Love can make us do crazy things. But can it drive us to murder? Hopefully not, but for one Florida man, Grant Amato, his love for a webcam model drove him to kill his family.
The new Paramount+ documentary CTRL+ALT+DESIRE shines the spotlight on Amato and the events that led up to his terrible crime.
So, why did Grant Amato kill his family? And where is he now? Let’s take a closer look at his case.
Why did Grant Amato kill his family?
On January 24, 2019, Grant Amato murdered in cold blood his mother Margaret, his father Chad, and his older brother Cody. The police discovered their bodies in the home after one of Cody’s colleagues called them after Cody failed to turn up for work.
Upon entering the household, the police discovered the dead bodies of Grant’s family. Cody was curled up on the floor in a storage room, Chad was lying on his back in the kitchen, and Margaret was sprawled over the desk in the home office.
So, why did Grant kill them? As we discuss here, it was his obsession with a Bulgarian cam model named Silviya Ventsislavova, who went by the alias “Silvie,” that led him to murder his parents.
After losing his job, Grant became a recluse at his family home. He eventually became addicted to pornography, partly fuelled by a website featuring cam models like Silvie. He developed an obsession with the cam girl and stole his family’s money to pay for tokens that allowed him to spend time in her company.
When Grant’s family discovered what he had been up to, they sent him to a rehabilitation facility for porn and internet addiction. When he returned home and made contact with Silvie again, Grant’s father told him to pack his bags and leave.
It’s this dispute over his relationship with Silvie that drove Grant to kill his parents and brother. He shot his mother in the back of her head while she was working at a computer and later shot his father and brother.
Following his arrest, the police stated his reason for killing them was because “his family had been blaming him for months for ruining their lives, stealing and not following the rules of the home, so he might as well be blamed for this too.” (source)
What happened to Grant Amato?
In July 2019, Grant was put on trial for the murder of his three family members. The prosecutors told the jury that he had arranged the crime scene to make it look like a murder-suicide.
When the jury delivered their verdict, Grant was declared guilty of first-degree premeditated murder. He was spared the death sentence and given life in prison without the possibility of parole.
Where is Grant Amato now?
Grant is currently serving his time at the Tomoka Correctional Institution in Daytona Beach, where he maintains his innocence. At the time of writing this article, he is 34 years old. He has written several appeals but so far nothing has come of them.
In 2019, Grant wrote to Colin Archdeacon, the documentary filmmaker behind the Paramount+ series Ctrl+Alt+Desire.
In the email, Grant said: “I have nothing to hide in this world. I loved my family more than anything and Silvie was a beautiful and new addition to that love.” (source)
When speaking to Variety about the new documentary series, Archdeacon said:
“I chose this story because I wanted to make a project that explores the way technology and loneliness are reshaping society. As we all spend more time online and less time in the physical presence of other people, a new culture is being born that I’m not sure any of us quite understand yet. ‘Ctrl+Alt+Desire’ is my attempt to bring these issues out into the open for audiences to examine them.”
Expect to learn more about Amato, his crimes, and the current state of his sentence, in the Paramount+ documentary.
Read More: Why did Grant Amato murder his family?
What do you think of the Grant Amato case? Let us know in the comments below.