Press Release

Queens District Attorney Melinda Katz announced that Tex Ortiz was sentenced today to 13 years in prison for a kidnapping in which five people – including a 9-month-old – were held at gunpoint during a botched home invasion robbery that turned into a hostage standoff in Richmond Hill in 2020. The case against his co-defendant is pending.

District Attorney Katz said: “This defendant violated the sanctity of a family’s home, terrorizing them and endangering a baby. This sentence will hopefully provide a measure of closure for his victims.”

Ortiz, 38, of First Avenue in Manhattan, pleaded guilty on June 30 to kidnapping in the second degree. Justice Gia Morris sentenced him today to a determinate term of 13 years in prison.

Co-defendant Wilbert Wilson, 53, of Valentine Avenue in the Bronx, pleaded guilty to kidnapping in the second degree and related charges on July 21 and will be sentenced on September 12.

According to the charges against Ortiz:

• On November 17, 2020, at approximately 8:40 p.m., Ortiz and Wilson pried open the back door of a residence on 125^th Street in Richmond Hill. Four women and a baby were inside.
• The defendants ziptied some of the hostages and held them at gunpoint. They demanded money from the mother and pistol whipped her on the head, causing her to fall into furniture while she held her 9-month-old daughter.
• One of the victims managed to call 911 and when police arrived on the scene the young mother ran from the home clutching her baby in her arms.
• The remaining three victims, still held hostage, were threatened by the defendants at gunpoint. The defendants at one point used one of the victims as a human shield, forcing the woman to walk in front of them at gunpoint and yell to the police not to shoot.
• The defendants surrendered to police after releasing the last hostage.

Assistant District Attorney Eric Weinstein, of the District Attorney’s Career Criminal Major Crimes Bureau, prosecuted the case under the supervision of Assistant District Attorney Michael Whitney, Bureau Chief, and under the overall supervision of Executive Assistant District Attorney for Major Crimes Shawn Clark.