrote in the letter that his father is “controlling and abusive,” his mother is “simply around for security,” and his brother is “also controlling and does not understand how I could care for someone as much as I cared for Silvie.”

In so many words, Grant wrote in the letter that his life was over without Silvie. He wrote:

“Seeing her so happy without me in her life is something I hope you guys never have to [live] through. It is a feeling that rips your heart out and makes me realize how pointless everything is without her.”

During closing arguments, Domenick Leo said:

“Grant fell in love with a woman named Silvie. Not only did he fall in love with her, he became obsessed with her — to the point that she’s all that mattered.”

Jason Amato’s Testimony

Grant's brother, Jason, testified for the prosecution about the relationships between his family members in the months leading up to the murders. It was a very emotional testimony. Jason told the court about the ultimatum Chad had given Grant, and the list of rules he had to follow if he wanted to continue living at home.

The last time he had seen his dad and brother was on the morning of Dec. 22, a weeping Jason Amato told the court. They had gone to their aunt's home for the intervention on Grant. After that, his father, mother and brother had taken Grant to the rehab facility.

Jason was asked whether his father was ever abusive towards him or his brothers. While Chad could be strict with them, Jason said, he was not abusive. They did get spanked when they were children, but Jason had never thought of this as abuse.

At the end of his testimony, one of Grant’s lawyers asked Jason if he loved Grant.

“I loved both of my brothers,” Jason tearfully replied.

In Grant’s Defense

Grant’s defense team said that detectives were too quick to focus their investigation on Grant, never seriously looking at any other suspects. They also said that investigators should have done a better job of processing evidence.

Finding Grant Amato guilty of the murders because you ask yourself, “If not Grant, then who?”, is not good enough reason to convict, the defense argued.

The prosecution’s timeline of events “did not add up”, they said, and they (the prosecution) were just speculating as to what time each family member was murdered.

While cross-examining Geraldine Blay, one of Grant’s attorneys, Jared Shapiro, asked if she was at the Amato home on the evening of Jan 24. She replied she was not.

“You have no idea when Cody Amato passed away, is that correct?” Shapiro asked.

“That’s correct,” she replied.

He asked if she knew who plugged Cody’s phone into Grant’s computer. No, she replied. He then asked her if she was speculating about what the person who plugged in the phone was doing (as she said she believed whoever plugged the phone into the computer was trying to wipe the phone). She replied that her testimony “was formed by her years of experience as a forensic analyst.”

“So you’re engaged in mind-reading, is that correct?” Shapiro asked Blay.

The prosecution objected to this question.

The defense pointed to the fact Chad accessed his bank account at 12:08 p.m. on Jan. 24. However, as I mentioned earlier, the prosecution very convincingly asserted that this was Grant’s doing - he used his dead father’s biometric fingerprint to access the app.

They said there were text messages sent from Cody to Chad at 11:51 p.m. which read: “Dad, for the third time now, delete the Blink app”. At 12:31 a.m. on Jan. 25 the Blink app was uninstalled from Chad’s phone. If Grant was able to use his father’s fingerprint to access his phone, I’m pretty sure he could also send text messages and delete apps from their phones also…

They argued that Grant had “no motive” to kill his parents and brother. He got along well with his mother, and he and his brother were extremely close. Furthermore, his family always just gave him money whenever he needed it. This sounds totally ridiculous to me - of course Grant had motive to kill his family. Silvie was Grant's whole world and he saw his family as an obstacle to being with her. On top of that, his father had told him he had to start paying back his debts to them, meaning they weren’t going to give him any more money.

There was no physical evidence found on Grant - none of his family's DNA, no gunshot residue. Nor was any of Grant's DNA found on his family members. But then again, investigators did not track Grant down for a good 36 hours after the murders occurred, giving him plenty of time to shower and dispose of any clothes that might have been contaminated with their DNA. Plus, it gave him plenty of time to get rid of the missing murder weapon.

The defense also argued that Grant did not have access to any guns because he had sold all of his to send more money to Silvie. His father had guns, but kept them in a safe and Grant didn’t know the combination for the safe. During cross-examination of Blake Turpin, who testified about his stolen gun, one of Grant’s lawyers said:

“So just out of nowhere, six months later, 30 days before the trial starts, you can’t find a firearm that you haven’t seen in 12 months,” Dowdy said. “Would you call that responsible gun ownership?”

Turpin responded that the gun had been sitting safely in his closet for years.

The Verdict

On July 31, 2019, after eight hours of deliberation, the jury found Grant Amato guilty of premeditated first-degree murder of his father, mother and brother. Below is a clip from WKMG News 6 Orlando covering the verdict coming in.

On Aug. 12, 2019, the jury recommended that Grant be sentenced to life in prison without the possibility of parole, meaning he would avoid the death penalty.

Grant Amato is currently incarcerated at Madison Correctional Institution in Madison County, Florida.

Cody’s girlfriend, Sloan Young, spoke of what a caring, thoughtful person Cody was, who treated everyone he encountered with respect. She said:

“Cody was the best kind of person. He cared so much about his job and his patients, and not just them, but his coworkers and his friends and his family. It’s been devastating for all of us. It’s difficult to accept that he was only 31 and he will never be any older.”

Miracle Lane Stables, where Margaret spent much of her time tending to the horses before her murder, had a plaque made in Margaret’s honor. It read: