Wednesday, May 18, 2005

D.A. BROWN: MANHATTAN MAN PLEADS GUILTY TO MURDER IN STABBING DEATH OF JAMAICA YOUTH DURING THREE BORO CRIME SPREE; FACES 15 YEARS TO LIFE PRISON

Queens District Attorney Richard A. Brown announced today that a Manhattan man has pled guilty to murdering in January 2004 a Jamaica, Queens youth during a three-county crime spree. The defendant has already been sentenced in the Bronx and Manhattan for two incidents that took place on the same day.

District Attorney Brown said, “The defendant has admitted his guilt, waived his right to appeal and acknowledged that he was responsible for the stabbing death of an 18-year-old youth in Jamaica, Queens during a crime spree in the Bronx, Queens and Manhattan. The defendant is a threat to society and the sentence to be imposed -- a prison term of 15-years to life -- is more than warranted by what was a shocking and terrible crime.”

The District Attorney identified the defendant as Andre Shobey, 47, of 630 Riverside Drive in Manhattan, who said he was employed as a salesman. The defendant pled guilty yesterday to Murder in the Second Degree before Queens Supreme Court Justice Robert J. Hanophy who indicated that he would sentence the defendant to 15 years to life in prison on June 14, 2005.

District Attorney Brown said that the defendant admitted in court that on January 21, 2004 about 2:45 p.m. at 106-56 160 Street in Jamaica, Queens he fatally stabbed Terrance Neal, 18, in the chest and throat with a knife and was also in possession of a loaded .32 caliber revolver. The victim was in the apartment caring for a four-year-old child when he was slain while trying to stop the defendant from leaving the apartment to attack a man who he had seen on the street and recognized. The child was not harmed.

According to District Attorney Brown, the defendant also pled guilty in the Bronx and Manhattan in two additional incidents that took place on the same day as the Queens homicide including the shooting of a woman inside an apartment building at 1420 Washington Avenue in the Bronx and a robbery and sexual abuse of a 15-year-old girl on a rooftop landing in the Baruch Houses on the lower East Side. The defendant has already been sentenced to 25 years to life in prison on each of those cases. The Manhattan sentence will run consecutively.

The investigation was conducted by Detectives Charles Lo Presti and David Shapiro of the New York City Police Department’s 103 Detective Squad under the supervision of Lieutenant Al Murphy as well as detectives of the Queens Homicide and Queens Robbery Squads.

The case is being prosecuted by Assistant District Attorney John W. Kosinski of the District Attorney’s Homicide Trials Bureau under the supervision of Assistant District Attorney Jack Warsawsky, Deputy Bureau Chief and the overall supervision of Executive Assistant District Attorney for Major Crimes Charles A. Testagrossa and Deputy Executive Assistant District Attorney for Major Crimes Daniel A. Saunders.