Press Release
GRANDMOTHER CONVICTED IN DEATH OF DAUGHTER’S BOYFRIEND
Queens District Attorney Melinda Katz announced that Suzette Olin was convicted of manslaughter for her role in the death of Shaka Ifil, her daughter’s boyfriend and the father of her daughter’s newborn. Ifil was shot once in the back while in his Woodhaven home.
District Attorney Katz said: “The jury convicted this defendant in the cold-blooded death of the father of her grandchild. She is being held to account.”
Olin, 68, of Redfern Avenue, Far Rockaway, was convicted by a jury on March 31 in Queens Supreme Court of manslaughter in the first degree and criminal possession of a weapon in the second degree. She faces a sentence of up to 25 years in prison by Queens Supreme Court Justice Ushir Pandit-Durant on May 9.
According to the trial testimony:
- On July 26, 2020, at approximately 2 p.m., an upstairs neighbor of Ifil’s on 91st Avenue heard a commotion in his apartment and, a few minutes later, walked downstairs and found his door open. Ifil was on the floor with a gunshot wound to his back.
- The neighbor called 911 and when police arrived, the 40-year-old Ifil told them he was dying and that his girlfriend’s mother shot him. He was taken to Jamaica Hospital and later pronounced dead, the bullet having hit several major organs and blood vessels.
- Security camera video showed a woman who appeared to be smoking a cigarette get out of an Access-A-Ride car service vehicle near Ifil’s home at about 1:51 p.m. July 26, 2020, and then leave the home at 2:01 p.m. The woman was identified as Olin and a DNA test of a cigarette butt found in the apartment was linked to her.
- An investigation revealed that three days before the shooting, Olin’s daughter filed a domestic incident report with police alleging Ifil broke a door in their apartment. Police responded, and bodycam footage showed the broken door. The girlfriend did not appear to be injured.
- Olin was arrested on Sept. 18, 2020.
Senior Assistant District Attorney Gregory Lasak of the District Attorney’s Homicide Bureau and Ryan Licciardello of Felony Trial Bureau III prosecuted the case under the supervision of Assistant District Attorneys Peter McCormack III and John W. Kosinski, Senior Deputy Bureau Chiefs, and Karen Ross, Deputy Bureau Chief, and under the overall supervision of Executive Assistant District Attorney for Major Crimes Shawn Clark.