Press Release

DISGRUNTLED CLIENT INDICTED ON MURDER CHARGES IN STABBING DEATH OF QUEENS LAWYER

Queens District Attorney Melinda Katz announced that Nando Perez, 64, has been indicted by a Queens County grand jury and arraigned in Supreme Court for murder in the August 2021 stabbing death of a 65-year-old Queens attorney.

District Attorney Katz said, “This was a brutal killing that stunned the community. The victim was found dead inside his Jackson Heights office with multiple stab wounds and a former client is accused of settling a disagreement with violence.”

Perez, of East 165th Street in the Bronx, was arraigned late yesterday before Queens Supreme Court Justice Ushir Pandit-Durant on an indictment charging him with murder in the second degree and criminal possession of a weapon in the fourth degree. Justice Pandit-Durant continued to hold the defendant without bail and ordered him to return to court on October 12, 2021. If convicted, Perez faces up to 25 years-to-life in prison.

According to the charges, sometime after 4:20 p.m. on August 4, 2021, Perez entered the law office of Charles Zolot on 82nd Avenue near 37th Street in Jackson Heights, Queens. The defendant, who had once been a client, allegedly attacked Mr. Zolot in his second-floor conference room, stabbing him approximately 20 times before fleeing the scene. The lawyer’s body was found the following morning.

The investigation was conducted by Officer Tyler Scala of the 115th Detective Squad and Detective Joseph Bey of the Queens North Homicide Squad.

Assistant District Attorney Jonathan Selkowe, of the District Attorney’s Homicide Bureau, is prosecuting the case under the supervision of Assistant District Attorneys Peter McCormack III, Senior Deputy Bureau Chief, John Kosinski and Karen Ross, Deputy Bureau Chiefs, and under the overall supervision of Executive Assistant District Attorney for Major Crimes Daniel A. Saunders

**Criminal complaints and indictments are accusations. A defendant is presumed innocent until proven guilty.