MANDEL: Still haunted on first anniversary of Vaughan condo building mass murder
John Di Nino and his wife Doreen feel grateful to be alive one year after a disgruntled neighbour killed five residents in a shooting rampage
Torontosun.com
Dec. 18, 2023
Michele Mandel
John Di Nino still sees the barrel of the gun pointing right at him.
His wife Doreen lies crumpled on the vestibule floor of their penthouse condo, their disgruntled neighbour Francesco “Frank” Villi having just fired at her face, the bullet slamming through her jaw and out the back of her neck, knocking her to the floor, her blood slowly staining the new white runners of one of her guests who’d come to visit that Sunday evening of Dec. 18, 2022.
Next, Villi’s Beretta semi-automatic pistol was pointed at Di Nino’s chest. He still doesn’t know why the 73-year-old didn’t shoot again.
After all, as the volunteer president of the Bellaria Residences condo board going to zoom court the next day to force Villi to sell his unit after years of unhinged, intimidating harassment, he was his likely target.
Did his gun jam? Did he run out of bullets? Di Nino needs to know why he was the lucky one.
“It’s the feeling of survivor’s guilt,” he explains softly, sitting beside Doreen in their Vaughan condo brightly decorated for Christmas, the anniversary of the mass murder just days away.
It might as well have happened yesterday.
“Five of our friends died in a senseless tragedy and every day you try to process that,” says Di Nino, 57, better known before the mass shooting as Canadian head of the Amalgamated Transit Union. “Those memories keep coming back.”
Before being shot by police, Villi killed condo vice-president Rita Camilleri, 57, and her husband Vittorio Panza, 79, board member Russell Manock, 75, and his wife Lorraine, 71, and board member Naveed Dada, 59.
From his window overlooking the city, Di Nino points out the trees and park benches dedicated this summer in their memory.
“To me, this is not really an anniversary. It’s more of a one-year reminder of how our life changed forever,” he says. “It’s really a time of reflection for us.”
For the first part of this past year, Di Nino was in “adrenalin-mode,” keeping busy with his wife’s recovery and demands of his union membership. But people were telling him he’d changed and countless unexplained medical issues were sending him to doctors. In May, he finally realized he had to seek help.
He was paralyzed by visions.
“My mind is trying to make me see dead bodies on the floor in pools of blood – and I didn’t see any of that. But those things just keep haunting me,” he explains. “I now realize it’s part of the PTSD I didn’t know I had – until recently.”
By contrast, his wife – the lone survivor of the shooting rampage – insists she’s doing okay one year on.
“I’m just happy to be alive,” says Doreen, 67.
She appears remarkably recovered – emergency surgery placed a titanium plate in her jaw and a year of physiotherapy has meant her speech is virtually back to normal. But it’s not over.
In the new year, she faces another major facial reconstruction surgery, which will necessitate more months of rehabilitation. Once healed, she’ll require bone grafts for the dental implants she needs to replace three teeth shattered by the bullet.
“I still can’t eat on this side,” she explains, touching the side of her cheek.
“It’s just a never-ending process,” her husband adds. “It feels like we’re stalled in this nightmare that doesn’t go away.”
For years, Villi had railed against the condo board, claiming the electrical room below his unit was causing him pain and they were conspiring to harm him. In 2022, a judge rejected those claims as “frivolous” and he was ordered to stop his threats and stay away from board members.
But Villi continued his menacing attacks and the board felt their only alternative was going back to court to evict him.
Di Nino believes Villi’s plan of homicidal revenge was originally intended for the night of their condo Christmas party nine days earlier, when he showed up uninvited in the same long dark coat he’d later wear during the carnage.
“He went to each of the victims and wished them a Merry Christmas and shook their hands,” he recalls. “He was f---- evil.”
No one knew Villi had legally obtained a gun in 2019 that he’d later use in his killing spree.
“A gun in the hands of someone who’s unstable, it’s a recipe for disaster,” Di Nino insists. ” How this individual got this weapon is beyond me.”
But no one imagined what he was capable of doing. Di Nino doesn’t want anyone to make the same mistake..
“Take nothing for granted,” he warns. “I never assumed in my life that my family or I would be watching the worst horror story that anybody could imagine because this doesn’t happen to me, it happens in the world and on TV.”
“But it can happen in your own home,” Di Nino adds.
It’s in that home that saw such violence and bloodshed that they’ll mark the dark day with the same guests they had last year. They’ll remember those they lost and quietly toast their own escape.
“I feel for those five people that are gone and who will never have a life, where I have a life. We have a life,” Doreen says, looking at her husband. “We have a second chance and that keeps me going.”
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