Friday, April 22, 2005
D.A. BROWN: QUEENS WOMAN CONVICTED OF HAMMER ASSAULT ON HUSBAND; FACES UP TO 25 YEARS IN PRISON
Queens District Attorney Richard A. Brown today announced that a Queens woman has been convicted after a jury trial of assaulting her husband by viciously beating him with a hammer.
District Attorney Brown said, “The defendant viciously attacked her husband with a hammer and repeatedly struck him in the head fracturing his skull. The conviction ensures that justice has been done for the victim who sustained serious physical injuries in the attack.”
District Attorney Brown identified the defendant as Gina Guillen, 26, of 40-15 Hampton Street in Elmhurst, Queens, a nightclub waitress/bartender. The defendant was found guilty of Assault in the First Degree and Criminal Possession of a Weapon in the Fourth Degree after a two and one-half week trial by a jury of seven men and five women who deliberated for three hours before returning its verdict before Supreme Court Justice Mark H. Spires. The defendant will be sentenced on May 10, 2005 and faces up to 25 years in prison.
The District Attorney said that according to the trial testimony on April 29, 2003 at 8:30 a.m. inside the victim’s residence at 40-18 Forley Street in Elmhurst, Queens, the defendant attacked her husband, Felipe Herrera, 35, and repeatedly struck him in the head with a hammer, causing him to suffer a fractured skull, brain damage, right-side paralysis, difficulty speaking and memory lapses. The victim was in a coma for several days as a result of the brutal attack.
Assistant District Attorney Shlomit L. Metz of the District Attorney's Narcotics Trials Bureau is prosecuting the case under the supervision of Assistant District Attorney Kenneth C. Holder, Bureau Chief, Karen H. Rankin and Kevin M. Duddy, Deputy Bureau Chiefs and the overall supervision of Senior Executive Assistant District Attorney for Trials James Clark Quinn and Deputy Executive Assistant District Attorney John H. Larsen.