Naked Washington Heights Killer Found Guilty

By SANDRA ALMONTE & MARCO POGGIO

A Washington Heights man who accused of killing two of his neighbors and injured two others during a naked stabbing spree three years ago was found guilty of two murders Tuesday in Manhattan Supreme Court.

Christian Falero, 26, was convicted of the first-degree murders of Yanzhi Wang, 60, and Ignacio Collazo, 81, and for assaulting two other people, including Isabella Rivera, who was 86 at the time of the rampage.

On the second day of deliberation, the jury — presumably to assess the defendant’s sanity — asked to review five video clips recorded by security cameras inside and outside the apartment building at 870 Riverside Drive, where the stabbings took place on August 23, 2011.

Last November, Falero’s defense lawyer, Steven Hoffner, said his client’s actions were caused by an evident mental illness, which prevented him to distinguish right from wrong.

Cheryl Paradis, a psychologist and professor at Marymount Manhattan College who was called to testify by the defense, said Falero was “acutely psychotic” at the time of the killings.

But the jury didn’t buy it.

The prosecutor in the case, Assistant DA Maxine Rosenthal, however, contended Falero was fully aware of his actions when he carried out the stabbings and that has since his arrest tried to fake schizophrenia to elude punishment.

According to Rosenthal, Falero’s violent rush was an explosion of negative emotions fueled by dissatisfaction with his life as well a pattern of drug use.

The jury requested a review of the video recordings before reaching a verdict.

In one of videos, a middle-aged woman appears running away, with Falero chasing her erratically up a flight of stairs.

Another clip showed the defendant running outside the building from the front door on Riverside Drive, running around completely unclothed.

At the time of the stabbing, an earthquake had just shaken the city. Falero grabbed a 10-inch knife from a neighbors’ hand and begin randomly slashing whoever he found in his way.

According to a medical report compiled one day after he was arrested, a nurse heard Falero asking whether he was Neo, the main character from the movie “The Matrix.” The report also mentioned the defendant said he was seeing eyes around himself.

The jury focused on conflicting medical evaluations.

In her testimony, Professor Paradis said she determined after a lengthy examination of Falero’s mental state that the defendant was mentally ill at the time of the slaying. After the earthquake hit, Paradis said, he thought the world was ending and that he was ordered by his computer to save humanity.

But a diagnosis made by the medical staff at Bellevue Hospital, where the defendant was taken shortly after his arrest, determined Falero did not appear to be psychotic and was not treated with medication before being returned to the custody of the New York Police Department.

The prosecutors also argued that a video showing police detective reading Miranda Rights to Falero allegedly showed that the defendant was lucid and responsive.

As he was escorted out of the courtroom, Falero turned back and gave a sad look to his mother, who appeared devastated by the verdict.