Sources say NYPD instructor will admit to fatally shooting his fiancee, also an officer, in their Bay Shore home and get 10-year sentence
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NYPD officer fatally shot; fiance questioned
By Ann Givens
Newsday
NEW YORK — A New York City police academy instructor is expected to plead guilty this morning to shooting his fiancee, in a deal that will send him to prison for 10 years, sources close to the case said.
Alexis Chaparro, 28, is expected to plead guilty to first-degree manslaughter, a crime that carries a maximum prison term of 25 years. Chaparro was originally charged with second-degree murder.
Bob Clifford, a spokesman for the Suffolk district attorney’s office, declined to comment on this morning’s court appearance.
Chaparro’s defense lawyer, William Keahon of Islandia, said that he will be in court tomorrow for his client’s scheduled appearance. “Whatever comments I make, I’ll make in court,” he said.
Prosecutors said Chaparro shot his fiancee, Sonia Garcia, 28, a mother of two girls from a previous relationship and a four-year veteran of the New York Police Department, in the chest on Sept. 29, 2007, in Bay Shore. He then called 911 and told police that he had heard a shot and found her dead.
“She’s shot, she’s bleeding. Oh my God! Jesus!” said Chaparro on a 911 tape played in court hearings earlier this year. “I’m trying to do CPR, I’m pumping her chest. ... Just get over here, please!”
When police questioned Chaparro, he first said he had not fired his service pistol, then said he did not remember firing it, a detective said in court during hearings in the case. Also, police found only 15 rounds in Chaparro’s Smith & Wesson service pistol, not the 16 rounds he insisted were there. Chaparro said he hadn’t shot Garcia, while still saying he and Garcia were alone in the house, detectives said.
He was indicted nearly three months after the shooting.
Keahon has said that his client only remembers falling asleep the night his fiancee was shot and killed and that he had worried about burglars entering their home in the days leading up to her death. “No one knows what happened,” he said at the time.
But Garcia’s family has insisted that Chaparro was abusive and the likely killer. Attempts to reach her family for comment last night were unsuccessful.
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