Luciano Frattolin, a former coffee company CEO convicted of killing his nine-year-old daughter during a trip to New York, showed no remorse in court before receiving a sentence of 25 years to life in prison.
The 46-year-old was sentenced Wednesday in Essex County Supreme Court in Elizabethtown, New York, for the July 2025 murder of Melina Frattolin.
When given the opportunity to address the court, Frattolin offered neither an explanation nor an apology. He responded with just three words: “No thank you.”
Prosecutors said Frattolin drowned Melina in a muddy swamp in Ticonderoga as they returned from a trip to New York City. He then allegedly invented a kidnapping story, claiming masked men in a van had abducted her.
Frattolin, who had been the head of the failed coffee company Gambella, was caught giving investigators false information repeatedly as authorities worked to unravel his account.
Prosecutors argued that he killed Melina both to retaliate against her mother and to escape future child-support payments. Frattolin, however, has never acknowledged responsibility for the child’s death.
During the sentencing hearing, Judge Tatiana Coffinger sharply condemned Frattolin and told him, “I hope at some point in your life you will realize what you have done.”
“You live in a world of self-made delusion of wealth and image when the greatest accomplishment in your life could’ve been as a great father,” Coffinger said.
Luciano Frattolin, 46, the former CEO of failed coffee company Gambella, has been sentenced to 25 years to life for killing his young daughter during a trip to New York
Prosecutors said Frattolin killed his nine-year-old daughter Melina to punish his ex-wife and avoid paying child support
Frattolin was found guilty of second-degree murder in August. Judge Coffinger also said that, if he is eventually granted parole, he will face deportation after completing his prison sentence.
The defendant, an Italian and Ethiopian citizen who was living in Canada when Melina was killed, stood in court wearing a wrinkled gray suit. Court reporters said he appeared nervous and repeatedly shuffled as the sentence was read.
Although prosecutors identified financial pressure and resentment toward Melina’s mother, Kali Galanis, as possible motives, Judge Coffinger said she remained unable to understand how Frattolin could have carried out the crime.
“Everyone who has heard of this story, everyone wants to know why,” the judge said.
“My own daughter asked me repeatedly why this happened,” Coffinger added. “Even if we had an answer, that wouldn’t bring Melina back.”
The judge also criticized Frattolin’s attempt to conceal the killing through a staged kidnapping narrative, describing the elaborate deception as something “like a Hollywood script” that triggered a vast and unnecessary search.
“The search area kept expanding and our entire area, the entire region held their collective breaths in the hopes that Melina would be found safe,” Coffinger said.
After reporting Melina missing on July 19, 2025, Frattolin told authorities that two men had taken her from a white van while they were traveling back from New York
Frattolin has continued to deny responsibility and has never offered an explanation or apology for Melina’s death
Melina’s remains were discovered later on July 19, 2025, concealed beneath a log near a remote pond in Ticonderoga.
At Frattolin’s trial, medical examiners testified that they found her covered ‘in a large amount of mud’ in a knee-deep swamp, and said evidence showed she was drowned.
‘The lungs were just full of black material, basically mud and plant debris,’ medical examiner Dr Michael Sikirica said in the trial.
‘It was obvious quickly that her lungs were hyper expanded,’ Sikirica testified, adding that her remains appeared to be weighted down by a stone in the water.
Prosecutors also presented cell phone data that placed Frattolin near the lake where his daughter’s body was found, which he had told investigators he had not been near to.
New York State Police Bureau of Criminal Investigation Investigator Daniel Mauro testified that he interrogated Luciano for 13 hours after he reported his daughter was missing.
Mauro said the coffee CEO changed his story several times, including being caught in a lie about changing his clothes. At first he said he did not change, before admitting he changed his shirt because he ‘was sweaty.’
The investigator said inconsistencies in the story alerted cops, who believed Frattolin changed his clothes because he had been wading in the marsh.
Frattolin’s wet clothes were later found in a trash bag discarded along Interstate 87, the route where he had been driving Melina back to her mother in Montreal.
Frattolin was the CEO of coffee company Gambella
Melina’s mother said she sent her this picture just hours before she was allegedly murdered
After Frattolin was sentenced this week, District Attorney Michael Langey read a statement on behalf of Melina’s family.
‘We continue to suffer deeply since the day Melina was brutally murdered. Nothing can bring Melina back, but we are relieved that this chapter is over,’ he said.
‘We are sincerely grateful to everyone who worked on the case, for your dedication and persistence. Your efforts helped bring a measure of justice for our family.’
Frattolin’s attorney Brian Pilatzke maintained his client’s innocence, and said that ‘what happened in that body of water in Ticonderoga is a mystery.’
‘Nobody knows what happened there,’ he said.
