Queens youth face 14 years to life for premeditated murder

Posted 9/30/09

Queens District Attorney Richard A. Brown announced Dec. 23, that a 22-year-old Queens man has pleaded guilty to murder in the strangulation death of a woman he met on the street, followed home and …

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Queens youth face 14 years to life for premeditated murder

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Queens District Attorney Richard A. Brown announced Dec. 23, that a 22-year-old Queens man has pleaded guilty to murder in the strangulation death of a woman he met on the street, followed home and then viciously killed with his bare hands in July 2009.

District Attorney Brown said, “This was a brutal murder – made all the more horrible because the defendant was just 15 at the time. A young woman’s life was senselessly cut short and the defendant, now an adult, will face a lengthy term behind bars when sentenced next month.”

The District Attorney identified the defendant as Jose Martinez, 22, whose last known address was on Northern Boulevard in the Corona section of Queens. The defendant pleaded guilty last Friday to second-degree murder before Queens Supreme Court Justice Gregory L. Lasak, who indicated he will sentence Martinez to 14 yeas to life in prison as a juvenile offender on January 27, 2016.

District Attorney Brown said that, in pleading guilty, Martinez admitted to killing 23-year-old Carmen Saldana on July 12, 2009. The defendant, on a bicycle that day, encountered the woman on the street and started talking to her. He followed her home and once inside the Astoria apartment she shared with her mother, the two argued and a physical altercation ensued. Martinez then wrapped his hands around the victim’s neck and choked her to death.

Senior Assistant District Attorney Shawn Clark, of the District Attorney’s Homicide Trials Bureau, prosecuted the case under the supervision of Assistant District Attorneys Brad A. Leventhal, Bureau Chief, and Jack Warsawsky, Deputy Bureau Chief, and under 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.

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