[*Warning…this story contains details of how the victims died.]
A Danville man who had admitted murdering his girlfriend and her sister in February of 1980 has died. Livingston County Coroner Danny Watson says the cause of 69-year-old Charles Silagy’s death ‘’was purely medical’’. The Coroner says an autopsy was conducted on Silagy after he died on July 12th. Silagy had been confined at the Pontiac Correctional Center after his death sentence was commuted to life in prison in 2003.
Silagy had admitted during a court appearance in Danville that he killed 32-year-old Cheryl Block and her sister, Anne Waters, who was 29. Silagy said he ‘’stabbed and stomped’’ the women, adding that he wanted to die and deserved to die. He later changed his mind and filed several appeals.
Both women died from multiple stab wounds. Police found Waters body in a mobile home on Danville’s east side. Block’s body was found lying in a ditch along a country road southeast of Danville.
According to court statements Silagy lived at the mobile home with the women and on the evening of February 13th, 1980 had driven them to a male strip show at a local night club. Silagy dropped the women off and then returned to the club but was asked to leave after slapping beer mugs and a pitcher off a table. Witnesses said Silagy was very apologetic as he left the club, but then argued with the victims outside the club, according to court statements.
Another person drove Waters home and Silagy started choking Block as he was driving her to another bar, according to the court statements.
And when his truck broke down Silagy said ‘’I throwed her on the ground and I got outta the truck, and I started astomping on her and jumping up and down, on her head, and then I drug her across the road….’’. Silagy said he then got out his pocket knife and stabbed Block. He says he then drove to the mobile home and stabbed Waters after he had ‘’throwed her over toward the TV…and her head hit the coffee table…’’.
At his arraignment after being arrested in Kentucky Silagy pleaded not guilty by reason of insanity. But in a later hearing a court appointed psychiatrist found that he was ‘’reasonably certain that Charles Silagy did have a substantial capacity to understand the nature of what he was doing and to conform his conduct to the law.’’
