An Ecuadorean immigrant was found lying in a pool of blood in an alley near where he was believed stabbed by a group of teenagers, a police officer testified Friday.
Suffolk County Police Officer Frank Munsch testified at the trial of Jeffrey Conroy, 19, who has pleaded not guilty to murder and manslaughter as a hate crime in the November 2008 killing of Marcelo Lucero.
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Munsch said the trail of blood began in a parking lot of the Patchogue train station and went down an alley where the 37-year-old Lucero was found under a van.
“He was lying in a pool of blood. He had trouble breathing. He was pale and his hands and feet were shaking,” the officer testified.
Conroy is the only one of seven teens arrested in the killing to be charged with murder because authorities allege he was the person who plunged a knife into Lucero’s chest.
Prosecutors contend the killing was the culmination of a campaign of violence against Hispanics on eastern Long Island. The U.S. Justice Department is currently investigating police responses to hate crimes in the community, which has seen a large influx of Hispanics over the last decade.
An emergency medical technician testified Thursday that it took about 40 minutes from the time the first 911 call was received about the stabbing until Lucero reached a nearby hospital. He died there shortly afterward.
Defense attorney William Keahon has suggested that Lucero might have survived if emergency response had been faster.
Four of Conroy’s friends from Patchogue-Medford High School have pleaded guilty to hate crime-related charges and agreed to testify against him. They face prison terms of perhaps 10 years or more. State Supreme Court Justice Robert Doyle will decide their sentences after Conroy’s trial.
The trial began Thursday and is expected to last six to eight weeks.
Copyright 2010 The Associated Press.
