Trumbull prosecutor opposes parole for killer of two

Staff report

WARREN

Trumbull County Prosecutor Dennis Watkins has asked the Ohio Parole Board to keep a 71-year-old murderer in prison when his parole hearing comes up in December.

Henry G. Rockwell was 38 years old and living on Mahoning Avenue in Champion in July 1981 when he killed two men at his house in a drug-related confrontation. He’s been in prison 33 years.

Rockwell was sentenced in October 1981 to 15 years to life on each of two counts of murder in the deaths of Frank Mancinelli, 39, of Warren and Seymore Gillman, 52, of Brooklyn, N.Y.

Both men had been shot in the head at the Mahoning Avenue residence, a short distance south of state Route 305. Their bodies were found in the trunk of Gillman’s Cadillac, which was found burning on state Route 82 about one mile east of state Route 46.

Rockwell told Ricky Williams, described in a court document as a man who sold drugs for Rockwell, that Rockwell “tricked” Mancinelli and Gillman while the two men were at Rockwell’s house for a meeting.