TUESDAY, AUGUST 30, 2005

DA BROWN: FLORIDA MAN CONVICTED OF MURDER FOR 1994 SHOOTING OF FORMER ROOMMATE
Faces up to 25 Years to Life in Prison

Queens District Attorney Richard A. Brown announced today that a Florida man has been found guilty after a jury trial in the April 1994 slaying of his former Jamaica, Queens, roommate.

District Attorney Brown said, “The victim was an aspiring musician who had been shot twice before being dumped alive from a moving van and then shot three more times before dying hours later at a local hospital. The defendant intentionally took a life and his actions warrant imposition of a maximum prison sentence to punish him and protect society.”

The District Attorney identified the defendant as Christopher Schloss, 37, whose last known address was 6809 South Englewood in Tampa, Florida. He was convicted of Murder in the Second Degree.

The District Attorney said that the defendant was convicted last night by a jury of four men and eight women that deliberated five hours after a two-week trial. The jury returned a verdict of guilty before Queens Supreme Court Justice Arthur J. Cooperman who indicated that he would impose sentence on September 20, 2005. The defendant faces up to 25 years to life in prison.

The District Attorney said that, according to trial testimony, the defendant was traveling in a van with his roommate, Omar Langshaw, 26, of Cambria Heights, on April 26, 1994, when the defendant shot Langshaw in the leg and demanded that he hand over a briefcase. When Langshaw refused, the defendant shot him again and then pushed him from the van at 145th Drive in Springfield Gardens and shot him three more times.

According to District Attorney Brown, the defendant was arrested at his Tampa residence on May 21, 1999, after bragging to his ex-girlfriend, Celeste Johnson, that he had killed Langshaw and warning her that if she told anyone, he would, “ . . . put you 6 feet under, like Omar.” While in custody, the defendant was diagnosed with paranoid schizophrenia and declared unfit to stand trial. In February 2003, he was found fit and stood trial during which he acted as his own attorney. However, the defendant caused a mistrial when he stopped taking his psychiatric medications and began behaving erratically.

The case was prosecuted by Assistant District Attorney Denise Tirino, 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.