Press Release

Queens District Attorney Melinda Katz announced today that Robert Rodriguez, 31, has been sentenced to 19 years in prison after pleading guilty to manslaughter for shooting and killing a 34-year-old woman in September 2017.

District Attorney Katz said, “The defendant admitted killing the mother of his infant son during an argument in front of her home. This violent tragedy leaves three children without their mother. This sentencing cannot redress their loss but we hope it brings their family a measure of justice”

Rodriguez, of 225^th Street, in the Cambria Heights section of Queens, pleaded guilty on January 10, 2022, to manslaughter in the first degree before Queens Supreme Court Justice Kenneth Holder. Yesterday, Justice Holder sentenced Rodriguez to prison for 19 years, to be followed by five years’ post release supervision.

According to the charges, at approximately 2 a.m. on September 17, 2017, the victim Luz Cuza and the defendant were in the front yard of her home on 147^th Street. The victim’s brother came outside and found Ms. Cuza on the ground with a fatal gunshot wound to her eye. The defendant was seen walking away from the scene carrying a shoe box.

District Attorney Katz said, the victim’s brother banged on neighbors’ doors and yelled for someone to call 911. Police responded to the scene then went to the defendant’s address, where they found a loaded semi-automatic pistol and 48 rounds of ammunition in a shoebox. Forensic analysis proved the firearm was the same used to kill Ms. Cuza.

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