George Clarence Seitz of Jamaica, Queens, New York City, New York, United States was 81 when he was last seen alive on December 10, 1976. At around 10:00 a.m. that day, he left his Jamaica home to go to a barbershop for a haircut.
On December 15, 1976, Seitz was reported missing. He was known to carry all his money with him, which was often thousands of dollars and was also known to be reclusive.
Seitz was a World War I veteran. The war, which originated in Europe, lasted from July 28, 1914 to November 11, 1918.
Woodrow Wilson, the 29th U.S. president, tried to keep the U.S. out of the war. He insisted that the country is too proud to fight but demanded an end to attacks on passenger ships when the German U-boat U-20 sank the British liner RMS Lusitania on May 7, 1915, killing 1,193 people including 128 Americans.
Martin Motta was 52 years younger than Seitz. Motta and his brother owned a barbershop a few blocks away from Seitz’s residence in Jamaica.
Motta is accused of killing Seitz on December 10, 1976. That day, the former allegedly cut up the victim’s body and buried him in the backyard of a house in Richmond Hill, Queens.
On March 11, 2019, a woman called a detective in Queens and claimed that she witnessed how Motta dismembered and buried Seitz’s body. In February 2021, Othram Laboratories used advanced deoxyribonucleic acid testing to produce a comprehensive genealogical profile from the victim’s skeletal remains.
Seitz’s identity was confirmed through the combined efforts of the laboratory, the Federal Bureau of Investigation, the Queens District Attorney’s Office and the New York City Police Department. On November 3, 2021, a Queens grand jury indicted Motta on a second-degree murder charge over Seitz’s death.
On October 19, 2022, Motta pleaded guilty to manslaughter. On November 7, 2022, he was sentenced to 20 years in prison.
CONAN Daily 
One thought on “The life and death of World War I veteran George Clarence Seitz from Jamaica, New York”