Hamilton judge says man guilty of murder has 'cruel and rotten heart' after planning Marko Bakir's death
Victim's family described him as kind and a devoted son and brother with dreams of becoming a father
After one day of deliberations, a jury has found Alessandro Giammichele guilty of murdering Marko Bakir.
The 12 jurors delivered the verdict to a Hamilton Superior courtroom on Tuesday morning where Bakir's family members sat along with a slew of homicide detectives.
Giammichele, who goes by Gino, sat in the prisoner's box. The 31-year-old from Hamilton is tall with a dark beard. He appeared to have no outward reaction about the verdict.
Bakir's family members gasped and cried when the verdict was read, and hugged the Crown attorneys afterwards.
Giammichele was charged with first-degree murder in 2022 for orchestrating the shooting death of Bakir in 2018. He had pleaded not guilty.
Another man, Abdelaziz Ibrahim, was also charged with the first-degree murder of Bakir but died before the charges were resolved. He was accused of pulling the trigger on Giammichele's behalf.
Bakir's father, Rafek Aewob, described his son as kind, respectful and full of life and dreams.
"There are no words in the English language that can truly capture the depth of pain I feel," Aewob said in his victim impact statement the Crown read to the court. "On the day Mark was taken from me, my world shattered. He was left to die on the cold pavement of his driveway all alone, like his life meant nothing, like he was disposable. He wasn't. He was everything."
Justice Toni Skarica had finished instructing the 12-person jury on Monday at 10:30 a.m., after a two-month trial. He'd told them they could find Giammichele not guilty, guilty of first-degree murder, guilty of second-degree murder, or guilty of manslaughter.
"I totally agree with that verdict," Skarica told the jury Tuesday morning.
In a candid and expansive sentencing decision, Skarica described Giammichele as an evil person with no moral compass who'd "rip off everyone including God if he had the opportunity."
Giammichele's heart is so "cruel and rotten it makes the heart of the Grinch look gargantuan in comparison," said Skarica, referring to the green Dr. Seuss character.
The judge sentenced him to life in prison with no possibility of parole for 25 years.
Skarica also noted it was likely the last murder trial he'd preside over before retiring. He became a lawyer in 1979 and has worked as a defence attorney, Crown attorney and judge.
The guilty verdict for Giammichele is an example of "God's insurance policy, in my opinion ... that good in society will always win out."
Crown said Giammichele hired hitman
In the trial, the Crown and defence agreed that in September 2018, Bakir lent Giammichele, a drug dealer, $100,000 as an investment in what the jury heard was likely a drug-related business. The pair, who had become close, signed a contract with a payment plan, but Giammichele stopped following it after two partial payments.
On November 22, 2018 around 8:15 p.m., Ibrahim shot Bakir, 31, to death in front of his home in Hamilton's west Mountain area, both sides said.
The Crown said that it was Giammichele who hired Ibrahim through an alleged drug dealer.
Giammichele did so, at least in part, because Bakir threatened to expose his criminal lifestyle to Giammichele's father and take him to court, the Crown said.
"Marko lent Gino $100,000 and Gino had 100,000 reasons to want him dead," assistant Crown attorney Elise Quinn said in her closing argument on May 31.
Giammichele turned off his phone and drove Ibrahim to the scene of the shooting, and communicated with Ibrahim before and after Ibrahim shot Bakir five times, Quinn said.
"This is not a string of bad luck for Gino," Quinn said. "The cumulative effect of these events makes it absolutely improbable that these are just a series of unfortunate coincidences, especially when you consider all the other evidence in this case."
Shooter died of drug poisoning in 2022
During the trial, defence lawyer Kendra Stanyon had argued the evidence against her client was inconclusive and did not establish his guilt beyond a reasonable doubt.
"Suspicion is not enough. 'Maybe,' is not enough. 'Likely,' is not enough. Even 'probably,' is not enough," she said in her closing statement.
Stanyon also said the Crown's narrative was illogical. For example, she said Giammichele already had a plan to meet Bakir in a private location to pay him back, so he had no need to kill him — especially in a neighbourhood full of potential witnesses.
But ultimately the jury accepted the Crown's version of events when they found Giammichele responsible for Bakir's death.
The accused shooter, Ibrahim, was 25 years old when he died in August 2022 in the Central East Correctional Centre in Lindsay, Ont. A 2024 coroner's inquest found the Hamilton man died accidentally of acute toxicity of fentanyl.
As a child, Bakir fled the war in Iraq with his parents, brother and sister and settled in Hamilton in the 1990s. In their victim impact statements read in court, they described him as a devoted son and brother who'd drive his siblings to school and bring his dad a chocolate croissant every day.
Bakir got into a motorcycle collision a decade ago, and spent months in a coma, said his brother Rawand Bakir. For him to have survived only to be murdered years later has created a "permanent nightmare" for his family.
"My mother hasn't fully smiled since, my father cries when he thinks no one is watching, and my chest is so heavy it feels like I can't breathe," Rawand said. "The worst part is knowing this didn't have to happen. It was a plan that destroyed our lives."