18 Years in Brownsville Bludgeon Death

By AHMED JALLOW

An East New York man was sentenced to 18 years in state prison on Tuesday in the 2014 beating death of a 26-year-old man inside the victim’s apartment on St. Marks Avenue in Brownsville.

Delvin Garcia, 31, was sentenced by Justice Neil Firetog at State Supreme Court in Brooklyn after the defendant pleaded guilty on Jan. 30 to first-degree manslaughter in the death of Anthony Freeman, 26. Garcia was also ordered to serve five years’ post-release supervision.

Through his lawyer, Garcia offered his condolences to the victim’s family before Firetog sentenced him. Garcia declined to speak.

“I’m glad its over. I forgave him already. Had I not forgiven him I wouldn’t have moved on,” said the victim’s aunt, Beverly Williams, who was in court with other family members.

Kamel Freeman, 31, the victim’s brother, said he had little to say but that “justice is served.”

Authorities said that Garcia bludgeoned Freeman with a 13-inch television and beat him with one of Freeman’s crutches, causing the victim to die of blunt trauma to the head. The items, both blood-splattered, were found next to the victim after the slaying on Sept. 2, 2014, and were later matched to Garcia through a fingerprint left on the television, according to a statement from Acting District Attorney Eric Gonzalez. In addition, he said, the victim’s girlfriend identified Garcia as a man she’d seen riding a bicycle in the vicinity.

“This defendant, who attacked the victim in his own home and left him to die, deserves to spend many years in prison for taking a young man’s life,” Gonzalez said in the statement.