Illustration by Anthony Ventura
In fact the State Attorney's Office had been aware of the federal investigation for at least three years. Fourteen months before the trial began, in October 1996, prosecutor Gail Levine had written a memo to her supervisor addressing the fact that federal prosecutors were targeting Schiller, almost to the exclusion of any other potential Medicare fraud defendants. The feds, she wrote, "just seem like they will plead everyone out -- but Schiller. That's the only person they care about....
Steve Satterwhite
Judge Alex Ferrer stepped up to the plate for justice
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On July 17, 1998, more than three years after the murders were committed, Judge Ferrer sentenced Lugo and Doorbal. They each received two death sentences for the murders of Frank Griga and Krisztina Furton, and consecutive sentences for all the other crimes for which they had been convicted.
That wasn't the end of Judge Ferrer's involvement, however. In February 1999, after Marc Schiller pleaded guilty to one federal count of false Medicare billing, the judge took the highly unusual step of providing favorable testimony at his sentencing hearing.
Such testimony from a sitting judge is extremely rare. For Ferrer it was unprecedented, but he was moved to do so out of compassion and, to a degree, admiration. Not only had Schiller demonstrated extraordinary courage and endurance in surviving the Sun Gym gang's torture and attempts to kill him, but he later proved to be indispensable in prosecuting the case against his captors. "I know we can consider anything at sentencing," Ferrer said at the hearing. "This case was a very emotional case to sit through. It still bothers me to some extent. And I know that if things were just black and white, they could have computers do our jobs. But there's something intangible about this case that makes me feel like what he went through should be given some credit, because I don't think it could have been worse if he was a prisoner of war."
Ferrer also spoke of Schiller's haunting testimony. "Schiller was obviously emotionally bothered by it," he said. "It's hard to imagine that anybody would not be emotionally distraught about what happened to him. He tried to keep a very cool composure, but ... I think even just relaying it in court was traumatic to the people that were hearing it."
On Wednesday, March 17, 1999, Marc Schiller was sentenced to 46 months in prison, the most lenient sentence available under federal guidelines.
The Sun Gym case is now closed.
Information for this story was drawn from interviews with principal characters, investigative reports, court documents, and trial testimony. This is the last part of a three-part series.
