Joan Vila Dilmé

In 2014, he was found guilty by the Supreme Court of Spain and sentenced to 127 years and a half imprisonment for his crimes.

Vila's defense team filed an appeal to the High Court of Justice of Catalonia, alleging that their client's presumption of innocence had been violated and that he had been sentenced with only his confession as evidence, as by that time, the autopsies on the victims hadn't concluded. The request was denied on February 23, 2014. An appeal was then forwarded to the Supreme Court of Spain, which also rejected the appeal on October 10 of that year.

Vila's trial began at the Provincial Court of Girona on May 27, 2013, with him initially confessing that the didn't want to hurt the old women and was relieved to see them dead. He was faced with the possibility of a sentence of more than 200 years imprisonment for 11 counts of the murder, the last 3 of which were aggravated. The prosecution argued that the killer took advantage of the times when there was few other staff members, and with his victims being unable to defend themselves, he was able to freely kill without any hindrances.

On June 21, 2013, the juries (consisting of five men and four women) found Joan Vila Dilmé guilty on all counts and recommended a sentence of 127 and a half years imprisonment for the aggravated murder of the last three victims, and murder with malice aforethought for the remaining ten. In all, of the possible 194 possible years in prison, he received a lesser sentence of 127 due to his confessions, and was prohibited from approaching or contacting any of the victims' family members or relatives for a period of 10 years. While the imposed sentence was 127, the maximum penalty established by criminal law amounted to 40 years imprisonment, which Vila had to serve at the Puig de les Basses Penitentiary Center in Figueres.

The last three murders took place within the span of five days between October 12 and 17: Sabina Masllorens i Sala on the 12th, Montserrat Guillamet Bartolich on the 16th and Paquita Gironès i Quintana on the 17th. In the commission of these murders, Vila had forced his victims to drink bleach, or injected them with acid or other corrosive substances directly into the mouth. This technique proved to cause excruciating pains to the victim, with the sodium hypochlorite causing several internal burns in the esophagus, mucous membrane and the lungs. At trial, Vila confessed that he had been drinking wine with Coca-Cola for 10 days, and that after killing Masllorens, he had gone home and sat down to watch the TV. Later on, he was invited to join the woman's funeral and the subsequent vigil dedicated in her memory.

A month later, Vila voluntarily requested to appear before the court, where he confessed to killing 11 elderly patients during his term at La Caritat. Initially, his lawyer Carles Monguilod, who claimed to have a kindred relationship with his client, tried to justify his client's actions by portraying them as euthanisations to end their suffering. The judge ordered the exhumation of other victims' bodies for an autopsy, given that 56 deaths had occurred since Vila had begun work at La Caritat, of which 27 happened during his shifts (48,2%). Months later, in February 2011, the results of the National Institute of Toxicology and those of the Institute of Forensic Medicine of Catalonia – both requested by the judge – couldn't clarify whether other victims had been killed with barbiturates or if they had been poisoned at all, given that the bodies had been highly decomposed. Because of this, it was impossible to verify whether there were more victims or not.

From 2006 up until the autumn of 2010, Vila lamented to his colleagues that 'all the old women were dying on him'. The rest of the staff agreed that Vila was an efficient and attentive nurse, who put in a lot of effort into explaining the circumstances of death to the deceased patients' relatives. In late September, however, he began to undergo a change of character, becoming more uncompromising and violent. He stated that he was fed up with elderly patients, that he wanted to change jobs, and after the murder of Joan Canal Julià on September 19, 2010, he forced a co-worker to enter the man's room to watch over his body.

After working there for three and a half years without incident, Vila began killing his patients in August 2009. When committing the killings, he would use two methods: either orally administer a cocktail of barbiturates and drugs mixed with water, or perform intravenous injections with high doses of insulin, which he reserved for diabetic victims. Each death occurred within months of the last one, with several relatives reporting that their loved ones had died an agonizing death, with some of them bleeding from the mouth. The victims, who were predominantly women aged 80–96, were Rosa Barbures Pujol, Francisca Matilde Fiol, Teresa Puig Boixadera, Isidra García Aseijas, Carme Vilanova Viñolas, Lluís Salleras Claret, Joan Canal Julià i Montserrat Canalias Muntada.

In the beginning of 2006, after having worked in Banyoles and Salt, Vila was hired as a nursing assistant at the Fundació La Caritat nursing home in Olot, next to the Fluvià River. At the time the home was run by psychologist Joan Sala, who saw no harm in the new employee. Vila's shifts were divided between holidays and weekends, and thus, he worked during hours when few staff was present at the facility.

Joan Vila Dilmé (born September 26, 1965), known as The Caretaker of Olot and The Angel of Death, is a Spanish serial killer and nursing assistant. He is responsible for at least 11 murders committed at the Fundació La Caritat in Olot between August 2009 and October 2010, with all his victims being elderly patients aged 80–96.

Joan Vila Dilmé was born on September 26, 1965 in Castellfollit de la Roca, Catalonia (Spain), the son of a working class-family of embutido makers. An asocial and insecure individual, Vila avoided interacting with his peers due to worries about his acne, sexuality and the significant tremors in his hands. After his arrest, Vila would acknowledge that throughout his childhood and youth, he felt like "a woman trapped inside a man's body" and that his homosexuality had influenced some of his habits – a fact which psychiatrists deemed to be a result of his mental anguish.