After pleading guilty Monday to the strangulation deaths of his wife and daughter, Anthony Marcus of Waukegan was sentenced to 45 years in prison.
Officials said last month they had been exploring a negotiated plea deal, and the end result is the 54-year-old received “essentially a life sentence,” said Assistant State’s Attorney Matt DeMartini.
Although Marcus pleaded guilty but mentally ill to first-degree murder charges, he must serve the 45 years at 100 percent and would be 99 before he became eligible for parole, DeMartini said.
The plea will allow him to receive psychiatric treatment in prison, but no diagnosis would change the outcome of the sentencing Monday, DeMartini added.
Marcus, a resident of the 4100 block of Continental Drive, had initially pleaded not guilty to several counts of first-degree murder after being charged with killing his wife, Sun Marcus, 50, and his 17-year-old disabled daughter on the evening of June 8, 2014.
He also killed the family dog and injured himself trying to slit his own wrist, according to police.
With his surviving daughter and several of her relatives in the courtroom, Marcus was sentenced by Judge George Bridges.
Marcus made no statement in court.
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“First and foremost, I just want you to know that none of this is said in hate. The truth is, I tried to hate you. I wanted to, but I just can’t,” said DeMartini, reading an impact statement for the surviving daughter, Michelle Marcus.
“Emotionally, I am in constant turmoil. All I want is to feel normal again, to feel OK. I don’t know if I’ll ever get there,” Michelle Marcus wrote in the statement. “Besides those feelings, you took away my little sister. I do not know if you know this, but in the past 2 years, I’ve come to not only call her my sister, but my friend as well. I only got a taste of the person she would become. You also took yourself away from me. My father. I had always considered myself ‘Daddy’s little girl.”
After Marcus was arrested, authorities found a note he had left for Michelle Marcus. In the note, Marcus apologized and said he was a failure, prosecutors said.
Prior to his plea, Marcus had been held in the Lake County Jail with bond set at $5 million. He will soon be transferred to the Illinois Department of Corrections to begin serving his sentence.
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