Valley Street in Springfield on Thursday, June 9, 2022. Photo by Glenn Russell/VTDigger
New details of a 2022 murder in Springfield illustrate an extensive police investigation that tied together the alleged major players in a particularly violent period for the town.
Vermont State Police last week announced the arrest of Paul Lachapelle Jr., who is charged with the murder of Justin Gilliam in Springfield more than two years ago.
Documents in that case reveal how police worked a web of sources, leading them to bullet casings and a burnt car stashed in two different graveyards, and potential evidence cast into nearby rivers. A drug trafficking hierarchy appears in court records, with Lachapelle Jr. allegedly taking orders from Anibal “Papi” Castro Sr. and Jonathan Castro, both of whom were arrested in a federally led drug raid later that year on Valley Street.
Neither of the Castros has been charged in connection with Gilliam’s murder.
Detective Sgt. Francis LaBombard detailed the investigation in a 13-page graphic affidavit filed in court last week.
Police discovered Gilliam dead along the side of Greeley Road in Springfield on June 6, 2022. The next day, a state medical examiner determined he had died from a gunshot to the head.
Police sources immediately connected Lachapelle Jr. to the murder, documents show. In an interview on June 7, a source told police that he had “heard rumors that Paul Lachapelle Jr. came back and put the third notch in his belt, alluding it was his third kill,” according to the affidavit.
Days later, police discovered a backpack containing drug paraphernalia along the Connecticut River in Springfield, according to court documents. The backpack also contained ammunition that forensic investigators later connected to a revolver found in Lachapelle’s possession, a Rough Rider handgun that appeared to match a gun seen in a photo of Gilliam.
As police continued their investigation, interview subjects began suggesting Gilliam’s murder was connected to earlier crimes in Springfield. One source told police that a shooting that injured Todd Amell in May was actually intended to kill Gilliam, documents show.
A girlfriend of Gilliam told police that Gilliam’s ex-girlfriend was now dating Jonathan Castro, sparking a beef between the two men.
The cemetery fire
Meanwhile, following an investigation led in part by the Federal Bureau of Investigation, Lachapelle was arrested on gun charges on May 30, 2022. When police interviewed Lachapelle about Gilliam’s murder following that arrest, he pointed the finger at Anibal Castro Sr., according to the affidavit. He described Castro Sr.’s alleged comments about killing Gilliam: “You should have seen his eyes when he realized I had a gun … bam, bam, bam.”
Court documents suggest police continued to review past crimes in Springfield to try to connect the dots in the murder. They focused on a May 27, 2022 incident in which an Oldsmobile Intrigue was set ablaze in a Springfield cemetery around the time Gilliam went missing. That car, they learned, was purchased by Todd Amell, the man they thought may have taken a stray bullet meant for Gilliam earlier that month.
Electronic surveillance in a Southern Vermont Drug Task Force investigation revealed the Oldsmobile left the residence of Anibal Castro Sr. on the evening of May 27, returning later that night. Still later, the car was driven again, and police soon after discovered it on fire in the cemetery.
In the months to follow, a search of the Oldsmobile uncovered a blue iPhone, later determined to belong to Gilliam, records indicate.
In December 2022, police interviewed Amell. He told police what they already suspected: The shooting that injured him in May was targeting Gilliam.
A Vermont State Police Scuba team was spotted in Springfield on Wednesday, November 30, 2022, diving in the Connecticut River. Ethan Weinstein/VTDigger
Amell also said he’d sold the Oldsmobile to Jonathan Castro, according to the affidavit, and began to describe the Castros’ inner circle.
Amell told police that he “wasn’t one of the boys, but at one time, he wished he was,” the affidavit said.
A new lead
Almost two years passed before new details emerged, according to the affidavit.
In May 2024, police interviewed Lachapelle’s half-brother. The sibling told authorities that Lachapelle Jr. had admitted he’d killed Gilliam. According to the half-brother, the pants Lachapelle was wearing during the murder were stained with “brain matter,” leading Lachapelle and his father, Paul Lachapelle Sr., to burn them outside their residence on Valley Street, an address associated with Anibal Castro Sr. and Jonathan Castro, who Lachapelle “reported to,” the sibling told police. He said he believed Lachapelle Jr. had disposed of the murder weapon in a nearby river.
According to the half-brother, the Castros gave Lachapelle Jr. $5,000 worth of drugs in exchange for the murder.
To corroborate the half-brother’s story, police subpoenaed his prison phone records. He’d recently served time for a DUI, and investigators reviewed calls between him and his mother in the month after Gilliam’s murder.
A new motive for the murder began to emerge, documents indicate.
According to the half-brother’s mother, Gilliam was targeted because he’d assaulted Anibal Castro Sr.’s son, Anibal “Turtle” Castro Jr. Rumors also suggested Gilliam may have been working as a police informant, according to the recorded calls.
A month before Gilliam’s death, Castro Jr. was arrested on a federal charge for possessing a pipe bomb at his Valley Street residence. Police discovered the bomb while searching the home in connection with a shooting allegedly committed by Castro Sr., according to court documents in Castro Jr.’s case
In the recorded phone calls, the half-brother’s mother also said that Lachapelle Jr. had used his father’s phone to schedule the fateful meeting with Gilliam that led to his death, according to the affidavit.
Father and son
After reviewing the prison phone calls, investigators in June of this year sought out the sibling’s mother, who was Paul Lachapelle Sr.’s ex-wife.
According to her, Lachapelle Sr. knew his son had murdered Gilliam, the affidavit stated.
From there, police interviewed another alleged member of the Castros’ circle, Doug Marsh.
Marsh told authorities he’d seen Castro Sr. with a gas can the night the Oldsmobile was set on fire at the Springfield cemetery and that he later picked Castro Sr. up by the graveyard.
Marsh told police that once back at Valley Street, Lachapelle Jr. admitted to the murder, according to the affidavit.
Vermont State Police respond to a shooting in May 2022 in Springfield. Photo courtesy of Taigen Dezaine
“Marsh stated Lachapelle Jr. told him, he ‘Really scored some points with these guys, I’m actually going to move up the ladder,’” according to the affidavit.
In Marsh’s retelling, Lachapelle Jr. and Gilliam drove off in the Oldsmobile to smoke crack before the murder. After he’d shot Gilliam, “Lachapelle Jr. told (Marsh) he reached over and took the pipe out of Gilliam’s lap and smoked it,” according to the affidavit.
Lachapelle Jr. arrested
The investigation neared its conclusion as police interrogated a woman who had been Lachapelle Jr.’s girlfriend at the time of the murder.
According to the girlfriend, Lachapelle Jr. said Jonathan Castro had ordered the killing. In payment, she told police, he received $600, an 8-ball of crack and “a few buns of dope.”
In July 2024, police recorded her phone with her knowledge as she called Lachapelle Jr. But the murder suspect seemed suspicious of her calls.
“Paranoid people fucking don’t get caught,” he told his ex, never admitting to the crime, according to the affidavit.
Police questioned the ex-girlfriend for more information.
“(She) stated Lachapelle Jr. was most likely picked by the (Castros) to shoot Gilliam because he could be easily influenced, he wanted to be part of (Castros’) crew, he was a drug addict, and he was also very racist,” she told police, referring to the fact that Gilliam was Black.
She also led authorities to a cemetery in Weathersfield, where she believed Lachapelle shot Gilliam. There, police discovered two 9mm casings, later determined to match bullets used in an April 2022 Valley Street shooting involving Lachapelle Jr. and Castro Sr., and a casing found in Holyoke, Massachusetts, in May 2022, records show.
Police arrested Lachapelle Jr. on first degree murder charges last week.
In August, Anibal Castro Sr. was sentenced in federal court after pleading guilty to conspiracy to distribute cocaine base and fentanyl. He was sentenced to nine years, with credit for time served.
Jonathan Castro was sentenced last month in federal court for conspiracy to distribute cocaine base and fentanyl. He was sentenced to 98 months, with credit for time served, and will be housed at a federal prison in Connecticut, court records show.
In May, Anibal Castro Jr. was sentenced to six years in prison for possessing a pipe bomb and drug conspiracy.
Read the story on VTDigger here: A 2-year investigation of a Springfield murder reveals the backstory of a violent period.