Charlie Adelson is a former South Florida periodontist convicted of orchestrating the 2014 murder-for-hire killing of Daniel Markel, a Florida State University law professor and Adelson’s former brother-in-law. On November 6, 2023, a Tallahassee jury found him guilty of first-degree murder, conspiracy to commit first-degree murder, and solicitation to commit first-degree murder. He was sentenced the following month to life in prison without the possibility of parole, plus 60 consecutive years on the conspiracy and solicitation counts. His appeal is pending before Florida’s 1st District Court of Appeal.
Who Charlie Adelson Is
Before his arrest, Adelson practiced periodontics at his family’s Fort Lauderdale-area dental office, the Adelson Institute, where his mother, Donna, served as bookkeeper. Media coverage described him as a “Ferrari-owning periodontist” whose lifestyle reflected the family’s affluence.
In 2019, the Florida Board of Dentistry reprimanded him for negligence involving dental implant procedures and inadequate record-keeping in a patient case, fining him $5,000 and ordering mandatory continuing education.
His sister, Wendi Adelson, is the ex-wife of Daniel Markel. That relationship is the thread running through everything that followed.
The Murder He Was Convicted of Orchestrating
On July 18, 2014, Daniel Markel was shot twice in the head as he pulled into the garage of his Tallahassee home. He died the following day. He was 41.
The killing traced back to a bitter custody fight. Markel and Wendi Adelson had divorced in 2012. In 2013, Wendi asked a court for permission to move the couple’s two young sons from Tallahassee to South Florida, where the Adelsons lived. A judge denied the request, finding she had not shown the move was in the children’s best interest.
The post-divorce litigation grew sharper. Wendi’s former attorney, Kristin Adamson, testified that Markel’s filings became “increasingly personal and hostile.” In early 2014, Markel moved to restrict Donna Adelson’s access to the boys, alleging they had told him, “Grandma says she hates you.” The hearing on that motion never happened. Markel was killed first.
Prosecutors argued the Adelson family treated Wendi’s relocation as “non-negotiable” and, when the courts refused, Charlie and Donna sought what investigators called an “illegal remedy.” Luis Rivera, one of the hitmen, testified that gunman Sigfredo Garcia told him: “The lady wants her two kids back. She wants full custody.”
How the Plot Worked
The conspiracy ran through intermediaries built to keep the Adelsons at a distance from the killers. Prosecutors compared the structure to “train cars” that “only touch the car right in front of them.”
The critical link was Katherine Magbanua, Charlie’s then-girlfriend and the mother of Garcia’s children. Magbanua later became a state witness. She testified that Charlie asked her whether she knew someone who could “harm another person,” and she said she did. During planning conversations, she said, Charlie would step out of the room to speak with his mother before coming back with further direction.
Magbanua also testified that she was placed on the Adelson dental practice’s payroll despite never working there, an arrangement intended to provide her children with health insurance. Prosecutors alleged the family financed a $100,000 hit.
On the night of the murder, Magbanua said, she went to Charlie’s home to collect money for the operation. She described him as “frantic” and holding a gun, telling her his parents had “just left.” She also recounted Charlie telling her that his mother had “washed the money” used to pay the conspirators because the cash she received was “wet and starting to mold.”
How Investigators Caught Him
The case stalled publicly for nearly two years after the shooting. Garcia and Rivera were arrested in 2016, and Magbanua later that year. Getting to the Adelsons required more.
In April 2016, the FBI ran what investigators called a “bump” operation. An undercover agent posing as a Latin Kings member approached Donna Adelson outside her Miami condominium, handed her a flyer about Markel’s murder, and demanded $5,000, claiming his brother (Rivera) had not been properly paid. Donna immediately called Charlie. In the wiretapped calls that followed, FBI Special Agent Pat Sanford testified, the two spoke in code, using “TV” to refer to the murder. Sanford said Charlie had previously joked about buying Wendi a television because it was “cheaper than hiring a hitman.”
The next day, the FBI recorded Charlie and Magbanua at the Dolce Vita restaurant in Miami. On tape, Charlie mused about how investigators break cases: “How do you get people to talk? You throw a smoke grenade, and then you get all the cockroaches to run out.” He told Magbanua, “If they had any evidence, we would have already gone to the airport,” and coached her that police could not prove crimes without a confession or wiretap evidence. He was wrong on the second count. The FBI was recording him as he spoke.
The Trial and Verdict
Charlie Adelson was arrested on April 21, 2022. His trial in Tallahassee ran seven days of testimony in late October and early November 2023.
The state’s case combined Magbanua’s testimony, phone and financial records, and the FBI recordings. Prosecutors played the wiretaps and the Dolce Vita audio, and agents walked jurors through code words the conspirators used, including “listings,” “property,” “patients,” and “potbellied pigs.”
Adelson took the stand in his own defense. He admitted paying Magbanua after the murder but said he had been the victim of an extortion scheme, arguing the payments were meant to prevent further violence against himself. His defense team, led by Daniel Rashbaum, suggested Garcia may have acted out of jealousy over Magbanua’s relationship with Charlie, or that Magbanua herself had “masterminded” the plot after hearing Charlie make a “hit man joke.” Prosecutors called the extortion defense “utterly ridiculous.”
On November 6, 2023, after roughly three hours of deliberation, the jury returned guilty verdicts on all three counts.
The Sentence
On December 12, 2023, Circuit Judge Stephen Everett sentenced Adelson to life without release or parole on the murder count, plus consecutive 30-year maximum sentences on the conspiracy and solicitation counts. He received credit for 597 days of time served.
At sentencing, Adelson told the court, “I’d just like to say, I maintain my innocence.” Markel’s father, Phil Markel, delivered a victim impact statement by video, telling the court his life had been “in total disarray since Dan’s murder” and calling the Adelson family a “major cause of our heartbreak.” He asked for the maximum sentence and closed: “Thank you. Today is a good day.”
The Appeal
Adelson’s appellate attorneys, Michael Ufferman and Laurel Cornell Niles, filed his opening brief in May 2025. They argue Judge Everett committed reversible errors by denying a change of venue, making improper jury selection rulings, and excluding more than 400 text messages the defense wanted admitted. They point to pretrial publicity, noting that 40 percent of potential jurors screened had expressed preconceived notions about Adelson’s guilt, and allege some seated jurors gave dishonest answers about their knowledge of the case and their social media activity.
The State of Florida answered in September 2025, arguing Adelson waived his venue and jury selection arguments by accepting the jury without objection at trial, and that the excluded texts contained irrelevant and inflammatory content. A three-judge panel of the 1st District Court of Appeal heard oral arguments on February 3, 2026. During the hearing, Judge Lori S. Rowe pressed the defense on the absence of affidavits in the record documenting the extent of media bias among jurors.
As of mid-2026, the court has not ruled. Legal observers have described the appeal as an “uphill battle,” noting that the 1st DCA issued very few criminal reversals in 2025 and that appellate courts generally require issues to have been preserved through trial objections. Adelson also filed a notice in April 2025 regarding a pending motion to correct a sentencing error; details have not been publicly elaborated.
The Rest of the Family and the Co-Conspirators
Five people have been convicted in the case.
Luis Rivera, the getaway driver, pleaded guilty to second-degree murder in October 2016 and was sentenced to 19 years. He cooperated with authorities and gave testimony identifying the motive and the participants.
Sigfredo Garcia, the triggerman, was convicted of first-degree murder in October 2019 and sentenced to life without parole. He said he would appeal; the current status of any appeal is not clear from available records.
Katherine Magbanua was retried after a 2019 mistrial and convicted in May 2022 of first-degree murder, conspiracy, and solicitation. She received life plus 60 years, then testified against both Charlie and Donna Adelson. Whether she will receive a reduction for her cooperation remains unresolved. Lead prosecutor Georgia Cappleman said after Charlie’s trial that the State Attorney’s Office was “evaluating the situation.”
Donna Adelson, Charlie’s mother, was arrested at Miami International Airport on November 13, 2023, one week after her son’s conviction, as she was boarding a one-way flight to Vietnam. She was indicted two days later. Her first trial was paused in September 2024 when her defense attorney withdrew over a conflict of interest. She was retried and convicted of first-degree murder, conspiracy, and solicitation on September 4, 2025, and sentenced on October 13, 2025, to life plus 30 years each on the conspiracy and solicitation counts. She filed a notice of appeal in November 2025, now in its early stages before the same 1st DCA hearing Charlie’s appeal.
Wendi Adelson, Markel’s ex-wife and Charlie’s sister, has never been charged and has consistently denied any involvement in the plot. The case has fractured the family. Robert Adelson, Donna’s eldest son and a New York physician, testified at his mother’s 2025 trial that there was a “complete lack of curiosity” in the family about who killed Markel, and said the murder was “not a subject for discussion.” He told the court his last conversation with his mother came shortly after the hitmen’s 2016 arrests, when he tried to discuss them and she responded only, “I’ve got to go.” He also testified that his mother had explicitly told him not to speak with police.