The Deaths of John Chakalos & Linda Carman Part 3 (Connecticut) 35:24

Dark Down East is proudly sponsored by Amica Insurance. The unexpected can happen at any moment, and Amica knows how important it is to be prepared. Whether it's auto, home, or life insurance, Amica has you covered. Their dedicated and knowledgeable representatives will work with you to make sure you have the right coverage in place to protect what matters most. You can feel confident that Amica is there for you. Visit amica.com to get started.

Want the same expert advice you get from the pros in the store while shopping online at DiscountTire.com? Meet Treadwell, your personal online tire guide that matches you with the perfect tire for your vehicle. Get your best match in one minute or less with Treadwell by Discount Tire. Let's get you taken care of.

In October of 2016, about a month after he was plucked from a life raft after a week at sea, Nathan Carman walked into the private memorial service he'd organized to honor his mother, Linda Carman. Linda had been on Nathan's fishing boat when it sank, and though Nathan apparently survived the freak accident, Linda or her body were never recovered.

Authorities deemed the amount of time and conditions out there in the open ocean beyond the point of survivability, and so she was presumed dead. As such, Nathan wanted to honor his mother. Notably missing from the private service, though, were Linda Carman's three sisters, Valerie Santilli, Elaine Shaklas, and Charlene Gallagher.

It was publicly obvious that something wasn't right. The relationship between Nathan Carman and his aunts was not a good one. Soon it would be abundantly clear how and what the aunts thought about their nephew. They believed he was a murderer, driven by greed for the family fortune.

If you haven't already, begin with parts one and two of this story. They're out right now. I'm Kylie Lowe, and this is part three of a three-part miniseries covering the cases of John Shockless and Linda Carmen on Dark Down East.

According to a will filed in the probate division of New Hampshire's 8th Circuit Court, the estate of John Shockless was worth more than $42 million. It was left to his four daughters when he was killed by way of the Shockless Family Dynasty Trust. This trust would distribute John's assets to the individual trusts in each of his four daughters' names.

Among the financial assets were pieces of property that John owned, including his estate in West Chesterfield, New Hampshire. That home was intended to be left to Linda Carmen. Each of the Shockless daughters had some control over beneficiaries of their trust. Linda, with encouragement from her father before he was killed, named Nathan Carmen as the beneficiary of hers.

The probate court settlement meeting for the estate of John Shockless was scheduled for the week following the disappearance of the chickenpox, with Nathan and Linda aboard. If Linda was not present at the settlement meeting, the home once belonging to John Shockless would likely be given to Nathan, as he was the beneficiary of his mother's trust.

Various reports estimate that the value of that home and property was about $5 million. In total, probate court documents showed that Nathan Carman stood to inherit more than $7 million. That is, unless his aunts could do something to stop it.

The sisters of Linda Carmen were not about to let the person suspected of killing their father and having involvement in their sister Linda's disappearance inherit millions of dollars. Without any formal charges filed against Nathan for the murder of John, though, the best recourse the sisters had was a civil court case known as a Slayer Petition.

According to Cornell Law, the Slayer Petition, or the Slayer Rule, is part of trust and estates law that says a murderer cannot claim the inheritance of their victim. What's interesting about the Slayer Rule is that the accused murderer does not have to be convicted of the crime to be disqualified from inheriting the property of the victim.

A Slayer petition asks a judge to declare the suspect or accused person as the killer before or without criminal proceedings to conclusively name that person the murderer.

In the summer of 2017, as Nathan Carman's legal battles for the insurance payout rolled on, his aunts Valerie, Elaine, and Charlene filed the petition with New Hampshire courts in an attempt to block him from inheriting some $7 million from the estate of his grandfather.

As reported by Dave Altomare for the Hartford Courant, the petition alleged that Nathan committed the, quote, heinous act of shooting and killing his grandfather in his Windsor, Connecticut home in 2013 out of malice and greed, end quote.

The petition asked the court to name Nathan Carman as the murderer of John Shockless and as having involvement with the disappearance of Linda Carman based on the evidence available. Quote,

The details and evidence in the death of John and the disappearance of Linda all point to Nathan as the prime suspect. Yet, he now stands to inherit millions of dollars from their estates. His aunts seek to prevent that unjust result." The petition alleged that Nathan could not account for his whereabouts between midnight and 8 a.m. on the night his grandfather was killed, and that Nathan and John argued about money before John's murder.

It's stated that Nathan refused a polygraph test and that he purchased a rifle that used the same caliber bullets used to kill John Choklis, among other claims. When the petition was initially filed, Nathan was represented by the same attorney who represented him in the boat insurance case. But in September of 2017, Nathan filed paperwork notifying the court that he planned to represent himself against his aunts.

Based on later developments in the ongoing suit, I can only assume this move had something to do with finances. Nathan did not have a job and money was presumably scarce. Representing himself would have been a budget-friendly decision. However, a few months later in November, Nathan did ultimately hire his same attorney, Hubert Santos, to support him in the Slayer petition proceedings.

Attorney Santos responded to the lawsuit, asking the court to toss out the case altogether because New Hampshire was the wrong venue for the proceedings given that John Shockless was not a legal resident of the state. He lived in Connecticut, and therefore, the case had no grounds in New Hampshire despite John owning his massive mansion there.

Nathan also denied in the petition that he could not account for his whereabouts on the night of his grandfather's murder, and denied that he ever argued with John about money. Nathan did not deny, however, that he refused a polygraph test. He said although he would not agree to take that lie detector test, he did agree to being interviewed by police. Nathan also did not deny purchasing a gun that matched the kind of ammunition used to kill John Choklis.

The Slayer petition proceedings were just as long and drawn out as the insurance suit. Two issues, technicalities really, central to the case, included the status of Linda Carmen. She was presumed missing at sea, but was she legally dead? And then there was the issue raised by Nathan's attorney. Was this lawsuit even filed in the appropriate state?

In February of 2018, as a judge heard arguments from both sides in the ongoing proceedings, Nathan Carman chose to make a public statement. Quote, I did not kill my grandfather or my mother, nor did I engage in the violent behavior in my childhood that has been reported. It is my aunts who are being driven by malice and greed to make the vexatious, false, and insupportable allegations which form the basis of their probate lawsuit in New Hampshire.

An attorney representing Nathan's aunts said that the allegations that their Slayer petition probate suit was all about money were false.

The family only wanted justice, he said. If the sisters did win back the portion of Linda Carmen's estate, they promised to donate it to charity in her name. During actual court hearings, Nathan repeatedly invoked his Fifth Amendment rights, meaning he pleaded the Fifth in order to avoid self-incrimination.

However, Nathan became very vocal outside of the courtroom, appearing to seize every opportunity to address the media about the case his aunts filed against him. The Hartford Courant labeled one of his statements as a rambling diatribe. These statements were often filled with accusations thrown back at his aunts.

In May of 2018, Nathan said that his aunts were the ones who had financial motive to kill John Shockless. Quote, My aunt Valerie, for example, has told me several times she is the person that profited the most from his death. The petitioners are the people who have accused me of a murder that I didn't commit. He continued, My aunts hate me, and they hated me long before my grandfather died. End quote.

Nearly three years after the initial filing of the suit, a trial date was finally set for midsummer 2019 in the so-called Slayer petition filed by Nathan Carman's aunts. However, in a last-minute decision in May of 2019 by Judge David King, the entire suit was dismissed.

The judge ultimately decided that since John Shockless was a resident of Connecticut and not New Hampshire where the suit was filed, the aunts of Nathan Carman had no standing to file the case in New Hampshire court.

Although John Chocolis and his wife Rita had their sprawling estate and mansion in West Chesterfield, New Hampshire, known for its Christmas light display, Judge King determined that the New Hampshire residency wasn't real, and it was only established for tax purposes. John Chocolis really lived and had established a domicile in Connecticut.

As written in the decision by Judge King, quote, John Chaklis was a savvy businessman who hated paying taxes and only intended to create the appearance, for tax purposes, that he was domiciled in New Hampshire. In fact, his actual residence was in Connecticut. He had a more significant and lasting connection there, and he never intended to permanently reside outside that state, end quote.

With the petition dismissed, all civil action preventing Nathan from collecting his inheritance from his mother and grandfather's estates ended. The aunts would later appeal the ruling with the New Hampshire Supreme Court.

Enormous suspicion surrounded Nathan Carmen in the killing of his grandfather and the disappearance of his mother. His aunts believed he was the killer. The boat insurance company pointed fingers at him, and even the authorities identified Nathan Carmen as a prime suspect. So what exactly did they have on him?

The document that is most revealing about the early investigation and evidence against Nathan is a search and seizure warrant that I've referenced throughout all parts of this series. That warrant was made public in 2016 following the sinking of Nathan's boat, though it was issued in 2014. According to the affidavit, Nathan Carman was the last person to see John Choklis alive on December 19, 2013.

He had dinner with his grandfather, and he was at his Windsor, Connecticut home around 8.30 p.m. that night. After his dinner plans, Nathan was supposed to meet up with his mother in Glastonbury, Connecticut at 3 a.m. to drive to Rhode Island together. But Nathan never showed and wasn't answering his cell phone, so Linda went home.

At 4 a.m. on December 20th, Nathan finally called his mother and said that he was waiting in Glastonbury. He had just been running late. Authorities interviewed Nathan about his activities on the night of December 19th and into December 20th.

After checking Nathan's accounts of that night with video surveillance and cell phone records, it became clear that at least one hour of time was unaccounted for, a critical window between 2:57 a.m. and 4:00 a.m. What's more, Nathan disposed of the hard drive of his computer and his GPS on the morning of December 20th, 2013.

Police believed these items to be integral pieces of evidentiary value, but they were gone.

The very end of the document reads, quote, End quote.

Authorities tried to arrest Nathan all the way back in 2014, but they needed more information to get that arrest warrant signed. Just as the search and seizure warrant stated, the investigation was ongoing. The incident at sea in December of 2016 certainly renewed the investigative effort and public interest in the case of John Choklis.

In October 2016, a few weeks after Nathan was rescued, police searched Linda Carmen's home in Middleton and removed several items. Then in December of that year, the Associated Press reported that the FBI, among other agencies, were on a piece of abandoned property in New Hampshire, owned by the Chaklis family.

Ethan DeWitt and Isaac Stein reported for the Sentinel Source that the property located at 271 Route 9A was once the site of Spofford Hall, a 90,000 square foot building that housed a substance use rehabilitation center set on Spofford Lake.

The center closed its doors in 1995 and had been abandoned ever since. Why the FBI evidence response team was there donning hazmat suits and ventilators as they searched the grounds is anyone's guess, since a spokesperson for the Bureau would only say that they were assisting a multi-agency investigation. But just a side note, the building was demolished in 2021 and it was absolutely riddled with mold and asbestos.

Maybe the ventilators were to protect against the risks of exposure to those two substances. Or maybe they were for something else. The civil case against Nathan Carman filed by his aunts wrapped up in May of 2019, though they did continue to pursue the Slayer petition in Connecticut after appealing it with the New Hampshire Supreme Court.

And then the insurance claim battle closed with a judge ruling in the insurance company's favor in November of 2019. For a little over a year, it seemed Nathan got a bit of a reprieve from all the attention and legal hassles he'd faced since the day his boat sank in 2013. However quiet it may have seemed on the outside, though,

The investigation into the cases of John Chakalas and Linda Carmen was clearly ongoing because in May of 2022, the cases would see their biggest update yet, a grand jury indictment. Nathan Carmen was finally charged with murder.

Directly from the May 2022 indictment, quote, Beginning in or about 2013 and continuing until the present in the District of Vermont and elsewhere, defendant Nathan Carman devised a scheme to defraud the estate of John Shockless, its executor, the Dynasty Trust, and its trustees to obtain money from the Dynasty Trust by materially false and fraudulent pretenses

representations, and promises. As a central part of this scheme, Nathan Carman murdered John Shockless and Linda Carman. He concocted cover stories to conceal his involvement in those killings.

As part of his cover-up, Nathan Carman misrepresented his involvement in and responsibility for those deaths to law enforcement, to his family, to others who made inquiries about the deaths and their circumstances, and to others who challenged his cover-up or challenged his rights to his grandfather's assets." As the case stands right now, Nathan Carman is charged with eight total counts.

Counts 1, 2, and 3 are mail fraud, dating from May to November 2018. Mail fraud, as defined by Cornell Law, occurs when the U.S. mail is used in furtherance of a criminal act. Counts 4, 5, and 6 are wire fraud, dating from February to July of 2018. Wire fraud is a type of fraud that involves the use of some form of telecommunications or the internet to further a scheme.

In both the mail and wire fraud of this case, the scheme is defined as defrauding the estate of John Shockless, its executor and its trustees, to obtain money through materially false and fraudulent pretenses, representations, and promises.

Now, Count Seven is the big one. Count Seven reads,

This is the federal language for a charge of murder. Count 8 references the scheme to defraud and obtain money from BoatUS in the insurance claim suit, including another instance of wire fraud. But notably missing from this indictment is a charge for the murder of John Choklis.

Nathan Carman is not charged with that killing at this time, just the multiple counts of mail and wire fraud associated with the cover-up of John's murder.

However, there is significant discussion and multiple accusations included in the indictment that Nathan Carman did murder John Choklis. The indictment does not reveal if investigators have new physical evidence for the murder of John or the murder of Linda that they may have uncovered in the last several years before arresting Nathan Carman, but it does list circumstantial evidence.

Let's examine the allegations and evidence listed out in the May 2, 2022 grand jury indictment. According to the indictment, Nathan spent a lot of time with his grandfather in 2012 and 2013, the year before and year of his murder. Nathan tagged along to business meetings, and in other sources I've seen, he was photographed standing alongside his grandfather, possibly at a job site for one of his various real estate developments.

John Chaklis had convinced his daughter and Nathan's mother, Linda Carmen, to make Nathan the beneficiary of the trust in her name. John also set up a bank account in Nathan's name with $150,000 in it, which was intended to be used for a college education. Another account in both Nathan and his mother's name had $400,000 in it, with no express or dictated purpose for the funds noted in the indictment.

Nathan was named the beneficiary of these accounts upon his grandfather's death. But before John was murdered and Linda died under mysterious circumstances, Nathan was already benefiting from his grandfather's money. The indictment document states that John Choklis funded Nathan's living expenses, bought him a truck, and paid for his apartment.

During 2012 and 2013, when he was spending more time with his grandfather, Nathan was notably curious about how John had planned his estate. Nathan asked pointed questions of the trust attorney and financial advisors about how his mother was provided for in the various trusts his grandfather had set up. This, I believe, is presented as evidence of Nathan's motive. It was allegedly all about the money.

Another piece of circumstantial evidence discussed was a firearm owned by Nathan Carman at the time of his grandfather's murder. Police first mentioned the specific gun that Nathan Carman owned in that 2014 affidavit that was made public following the sinking of his boat in 2016. This weapon matched the caliber of bullets used to kill John. In the May 2022 indictment document, though, we get more details about this firearm.

The indictment notes that while Nathan Carman was living in Bloomfield, Connecticut, he actually had a New Hampshire driver's license that he obtained using the address of his grandfather's West Chesterfield, New Hampshire home. With that license, Nathan registered his truck in New Hampshire. On November 11, 2013, Nathan walked into Shooter's Outpost in Hooksett, New Hampshire and purchased a Sig Sauer rifle.

New Hampshire gun laws are among the most permissive in the United States. The live free or die state motto holds strong, whereas the laws in Nathan's then home state of Connecticut are comparatively more restrictive. If someone like Nathan wanted to buy a firearm, didn't want to jump through too many hoops to do it, and had the choice between buying in New Hampshire or buying in Connecticut, he would likely choose New Hampshire.

And obviously, that's the choice Nathan made. However, when law enforcement interviewed Nathan following the murder, Nathan denied ever purchasing that rifle. We already know from the 2014 search and seizure warrant that Nathan was the last person to see his grandfather on December 20th, 2013, about one month after buying the gun.

The 2022 indictment alleges that Nathan Carman shot and killed his grandfather with his new Sig Sauer while John Shockless slept at his Windsor, Connecticut home. The indictment document states that Nathan got rid of his computer hard drive and the GPS unit he used in his truck the night of the murder as part of his plan to cover up the crime. It also notes that Nathan lied about his whereabouts during the critical hours of 3 and 4 a.m. after the murder.

Further to the topic of motive, the whole financial benefit of killing his own grandfather, the indictment says that after John Joclis died, Nathan did receive those two accounts his grandfather set up to the sum of about $550,000. Apparently, during 2014 and 2016, before his mother disappeared off his sinking boat, Nathan was unemployed and living off these funds from the bank accounts he inherited.

But by the fall of 2016, that money was mostly gone, the indictment said, meaning Nathan had to figure out some other financial means for living. Nathan's scheme continued with the September 17, 2016 fishing trip with his mom, the document alleges. The indictment acknowledges the proven alterations Nathan performed on his boat, and it also mentions that before Nathan left on the trip, he removed his computer from his house.

This move prevented law enforcement from collecting it and reviewing its contents while he was supposedly lost at sea.

When Nathan was rescued, and the indictment puts rescued in quotation marks, he allegedly made false statements to the crew of the freighter who picked him up, as well as the Coast Guard and law enforcement agencies investigating Linda Carman's disappearance. His false statements continued, the indictment claims, as Nathan Carman moved forward with an insurance claim suit against Boat U.S. for the loss of his vessel.

And even more fraudulent statements were made, it's claimed, during the litigation for the so-called Slayer petition against Nathan Carman by his aunts. The indictment is light on mention of physical evidence, though that does not mean it doesn't exist. It's possible that further evidence will be introduced at trial when that day comes.

For now, the indictment alleges that Nathan had the opportunity, a fishing trip with his mom, and the motive, millions of dollars, to end his mother's life, and in the process committed numerous counts of wire and mail fraud to conceal and complete his alleged scheme.

If convicted of this murder on the high seas, as the Department of Justice referred to the charge, Nathan Carman faces a mandatory life sentence. So there's another detail about this case that I haven't shared with you yet, though it was first brought up during the insurance claim proceedings in 2018. I'm half inclined to believe it will become part of Nathan Carman's defense at trial,

And so I want you to know about it, though it is a rather inflammatory piece of information. Nathan Carman and his attorney revealed that his grandfather, John Shockless, had a mistress. And that mistress, and possibly her boyfriend, are the real murderers, they allege.

According to a motion filed in October of 2018 for a request to depose a woman referred to only as Mistress Y, the defense claimed that her testimony was likely to establish that when Nathan Carman left his grandfather's home on December 19th, John Shockless was alive and well and had not been shot.

Further, the defense believed that Mistress Y's testimony would indicate that the evidence of her involvement with John's murder was stronger than the evidence against Nathan. Citing a redacted Windsor Police Department supplemental report on the John Choklis homicide investigation, the motion lays out what they believe Mistress Y's testimony could reveal about the night John was killed.

From LaMotion directly, quote, At the time of John Chocolis' murder, Mistress Y was an attractive 25-year-old woman. Mistress Y first met 87-year-old John Chocolis during the spring of 2013 in connection with her job working in a housing complex in New Hampshire, which was controlled by Mr. Chocolis.

During the late spring and summer of 2013, John Chaklis regularly visited Mistress Y in New Hampshire and periodically took her out to lunch. During these visits, Mr. Chaklis would give Mistress Y increasingly large gifts of cash ranging from $100 to $800.

By August of 2013, the relationship between Mr. Swy and John Choklis involved Mr. Choklis giving Mr. Swy cash in exchange for sexual favors. At the time of this sexual activity, in August of 2013, Mr. Swy was living with her boyfriend in New Hampshire. In September of 2013, Mr. Swy moved from New Hampshire to Connecticut.

The relationship between Mr. Swye and John Chocolis continued through the fall of 2013. End quote. According to the motion, John and this Mr. Swye went to the Mohegan Sun Casino together throughout the weekend of December 13th and 14th, 2013. John gave her $3,500 cash that weekend. He also asked Mr. Swye to use a sex toy he'd purchased, but she refused.

Then on the day John Chaklis was murdered, the night he had dinner with Nathan Carmen, the motion states that John called Mistress Y around 8.36 p.m. and told her that his grandson was just leaving. After Nathan's departure, John and the woman spoke on the phone for about 20 minutes. During this call, he told her that he wasn't happy with what happened when they were at the casino the previous weekend.

If deposed, the motion claimed, Mistress Y would reveal in her testimony that she knew John Chocolis had a lot of money, that he kept cash in his home, and that she knew he would be home alone that night. It also claimed that this woman had a history of substance abuse disorder, as did her boyfriend at the time, who was also known to traffic in illegal narcotics.

In summary, the motion argues that this Mistress Y and or someone close to her could have been responsible for killing John Shockless, presenting an alternate theory that got lost between 2018 and today. From the motion, quote, "...evidence from Mistress Y dramatically alters our preconceived notions of what 87-year-old grandfathers do with their spare time."

The fact of the matter is that living alone in a house, in which he kept large amounts of cash, placed John Choklis at risk. By placing knowledge of this vulnerability outside a close circle of family and friends, Mr. Choklis's lifestyle exponentially increased this risk.

Finally, it should be noted that the fact that none of John Choklis' family had any knowledge of his sexual relationship with Mr. Swye suggests that Mr. Choklis may have been involved in other activities that led to his murder that we simply don't know about because he purposefully kept them a secret, end quote.

Nathan Carman is currently represented by a public defender. His bail hearing was postponed for at least 60 days as of May 16, 2022. Prosecutors argue he is a flight risk and a danger to his community. Neither Nathan's counsel nor the federal prosecutor are asking for a competency hearing for Nathan at this time. And that's the latest in this case.

With how things have gone so far, I'm anticipating a long wait until Nathan Carman faces trial. There are still so many questions and so much to think about with this case. One big question I have is, will anyone face justice for killing John Chakalis? Nathan Carman isn't charged with his murder, not as of right now anyway. Will enough evidence ever turn up to hold someone responsible for ending his life?

And what about Linda Carmen, forever lost at sea? What happened out there? Is Nathan's version of events the truth? Will new evidence emerge, revealing what really happened? I'll be watching this one and following along for every detail. When the time comes, I'll update you here on Dark Down East.

Sources cited in this episode, along with additional sources referenced, are linked at darkdowneast.com so you can do some digging of your own. A quick announcement. For the months of June, July, and August of 2022, Dark Down East will be a bi-weekly show, so there will be no new full-length episode next week, June 13th.

Thank you for supporting this show and allowing me to do what I do. I'm honored to use this platform for the families and friends who have lost their loved ones, and for those who are still searching for answers in cold missing persons and murder cases. I'm not about to let those names or their stories get lost with time. I'm Kylie Lowe, and this is Dark Down East.