Village murder charge
Sixth Precinct detectives on Monday arrested a 19-year-old illegal immigrant construction worker and charged him with the murder last Wednesday of an actress in her office on Abingdon Square in the Village.
The body of Adrienne Shelly, 40, the mother of a 3-year-old daughter, was found by her husband, Andrew Ostroy, at about 6 p.m. on Nov. 1, hanging from a shower curtain rod in the bathroom of the fourth-floor apartment office at 15 Abingdon Square.
Police first thought it was suicide because there was no evidence of forced entry or trauma to the body except for a bruise on the head. But Ostroy, owner of the family’s loft at Varick and Franklin Sts. in Tribeca, insisted that Shelly would never kill herself. A sneaker footprint in the bathroom that did not match the victim’s shoes prompted police to investigate the construction crew working in the third-floor apartment. They found a print that matched the one at the scene.
The suspect, Diego Pillco, had missed work for several days after the body was found and was arrested on Sunday evening, police said. He confessed on Monday that he encountered Shelly at the door to her office after she had complained about noise he was making on the floor below, police said. Pillco said he thought Shelly was dead after he struck her and knocked her to the floor, according to law enforcement officials.
Police said the suspect dragged her into the bathroom and hung her from a shower curtain rod with a sheet to make it appear like a suicide. Pillco was arraigned on a murder charge Tues. Nov. 7.
Shelly, whose real name was Adrienne Levine, appeared in several films, including “Factotum” with Matt Dillon and the popular 1990 film “Trust.”
Selis Manor stabbing
Wade Eberson, 41, of Selis Manor, a residence for the blind at 135 W. 23rd St., told police that three men stabbed him outside the residence on Sat. Nov. 4. But he changed his story in the hospital and said his pregnant girlfriend had stabbed him in his apartment and fled.
Police later arrested Fleurdliz Rolon, 42, in her home in the Bronx and charged her with second-degree attempted murder and first-degree assault. Eberson said he told the false story about three strangers because he didn’t want to get Rolon, who is pregnant with his child and also visually impaired, in trouble.
After being stabbed in the chest at about 1:20 a.m., Eberson made his way down 11 flights of stairs of the building and collapsed on the street, where he was found by police and taken to St. Vincent’s Hospital, where he was said to be in stable condition with a collapsed lung.
Albert Amateau
