Thomas Gilbert, Jr.

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Speaker 7 A Manhattan financier and his beautiful wife lived the high life among New York's elite.

Speaker 6 They had a couple of addresses in Manhattan, one on Park Avenue. They also had a home in the Hamptons.

Speaker 2 We lid a very nice life, but we lead it respectfully.

Speaker 7 With an Ivy League pedigree and a head for business, their handsome son was also destined for New York's upper crust.

Speaker 6 He was a ladies' man. He was incredibly good looking.

Speaker 2 He tried to start a business of his own.

Speaker 7 But a darkness is about to consume their whole family.

Speaker 2 What's emergency today, ma'am? Um, my husband is, I think, dead. Mr.
Gilbert was laying on the floor. Would have gone shot with his head.
I was stunned. I was absolutely shocked.

Speaker 7 The media frenzy that ensues will engulf all of Manhattan high society.

Speaker 8 It is a murder sending ripples through a quiet upscale Manhattan neighborhood.

Speaker 2 You're finding out that they're one of these little rich kids with the entitlement issue.

Speaker 6 We've got money and power and privilege and murder.

Speaker 7 But it's what the cameras don't see that reveals the truth behind this Prince of Manhattan's fall from grace.

Speaker 2 I thought, oh, you're far sicker than we ever knew.

Speaker 9 If you have an adult child who's suffering with mental illness, it is very difficult to force that person to see doctors and take their medication.

Speaker 2 What happened to our family should never ever happen to any other family again in this country.

Speaker 7 High above the busy Manhattan streets, life in the high-rises of Midtown is more refined.

Speaker 9 When you move into one of these neighborhoods in Manhattan, you don't just sign on the dotted line and move in. You have to pass background checks.
They have old money more than they have new money.

Speaker 9 But the key factor is they have money.

Speaker 7 Just after 3 p.m. on January 4th, 2015, an unusual call comes in to 911 from 67-year-old resident Shelly Gilbert.

Speaker 2 What's the emergency today, ma'am?

Speaker 2 My husband is, I think, dead. Okay.
Please run.

Speaker 11 Connected to EMS. Do not hang up, okay?

Speaker 2 Thank you. Okay.

Speaker 2 We knew that the victim was Thomas Gilbert, a male in his 60s.

Speaker 2 The caller was his wife, Shelly.

Speaker 12 And he's not breathing.

Speaker 2 What? I don't think so. I can't get a pulse.
I think he's just dead.

Speaker 2 He's been shot. He's been shot? Yes.

Speaker 7 Minutes later, first responders enter the apartment.

Speaker 2 We saw the wife at the time, Shelly. She was very distraught, very upset.

Speaker 7 Shelley directs police to the couple's bedroom.

Speaker 6 When investigators initially arrived on the scene, it had the look of a suicide.

Speaker 2 Mr. Gilbert was laying on the floor with a gunshot went to his head.

Speaker 2 The gun was in his hand, which is a little strange because you would figure if he hit the ground, the gun would probably be released from his grip and it would be on the ground, which it wasn't.

Speaker 9 Investigators immediately honed in on the fact that it was odd for someone who allegedly committed suicide to still be holding on to the gun.

Speaker 2 We could rule out a suicide at this point, but your mind starts working and thinking, I mean, what happened? Was it a burglary? Was it a robbery?

Speaker 7 In the next room, Thomas's shaken wife, Shelly, is also processing the devastating scene.

Speaker 2 I was stunned. I was absolutely shocked.
I just remember trying to get through minute to minute. Mrs.
Gilbert's with a couple of detectives asking questions.

Speaker 2 You just keep on going until you find out all the facts.

Speaker 7 Born in 1945, Thomas Gilbert seemed destined for success from a young age.

Speaker 6 He was born into a very upper-class white collar family. He didn't want for anything while he was growing up.
He attended Andover College and then he graduated from Princeton in 1966.

Speaker 7 In the late 70s, Thomas was an up-and-coming Wall Street big shot when he met beautiful Shelly Ray.

Speaker 2 I met Tom at my favorite dance in New York. He called the following Tuesday.
We went to a discotheque called the Hippopotamus for drinks.

Speaker 2 Three quarters of the way through the evening, I wanted to give him a shake and say, where have you been all these years?

Speaker 6 She was a debutante and they moved in the same circles of high society New York. And they married in 1981.
They were a beautiful couple. They seemed to be madly in love.

Speaker 7 By the early 80s, Thomas and Shelley were comfortably established in their roles amongst New York's upper crust.

Speaker 6 Thomas worked on Wall Street and Shelley Gilbert was assistant vice president at Newcourt Securities Corporation. They later moved to the Upper East Side.
They also had a home in the Hamptons.

Speaker 9 They had it pretty well.

Speaker 10 Memberships to various clubs.

Speaker 9 They were pretty much socialites in the area and had a lot of friends and were well-respected people in the community.

Speaker 7 Three years into their marriage, Thomas and Shelley welcomed a baby boy.

Speaker 2 Tommy was born in 1984 and we were ecstatic. After paternity leave, I went back to work for a year and I missed him dreadfully, so I became a full-time mother.

Speaker 9 The Gilberts had two children, Tommy, and they also had a daughter.

Speaker 2 We were ready to have children and loved it, absolutely loved every bit of parenting.

Speaker 7 When it was time for their son to attend college, Tommy followed in his father's footsteps by attending Princeton.

Speaker 2 While he was at Princeton, he was taking an economics course that he absolutely adored.

Speaker 7 With dashing good looks, Tommy stood out among his wealthy, pedigreed peers.

Speaker 11 He was quite tall. I think he's about 6'3, very, very fit, blonde, very model-looking.
He dressed very casually.

Speaker 7 In 2009, Tommy graduated from Princeton with a degree in economics.

Speaker 6 Thomas Gilbert Sr.

Speaker 6 really wanted his son, his namesake, to follow in his footsteps, to carry on the family name and pursue a job on Wall Street.

Speaker 7 But Tommy, like his father, wanted to chart his own path.

Speaker 2 He tried to start a business of his own using technical charts to predict market action. He went through the legal process to establish his company.

Speaker 2 He did some work for my husband in my husband's business, and my husband paid him for it whenever he could.

Speaker 7 Still, Tommy had to rely on his parents to stay afloat in expensive Manhattan.

Speaker 6 Thomas's Chelsea apartment was $2,400 a month. Thomas's parents paid for his apartment and they also gave him an allowance of $1,000 a week.

Speaker 7 With the generous cash influx of over $6,000 a month from his parents, Tommy had time to work and play the field. Tall, blonde, and destined for big things, Tommy never had a hard time finding a date.

Speaker 6 After college, Tommy started dating a socialite named Lizzie Frazier. The two of them together were beautiful and a stunning pair out on the New York social scene.

Speaker 7 After their relationship fizzled, Tommy began a fling with publicist Anna Rothschild in December of 2013.

Speaker 11 I did think he was very handsome, that's for sure. He told me that he worked for his dad for a time, but so I got the feeling that he was just trying to do something to make his dad proud.

Speaker 7 While his son dated gorgeous women and tried to build a reputation in the business world, Tommy Sr. was hard at work on a new venture of his own.

Speaker 7 After 40 years on Wall Street, he started his own hedge fund, Wayne Scott Capital.

Speaker 2 Tom was starting a business, but it wasn't quite there yet.

Speaker 2 But it showed every sign of doing exceedingly well.

Speaker 7 The Gilbert family seemed bound for continued wealth and success.

Speaker 7 Until one tragic January afternoon.

Speaker 2 We had received the call that there was a person shot at the Beekman apartment complex.

Speaker 6 Thomas Gilbert Sr. has been murdered.
The weapon was laying on his chest and his hand was placed over the weapon. What it appears to be is a bungled attempt to make it look like a suicide.

Speaker 7 After ruling out suicide, detectives are also able to quickly eliminate the possibility of a random attack.

Speaker 2 Either you're getting buzzed in or you have a key, so we know that. We also know that there was no breaking at the front door of the Gilbert home as well, so we knew that it wasn't a burglary.

Speaker 7 But who targeted this wealthy businessman?

Speaker 6 By this point, the neighborhood is aware that Thomas Gilbert Sr. has been murdered and everyone is concerned.
Is there a killer on the loose that could come for them next?

Speaker 7 Coming up, Shelly Gilbert relives the worst day of her life.

Speaker 2 This is horrific, and I'm not sure I'll ever believe it happened. I was terrified.

Speaker 7 And a citywide manhunt becomes front page news.

Speaker 2 We have a shell-casing envelope with the serial number of the gun that was recovered at the crime scene. Let's get the person that did this as fast as we can.

Speaker 11 All my friends were telling me, get out of your apartment. I was so scared.

Speaker 7 In January of 2015, Shelley Gilbert was full of pride for the success of both her husband, Thomas Gilbert Sr., and her son, Tommy.

Speaker 2 Tom was starting a business. Tommy, maybe a month before that, he had done a very fine analysis of the market, which Tom had actually used in his investing with success.
It was good for his portfolio.

Speaker 2 So I was thrilled.

Speaker 9 Is it not every father's dream to have their son follow in their footsteps whenever that's possible?

Speaker 7 But that dream came to an abrupt end on the afternoon of January 4th when Shelley Gilbert found her husband dead inside their Manhattan apartment.

Speaker 2 This is horrific, and I'm not sure I'll ever believe it happened. I was terrified.
Mr. Gilbert is laying on his back.
He had one gunshot wound to his head, which was the cause of death.

Speaker 2 The gun was a 40 Glock. There was a spent round found at the scene, as well as the casing.

Speaker 7 To piece it all together, investigators turned to the woman who'd made the 911 call, Thomas's wife, Shelly.

Speaker 9 The odd thing is that Shelly's tone of voice on the call was rather...

Speaker 2 calm.

Speaker 9 I mean, let's face it, whenever there's a spouse who is met with some sort of horrible death, they always look to the husband or the wife.

Speaker 7 In her interview with police, Shelley explains that around 3 o'clock that afternoon, their 30-year-old son, Tommy, had paid an unexpected visit.

Speaker 2 He came in unannounced. I was surprised to see him, thrilled to have him come by.
He told me he wanted to see...

Speaker 2 Tom to discuss business.

Speaker 7 On his way to talk with his father, Shelley says Tommy asked her for a favor.

Speaker 2 I thought, this is good news. He's really doing well.
He wants to work with Tom. That's terrific.
He asked me to go out and get a sandwich and Coke, and I did. That was that.

Speaker 2 He and his dad were going to have a conversation relative to some financial things, and he had some plans that he wanted to go into with his dad.

Speaker 2 That's when Thomas went into the room to speak to his dad.

Speaker 9 Shelly leaves the house, and call it a mother's intuition, call it what you will. But a few minutes later she gets what she describes as a bad feeling.
She turns around and goes back to her apartment.

Speaker 2 I came back right away. There was something about it that was concerning, so I came right back.
I didn't get a sandwich.

Speaker 7 Shelly tells detectives that as soon as she entered the apartment, her stomach sank.

Speaker 9 She is most notably struck by what she calls a deafening silence when she walks in.

Speaker 2 I was expecting to hear conversation when I listened at the door. I heard nothing, and I was concerned about that.

Speaker 9 She goes to the back bedroom and immediately sees her husband on the floor.

Speaker 2 My first thought when I saw Tom was, oh, you're knocked out. You must have gotten into a fisticuff.

Speaker 7 Shelly says she quickly realized the situation was much worse.

Speaker 9 She sees her husband on on the floor with a bullet hole to the side of his head, kind of weirdly holding a.40 caliber block. Shelly immediately picks up the phone to call 911, as any wife would do.

Speaker 2 I remember talking to the nice lady on the other end of the phone. You know, when will they be here? When will they be here?

Speaker 2 I remember being desperately in need of being with somebody, not being alone. It seemed like a very long time before they came.

Speaker 7 Shelley tells investigators there's only one person who could have shot Thomas. Their son, Tommy Jr.

Speaker 9 That's the only other person in the apartment. When she leaves, by the time Shelley Gilbert gets back, following her intuition, Tommy's no longer there.

Speaker 2 I thought, oh, you're far sicker than we ever knew.

Speaker 7 According to Shelley, Tommy suffers from severe mental illness.

Speaker 2 He would do things like wash his hands frequently. He would lose things.
That seemed to increase, and I realized in retrospect that certain objects became contaminated and he couldn't deal with them.

Speaker 2 And so that he would just avoid them. And as that became more so,

Speaker 2 it became obvious what was going on.

Speaker 6 Thomas was diagnosed with obsessive-compulsive disorder, and it would show itself sometimes with him believing that things and places and people were contaminated or radioactive.

Speaker 2 When he last saw his doctor, they were trying to evaluate him for schizophrenia,

Speaker 2 which I'm sure he was full on schizophrenia.

Speaker 2 We wanted to get him help. We were trying to convince him to get help.

Speaker 7 Shelley tells detectives that their efforts had only pushed Tommy further away.

Speaker 2 He didn't want to have anything to do with us and he wouldn't answer texts or phone calls or emails. When we did talk to him, he'd tell us not to try and get in touch with him.

Speaker 2 As he got sicker and sicker towards the end there, we saw less and less and less of him.

Speaker 2 We were bashing our heads trying to figure out how to communicate with him more, arranging things to keep him busy that we might be able to be part of.

Speaker 7 As Shelly pours her heart out to detectives, it seems clear to them that she is telling the truth.

Speaker 2 This poor lady, you feel terrible for her. She lost her husband.
In her mind, she thinks her son had something to do with this.

Speaker 2 You could pretty much tell at that point you could eliminate her as being a suspect. Watching her and seeing her demeanor, we knew that she wasn't involved in this.

Speaker 7 As for Tommy, detectives know they need to act quickly.

Speaker 2 We're making him prime suspect, number one, at this point.

Speaker 2 We have to worry about if Thomas is the alleged perp at this particular point. Okay, does Thomas have another gun on him? You don't want some innocent person being shot.

Speaker 2 Let's get the person that did this as fast as we can.

Speaker 8 It is a murder sending ripples through a quiet, upscale Manhattan neighborhood.

Speaker 12 It could be a male white in early 30s, wearing a dark color sweatshirt. His name is Thomas Gilbert Jr.

Speaker 12 He may still be in the area, unknown right now if he's off or not.

Speaker 7 Coming up, police close in on their suspect.

Speaker 9 They have no idea what to expect.

Speaker 7 And alarming new information casts a dark shadow over this once gilded Prince of Manhattan.

Speaker 6 Neighbors saw someone standing in that cemetery among the tombstones, watching the blaze as this house burnt to the ground.

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Speaker 7 On January 4th, 2015, detectives with NYPD's 17th precinct have launched a manhunt for 30-year-old Tommy Gilbert after his father, 70-year-old Thomas Gilbert Sr., was found shot to death inside his upscale Manhattan apartment.

Speaker 2 We find out where he lives. We ping his phone.
We get a warrant that we'll know where his location is.

Speaker 2 so we're up on his phone we're checking if he's using credit cards we flagged the father's credit cards

Speaker 7 as the police dragnet intensifies news of the high-profile shooting sends shockwaves through new york's upper crust i had looked at my messages and people were saying tommy killed his dad All my friends were telling me, get out of your apartment.

Speaker 11 He's going to come there and kill you. I was so scared.

Speaker 7 Almost six hours pass with no updates. Then detectives finally get a break.

Speaker 2 There was a ping on the phone. Ping, meaning that a location.
And that location was his residence, his apartment.

Speaker 7 At 9.30 p.m., law enforcement converge on Tommy's Chelsea apartment building.

Speaker 9 They have no idea. what to expect, right? They don't know if Tommy is still armed and dangerous, if he's alive on the other side of the door.
They have no idea.

Speaker 2 We're waiting out there for a long time, it seemed like. And all of a sudden, who surfaces? Thomas.

Speaker 9 Tommy eventually just sort of casually opens the door while he's casually talking on his phone and lets them know that he's on the phone with his lawyer.

Speaker 2 He knew the jig was up. I'm sure what he's thinking is, my best bet is to come out.
Let me not make this a worse situation.

Speaker 2 At that point, he's handcuffed and searched, and he's transported back to the 17th precinct.

Speaker 2 We get back to the 17th precinct and we put him in an interview room where we were going to interview him. At that point, a lawyer showed up and said, cease insist all questioning, and we stopped.

Speaker 7 Tommy may not be talking, but the media is.

Speaker 6 The press jumped on this immediately. immediately.
We've got money and power and privilege and murder. This is the kind of stuff journalists really go for.

Speaker 2 When you have names such as Princeton and the Hamptons attached to your name, it hits the news in a big way.

Speaker 2 And if Tom and I had been factory workers,

Speaker 2 and living on the outer edges of New York, the press wouldn't have paid any attention to it whatsoever.

Speaker 7 As the media storm intensifies, NYPD investigators focus in on Tommy's past.

Speaker 7 Speaking to his closest friends, detectives are stunned to learn that the handsome 30-year-old is the subject of another investigation, this one in nearby Southampton, a vacation haven for the East Coast's wealthy elite.

Speaker 9 Tommy Gilbert became best friends with a man named Peter Smith.

Speaker 6 Thomas would often go surfing and spend weekends at Peter's home in the Hamptons where they would hang out. They were really close.

Speaker 7 However, friends say the relationship soured when Tommy accused Peter of hitting on his ex-girlfriend, the gorgeous socialite Lizzie Frazier.

Speaker 9 Tommy was, for lack of a better word, infatuated with her. And even after they broke up, Lizzie became a point of contention between Tommy and his one-time best friend, Peter Smith.

Speaker 9 Tommy accused Peter of wanting to be with Lizzie, even though the relationship was over and even though Peter denied all of the allegations, that really stuck with Tommy.

Speaker 7 According to his friends, the tension between Peter and Tommy allegedly boiled over in the fall of 2013.

Speaker 9 One day, as Peter left his apartment, he was brutally attacked, allegedly by his old BFF, Tommy Gilbert.

Speaker 6 For whatever reason, Peter decided not to press charges against Thomas.

Speaker 7 Though Peter never formally pressed charges, he did get lawyers involved.

Speaker 6 Thomas's friends were...

Speaker 6 concerned about him, but they were also a little afraid. After that, Peter got a restraining order against Thomas.

Speaker 7 Then, almost a year later, Tommy's friends say a mysterious fire broke out in Peter Smith's Hampton's home.

Speaker 6 The whole home burns down. Investigators, upon going through the rubble, discover

Speaker 6 that this was arson. There were neighbors who said that they saw someone standing in that cemetery among the tombstones watching the blaze as this house burnt to the ground.

Speaker 6 And in that cemetery, investigators did find a gasoline can and strips of purple sheets that looked like they were used to accelerate the blaze.

Speaker 7 Despite Peter's suspicions, Southampton investigators never uncovered definitive proof that Tommy Gilbert was responsible for the blaze.

Speaker 2 The police were not able to prove anything about that that house. If he did it, if he did not, who knows?

Speaker 6 Thomas Gilbert was never charged or convicted with setting the fire. He was the main person of interest.

Speaker 7 Now, only four months after the fire, Tommy is back in the crosshairs of law enforcement. To get more information, police sit down with Shelly Gilbert once again.

Speaker 7 According to Shelley, though her son had suffered from mental illness for over a decade, he worked hard to hide it from those outside the family.

Speaker 2 He was always putting his best foot forward. So when he got sick, that was very much a part of what he was doing.

Speaker 2 Trying to appear, in that case, normal.

Speaker 2 And so that made it harder to see.

Speaker 6 Throughout all of this, his outward appearance is still immaculate. Meanwhile, his apartment is a train wreck.
It's the shambles, dirty, everything's out of place.

Speaker 6 There's a mismatch between his outward appearance and what's really going on behind the closed doors.

Speaker 7 According to Shelley, as the years went by, Tommy became more and more paranoid.

Speaker 2 His paranoia was that people were out to harm him, and he had various iterations of that that were very real to him.

Speaker 7 As Tommy's paranoia grew, so did his dependence on his parents.

Speaker 2 Thomas Gilbert Sr. used to give Jr.
money. He used to give him $1,000 a week, and he used to pay his rent, which was $2,400.

Speaker 7 Through it all, Shelley says she and her husband tried desperately to get their son the help he needed.

Speaker 2 The only way to get somebody into a hospital against them will is to go through the legal process, which we were more than willing to do, to have them taken in by the state.

Speaker 2 But there are so many people that get taken into the state that they are overwhelmed and will keep people typically only for four days.

Speaker 2 And after four days, one would have a very angry, very mentally ill son on their hands, which is even worse.

Speaker 9 If you have an adult child who's suffering with mental illness, it is very difficult to force that person

Speaker 10 to see doctors and take their medication.

Speaker 9 And that's the trap that the Gilbert family fell into here.

Speaker 7 Shelley tells police she believes Tommy is so sick that there's no way he could have understood what he did when he put a gun to his father's head.

Speaker 2 He was capable of doing it, but not understanding the impact and the importance of it.

Speaker 7 Coming up, Tommy's friends paint a different picture of this Playboy's life.

Speaker 11 He seemed to be in very good spirits two weeks before he had killed his dad.

Speaker 7 And detectives uncover bad blood between father and son.

Speaker 2 All of a sudden, his dad is taking some money away from him.

Speaker 9 He says, in my opinion, sarcastically, I love you. You're wonderful.
Now, stay the hell away from me.

Speaker 7 In January 2015, Shelly Gilbert finds herself at the center of a storm few can imagine. Her husband of 35 years is dead, and her beloved son is under arrest for his murder.

Speaker 2 I still can't believe that. I still can't believe that is true.
Not only am I a grieving widow, but a grieving mother.

Speaker 7 Shelley believes mental illness is what caused Tommy Gilbert Jr. to shoot his father on January 4th, 2015.

Speaker 2 He was sicker than we realized, and then he proceeded to get sicker because he wasn't getting any help.

Speaker 7 As investigators build their case, one question remains. If Tommy was mentally ill, how did he manage to get his hands on the.40 caliber Glock he used to kill his father?

Speaker 9 You can't get permission to have a firearm permit, a handgun permit, unless you have four people in your life willing to attest that you are mentally fit. Tommy didn't do that.

Speaker 7 Having confiscated Tommy's computer from his apartment, investigators scrutinize the 30-year-old's emails. They discover that Tommy found the Glock for sale on the internet.

Speaker 9 So Tommy has a long email exchange with the gun seller where they decide on price and they decide on Tommy getting in the car and driving to Ohio to get the gun because the person selling the gun figured out that it's illegal to just throw a Glock in the mail.

Speaker 11 But May, when I broke up with him, that week is the week that he went to go buy the gun.

Speaker 7 To investigators, Tommy's trip to Ohio seems at odds with his mother's portrayal of a young man who had no understanding of his actions.

Speaker 11 Sounds like it was quite planned that he drove to another state, bought a gun, drove back with it in order to hide it.

Speaker 7 If the murder was pre-planned and not part of a psychotic break, what was Tommy's motive?

Speaker 2 We're interviewing everyone we can, anyone that he may have come into contact with, friends or family, whatever we could do.

Speaker 7 It seems Thomas Sr.'s new business venture required him to tighten the reins on his cash flow to Tommy Jr.

Speaker 6 Thompson's father did not have the funds that he once did at the time of his death. He was in the process of starting a new business venture, and that takes money.

Speaker 2 As times got a little difficult for Senior, he started to diminish his weekly pay. So it went down from $1,000, I believe it went down to $600, I believe it even went down to $300.

Speaker 2 Through those investigations, you're finding out that he's one of these little rich kids with the entitlement issue. And now all of a sudden his dad is taking some money away from him.

Speaker 7 Authorities surmise that as the funds dwindled, the tension between Tommy and his dad rose exponentially.

Speaker 9 It culminates in the months prior to this murder, with Tommy basically sending an email to his father, probably the longest email that he's ever sent to his father, where he says, in my opinion, sarcastically,

Speaker 9 hey, dad, you've been the greatest dad ever. I love you.
You're wonderful. Now, stay the hell away from me.
I don't want to be your son.

Speaker 9 If we cross paths, I want you to cross the street. Don't contact me.
Don't email me. Don't talk to me.

Speaker 7 As evidence mounts, NYPD detectives begin to believe that it was not mental illness, but greed and anger that drove this wealthy Upper East Sider to commit murder.

Speaker 2 What we started to believe that Thomas Jr. went there and probably

Speaker 2 had an argument with his dad. Mom went out.
That's why he didn't want the mom there. And obviously he had a gun on him.
So his intent was to go there.

Speaker 2 And if he didn't get what he wanted, being the spoiled brat he was, he shot him.

Speaker 2 He panicked. He tried to protect himself and make it look like a suicide, placing the gun in his dad's hand.

Speaker 9 Tommy Gilbert was charged with second-degree murder. He was also charged with two counts of criminal possession of a weapon.

Speaker 9 He was also charged with criminal possession of ammunition within the New York City limits.

Speaker 7 As the legal and media storms rise, Shelly Gilbert's frustration mounts.

Speaker 2 Who wants to hear their child is spoiled and entitled? No, nobody wants to hear that. And it wasn't true.
We lid a very nice life,

Speaker 2 but we lead it respectfully and put our best efforts out. We're not spoiled people.
We don't raise spoiled children.

Speaker 7 Shelley's concerns escalate as Tommy's condition worsens behind bars.

Speaker 2 I would visit him and it was horrifying. Sometimes I visited him and he was remarkably coherent.
And sometimes he refused to see me and I assume those were... days he was really having a hard time.

Speaker 2 So here I was left visiting him and watching him get sicker and sicker and sicker and not being able to do a thing about it.

Speaker 6 While he was in prison, Thomas's psychosis seemed to be becoming worse.

Speaker 6 And he would say that he believed everything around him was contaminated and he thought that if he touched certain things, he would die.

Speaker 7 At Shelley's insistence, Tommy's attorneys attempt to take action.

Speaker 9 Tommy's lawyer wasn't quite sure that Tommy was actually competent to stand trial.

Speaker 13 Mr. Gilbert was undergoing a severe mental health break.
I moved very quickly to have him declared unfit by the court.

Speaker 7 Coming up, as a courtroom fight rages over Tommy Gilbert's mental competence, his mother stands behind him.

Speaker 2 How can I shut him out?

Speaker 2 That's the question. I can't.
It's impossible. He's still Tommy Gilbert.
He's just a very diseased Tommy Gilbert.

Speaker 7 And Tommy's future is determined.

Speaker 9 You can have mental illness, and you can still be guilty of a crime.

Speaker 7 In August of 2015, Tommy Gilbert's attorneys move to have the 31-year-old Ivy Leager declared unfit for trial.

Speaker 2 Defendants have to be able to understand what is going on in the courtroom. What the judge does, what the jury does, what the prosecutor and defense attorney do.

Speaker 2 He was incapable of that kind of higher level of thought.

Speaker 7 To prove Tommy is unfit for trial, his attorneys have him evaluated.

Speaker 2 The first two psychiatrists were from Bellevue Hospital. Two of them did a very thorough analysis and determined that Tommy was not fit for trial.

Speaker 13 He was contemporaneously evaluated by multiple experienced and independent psychiatrists. They deemed him to be unfit, unequivocally unfit to participate in his defense.

Speaker 7 Despite the findings of medical professionals, the prosecution attempts to argue otherwise.

Speaker 13 The prosecutors believed that he could participate in his own defense. He could decide strategy for his own defense.

Speaker 13 He could tell his lawyers what happened, what didn't happen, what's true, what's not. He could be part of the process.

Speaker 7 While Tommy is held behind bars, judges and mental health professionals debate Tommy's fitness. Then, on November 4th, 2015, 10 months after his arrest, the judge makes a decision.

Speaker 13 The prosecutors hired a doctor that did rule him to be fit for trial, and the trial proceeded.

Speaker 2 I was stunned. I was absolutely shocked.
He declared him fit for trial.

Speaker 13 So the system fails everybody. Fails Mrs.
Gilbert. fails Mr.
Gilbert Sr. and his memory.
It fails the defendant. He was completely unfit to participate in these proceedings.

Speaker 7 In May 2019, after a series of delays, 34-year-old Tommy's trial finally gets underway in a Manhattan courtroom. The media is anxious to get a look at the former New York Playboy.

Speaker 9 He had movie star looks. Fast forward to 2019, and that Tommy Gilbert is disheveled, looks older than his years, weathered, stressed.

Speaker 2 Over the years, his physical appearance deteriorated completely. And he wasn't even getting enough food to eat.
I didn't know it was possible for him to look so pale.

Speaker 11 He was unrecognizable. It was shocking how thin and pale and different he looked.
I wouldn't have recognized him if he were walking down the street.

Speaker 7 At his trial, Tommy's mental health is once again front and center.

Speaker 6 Thomas Gilbert ended up pleading not guilty due to reasons of insanity.

Speaker 9 In order to be found mentally insane, you have to show that you didn't know what you were doing is wrong.

Speaker 7 On May 28th, Shelly Gilbert takes the stand, determined to prove her son's true mental state at the time of her husband's murder.

Speaker 2 I wanted the court to understand how very sick he was. I mean if you brushed up against him with the coat that it was contaminated, he couldn't handle that.

Speaker 2 It was too painful for him, too difficult to process.

Speaker 2 He'd be very upset.

Speaker 7 Shelley asserts that Tommy grew to have such feelings about his father as well.

Speaker 2 He thought his father was controlling the horror show that was going on in his head.

Speaker 2 And that's, I think, was his reasoning for it. But he had no way of comprehending the gravity of it.
The money that the press has been talking about had nothing to do with it.

Speaker 7 Shelley's testimony is powerful. But discussing Tommy's illness in front of her son is a heart-wrenching experience.

Speaker 2 Here I was talking in depth about very personal things about my son. and my perceptions and my husband's perceptions of him, all deeply personal, and he was sitting right there listening to it all.

Speaker 2 I mean, that's not healthy for him, and it was brutal for me, of course.

Speaker 7 When it's the prosecution's turn, they allege that Tommy went to his parents' home that day, fully aware of his intentions.

Speaker 9 Tommy Gilbert drove from New York to Ohio to get his hands on that gun. He bought the ammo.
He bought a speed loader. Now, fast forward to the day of, what does Tommy do?

Speaker 9 He He shows up at his parents' apartment unannounced, chats with his mother, and then makes sure that she has to leave the apartment because he knows that he's about to kill his father.

Speaker 9 Tommy specifically said he wanted a sandwich and a Coke.

Speaker 9 Why is that significant? Because he knew that Shelly never kept Coke in the house. She would actually have to leave the apartment to go do what Tommy wanted.

Speaker 2 And she did.

Speaker 7 Prosecutors say it was greed, not mental illness, that caused Tommy to kill his father.

Speaker 9 When his dad decided to pull back on the money reins, Tommy probably felt very, very threatened.

Speaker 9 Not just that he was going to be out a few bucks, but that his entire lifestyle might come to a screeching halt. You can have mental illness and you can still be guilty of a crime.

Speaker 9 The point in Tommy Gilbert's case was: yes, he was mentally ill, but he wasn't so mentally ill as to get a pass for what he did.

Speaker 7 The ultimate decision rests with the jury. On June 28th, they return with a verdict.

Speaker 2 He ended up being convicted of second-degree murder and second-degree criminal possession of a weapon.

Speaker 9 The judge in this case sentenced Tommy to the maximum she could have sentenced him to, which is 30 years to life.

Speaker 9 She acknowledged that Tommy is mentally ill, but she, like the jury, did not buy that he was legally insane at the time he committed this crime.

Speaker 7 Though the conviction brings closure to the case, for Shelly Gilbert, the anguish never ends.

Speaker 2 I wasn't surprised so much as gut-wrenched,

Speaker 2 horrified.

Speaker 2 I still am.

Speaker 9 Shelly Gilbert is an example of what unconditional love truly looks like.

Speaker 3 Her husband is dead.

Speaker 9 Her son pulled the trigger, but she has been a staunch advocate for Tommy Gilbert.

Speaker 2 I love Tommy. I hate

Speaker 2 the disease. If he'd gotten the help he needed, my husband would still be alive today.

Speaker 13 It's a very sad situation because the Gilbert family has been ripped apart by this, right? Mr. Gilbert Sr., who is a wonderful man, is no longer here.
Mrs.

Speaker 13 Gilbert's left a widow with her only son incarcerated, and it's just sad all around.

Speaker 2 Society as a whole needs to understand this is how we treat our very mentally ill. We need to shine a bright light on it so people understand

Speaker 2 it.

Speaker 2 What happened to our family should never, ever

Speaker 2 to any other family again in this country, and it can and should be corrected.

Speaker 7 Tommy Gilbert will be eligible for parole in 2044.

Speaker 4 He will be 59 years old.

Speaker 14 Shelly Gilbert maintains that Tommy was not mentally competent when he shot his father. She plans to appeal his conviction.

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