Source: New York Times
By Manny Fernandez
RIVERHEAD, N.Y. — The Long Island teenager accused of stabbing and killing an Ecuadorean immigrant in a racially motivated attack was convicted on Monday of manslaughter as a hate crime, a less serious crime than the initial murder charge — saving him from spending the rest of his life behind bars.
Seventeen months after the stabbing in 2008 and 24 miles from the parking lot in Patchogue where the victim left a 370-foot trail of blood, the jury forewoman rose in State Supreme Court here to read the verdict, ending four days of deliberations. The teenager, Jeffrey Conroy, was found guilty of first-degree manslaughter as a hate crime and gang assault in connection with the death of the immigrant, Marcelo Lucero, and guilty of attempted assaults on three other Hispanic men. He was acquitted of the most serious of the 20 charges against him, second-degree murder as a hate crime.
