Last surviving Yablonski assassin dies
Paul Gilly leaving court in this 1973 file photo
Observer-Reporter
Police and union officials gather at the home of Joseph “Jock” Yablonski in Clarksville on Jan. 5, 1970, when the bodies of Joseph, 59, his wife, Margaret, 57, and daughter, Charlotte, 24, were found.
Associated Press
Joseph Yablonski, candidate for president of the United Mine Workers of America, at a news conference, May 29, 1969, in Washington, D.C.
The last surviving Yablonski assassin died last month while serving a life sentence in state prison for the infamous murders more than five decades ago.
Paul Eugene Gilly, 88, died of natural causes July 6 after being taken to a local hospital near SCI-Albion in Erie County, where he was serving his sentence, according to the state Department of Corrections.
He was one of three men convicted of murdering Joseph “Jock” Yablonski, his wife, Margaret, and their adult daughter, Charlotte, by fatally shooting all three of them while they slept in their Clarksville home on New Year’s Eve 1969. Yablonski’s son, Kenneth, found their bodies six days later.
Gilly, along with Aubran “Buddy” Martin and Claude Vealey, were hired by union bosses to kill Yablonski after he unsuccessfully ran for president of the United Mine Workers of America labor union just a few weeks earlier. Martin died in 1991 while Vealey died in prison in 1999.
Jock and Margaret Yablonski’s son, Joseph “Chip” Yablonski, who lives in Bethesda, Md., said the family recently communicated “among ourselves” about Gilly’s death. But Yablonski, 80, was blunt when reached for comment Wednesday on how the family reacted to the news.
“Good riddance,” Yablonski said.
While the family already knew of Gilly’s death shortly after it happened, it didn’t become public until this week when Washington County District Attorney Gene Vittone learned about it while writing a rebuttal to the murderer’s request for clemency this spring. In his request, Gilly claimed that “broken deals” with the special prosecutor led to his testimony and confession, and that he should be released “before the Lord calls my number.”
“Having spent nearly 50 years in prison I can honestly state that in my heart I feel that anything I did on 31 Dec. 1969 has been adequately paid for,” Gilly wrote in his October 2019 clemency request, which wasn’t filed with the state Board of Pardons until early May.
Vittone was writing his response to the pardons board Monday when he learned of Gilly’s death nearly a month earlier.
“It would not be hyperbole to state that Mr. Gilly was involved in one of the most heinous, cruel and evil acts of premeditated murder for hire in the history of the Commonwealth,” Vittone wrote in his rebuttal, which he shared with the Observer-Reporter but never sent to the pardons board because the clemency request is now moot. “The killing of the entire Yablonski family … still resonates with the people of Washington County. It is amazing that even at this late date, some 51 years after the murders, that Mr. Gilly continues to minimize his role in the murder of this family.”
Gilly’s death closes the book on one of the most infamous crimes in Washington County that brought national attention to the region.
Gilly and his two co-conspirators were convicted in 1972, and he was sentenced to serve three concurrent life sentences for the murders. UMWA President Tony Boyle ordered Yablonski’s murder, shortly after Boyle won reelection against Yablonski for the leadership position. Boyle was later convicted twice – the first one was overturned by the state Supreme Court and he was tried again – and he died of a stroke in 1985 while serving his sentence.
Gilly petitioned the courts for his release several times, most recently in 2013, but to no avail. In his recent clemency request, Gilly takes some responsibility for the murders, but also asks why he should remain imprisoned.
“I’ve given this a lot of thought over the past 50 years and I realize how many lives were shattered because of my actions prior to and culminating on that night,” he wrote. “I think a good question to ask is: Does keeping me incarcerated any longer benefit anyone or serve any useful purpose?”
In his rebuttal, Vittone offered a succinct response to Gilly’s question.
“The answer is simple,” Vittone wrote. “It serves the interests of justice.”