WEST PALM BEACH — A West Palm Beach man who broke into his ex-girlfriend’s apartment and stabbed her in the back 11 times will spend the rest of his life in prison.
Circuit Judge Sarah Willis sentenced Robert Wayne Murray, 60, to two concurrent life sentences on Sept. 26 for the first-degree murder and armed burglary of Jenie Barbato, 63, in her Century Village home.
According to prosecutors, Murray snuck into Barbato’s gated community on Sept. 14, 2020, shattered a window to enter her apartment and attacked her from behind with a kitchen knife. Investigators found Barbato, a 4-foot-9 heart-transplant survivor, lying face down in a pool of blood.
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Three weeks before her murder, Barbato called 911 and played a voicemail for a Palm Beach County sheriff’s deputy in which Murray threatened to kill her.
“You did me wrong. You told me you would never call the police on me. You called the police on me. For no reason,” he said, according to court records. “Remember that. I’m going to kill you.”
Jurors convicted Murray of murder and armed burglary in August. He returned to the West Palm Beach courtroom on Sept. 26 to ask Willis to spare him from life in prison on account of his longstanding mental illness.
“Murray’s not well. He needs help,” said his court-appointed defense attorney, Brent Del Gaizo. “He doesn’t need two life sentences.”
The attorney called a mandatory life sentence without the possibility of parole unconstitutional — “cruel and unusual punishment” for a person with mental illness. Barbato’s daughter, listening in the courtroom gallery, rolled her eyes.
Dr. Ivette Cardelli-Rosen, a psychiatric nurse practitioner at the Palm Beach County Jail who began treating Murray in March 2023, said Murray has been diagnosed with schizoaffective disorder, antisocial personality disorder and opioid use disorder. She described schizoaffective disorder as “a mix between schizophrenia and depression” where “patients might have symptoms of psychosis or delusions, they might hear voices or see things that might not be there.”
Jail intake records from the night of Murray’s arrest described him as “disheveled,” “agitated,” “confused” and “disorganized,” complaining of auditory hallucinations. He was placed on suicide watch and continued to report auditory hallucinations after his arrest.
Dr. Michael Brannon, a forensic psychologist, found that Murray met the first prong of Florida’s insanity test — having a mental illness — but not the second prong. Dr. Brannon stated there was no evidence that Murray couldn’t appreciate the nature, consequences or wrongfulness of his actions at the time of the crime.
Assistant State Attorney Mathri Thannikkotu urged Willis to sentence Murray to two consecutive life sentences. She pointed to Murray’s criminal history, which included 13 felony convictions dating back to 1981, when he was 17. Murray had spent approximately 35 of his 60 years incarcerated and was released from a 15-year prison sentence just six months before murdering Barbato.
“They weren’t friends,” said Barbato’s daughter Melissa Grace. “He thought that they were more, but he’s too pathetic to have been more. Truth be told, she felt sorry for him. She was scared of him.”
He was jealous of her other friendships, Grace said, “so he decided to carve her heart out.”
Grace said she had taken precautions against Murray, including calling police and posting his photo at security gates after he had previously abused her mother.
“I called the police department, the sheriff’s department, HOA, and the security office. I posted a picture of the perpetrator’s ugly face at both gates. I sent emails, made phone calls, changed my mom’s locks and changed her phone number,” Grace testified.
She called Murray pathetic, an imbecile, an old man and a coward before directing her anger toward his attorney who, according to her, had been “rude, disrespectful, asking stupid-a** questions—”
Willis interrupted Grace to ask that she refrain from using derogatory language toward Murray or his lawyer. Every speaker who followed Grace was given a whispered warning by a court deputy: “If you’ve got any cusswords, you need to switch them out.”
Another daughter, Adriana Busby, described her mother as “everything (Murray) wanted to be — loved, accepted, caring, accomplished, strong and powerful.” Busby said Murray had been rejected by the world and took advantage of her mother’s kindness.
Barbato’s sister, Judy Manalastas, watched the sentencing hearing over Zoom, too sick to attend in person. She said Sept. 26 would have marked the 10th anniversary of her sister’s heart transplant at Emory University in Atlanta.
“My sister Jenny almost died once, but she was donated the heart she needed and got a second chance at life — a second chance that Robert Murray took away,” Manalastas said.
She told Willis she hoped that after Murray dies, he’s reincarnated as a woman who was treated as Jenny was: stalked, beaten and stabbed to death.
Hannah Phillips is a journalist covering public safety and criminal justice at The Palm Beach Post. You can reach her at hphillips@pbpost.com.
This article originally appeared on Palm Beach Post: Florida man jailed for life after stabbing ex-girlfriend 11 times in back