FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
Tuesday, September 29, 2015
Brooklyn Handyman Convicted Of Murder for Killing His Boss
Defendant Bragged on Tape That He Dismembered the Body, Which Was Never Recovered
Brooklyn District Attorney Ken Thompson today announced that a former handyman who boasted about his crime on a secret audio recording has been convicted of killing and dismembering a 55-year-old Brooklyn property owner whose body was never found. The jury returned the verdict yesterday afternoon following less than a day of deliberations.
District Attorney Thompson said, “This verdict is a measure of justice for Bruce Blackwood and all of his friends and family members who knew that this hardworking, reliable man did not just simply disappear. The jury listened to the defendant’s own words as he coldly described what he had done to the victim, including cutting up his body and discarding his remains. And the jury used the defendant’s own words to convict him of murder.”
The District Attorney identified the defendant as Luis Perez, 50, formerly of 983 Hancock Street, in Bushwick, Brooklyn. He was convicted today of one count of second-degree murder following a jury trial before Brooklyn Supreme Court Justice Danny Chun, who set sentencing for October 13, 2015, at which time the defendant faces 25 years to life in prison.
The District Attorney said that, according to trial testimony, the victim, Bruce Blackwood, owned several properties in Brooklyn and hired the defendant to work in some of the apartments, which he was preparing to rent out. At some point, however, the victim discovered that the defendant stole the victim’s checkbook and cashed multiple checks against the victim’s account, totaling $7,700.
According to the evidence presented at trial, the victim confronted the defendant about the stolen checks on March 6, 2006, at one of the victim’s properties at 983 Hancock Street, where the defendant was living at the time. The defendant, who had a criminal history and did not want to return to prison, then killed the victim, and disposed of his body, according to 3 ½ hours of audiotape secretly recorded by the defendant’s daughter.
In the audiotape, the defendant told his daughter how he choked the victim and then used a machete to cut up his body and dispose of it in construction-grade plastic bags. He then told her that he used hospital-grade bleach to clean up the crime scene.
“It’s not about committing the perfect crime, it’s just about how well you clean it up,” the defendant boasted on the audiotape. The defendant told his daughter that he killed Mr. Blackwood to avoid going to prison for stealing his checks and cashing them, though he ultimately was convicted of that crime and was sentenced to two to four years in prison. He was arrested for the murder last year.
The case was prosecuted by Assistant District Attorney Melissa Carvajal of the District Attorney’s Homicide Bureau, under the supervision of Assistant District Attorney Kenneth Taub, Bureau Chief.
#