Jury convicts one in 'wrong man' murder trial
Co-defendant's fate still being debated
By Lisa Sweetingham and John Springer
Court TV
RIVERHEAD, New York (Court TV) -- A jury convicted a Long Island bodybuilder Tuesday of conspiring with his girlfriend to kill her husband, but killing the man's business partner instead.
After five weeks of testimony from 35 witnesses, jurors deliberated just four hours Tuesday before finding Ralph Salierno, 36, guilty of first-degree murder, second-degree murder and second-degree conspiracy. He faces up to life in prison when he is sentenced April 26.
Prosecutors argued Salierno helped plan the murder of his girlfriend's husband, Paul Reidel, but when he arrived at the Dolphin Gym in Amityville to carry out the hit, accidentally killed Reidel's partner, Alex Algeri, instead.
A separate jury is still deliberating the case of Salierno's co-defendant, Lee Ann Reidel, 36, who faces the same charges for the January 17, 2001, shooting.
"Justice has been served," Algeri's father, Salvatore, said outside the courthouse Tuesday. "We got one today. Hopefully we'll get the other one tomorrow."
Salierno showed little reaction when the verdicts were read. As he was led from the courtroom, he smiled slightly and thanked his lawyer, Seth Muraskin.
In his closing argument earlier Tuesday, Muraskin had told jurors there was absolutely nothing tying Salierno to the murder.
"There is no physical evidence of any kind -- no DNA evidence, no fingerprints -- nothing to suggest he was even there," Muraskin said.
But Salierno initially confessed, saying he and a friend, Scott Paget, drove from Florida to Long Island with the intent of killing Paul Reidel. In that six-page statement, Salierno claimed Paget was the one who pulled the trigger while he waited nearby in a white van they had rented for the trip.
Prosecutors took issue with many of the details in Salierno's statement, notably that Paget was the gunman. They contended Paget had nothing to gain in the killing, that it was Salierno who wanted Reidel dead, and that, when he got caught, Salierno gave police an account that minimized his involvement.
"I'm not asking you to believe that confession at all," Assistant District Attorney Denise Merrifield told jurors, "other than he admitted to being there with Scott."
Paget, who testified under a plea agreement, admitted driving the van, but said Salierno had done the planning and carried out the killing.
Salierno later changed his story, saying he was on a date that night with a stripper, who testified on his behalf. He clamed his confession had been beaten out of him by a police detective.
Merrifield rejected the notion that Salierno had been beaten, and showed the jury arrest photos of the defendant that failed to show bruises or other signs of a physical altercation.
"Look at the size of that man," she said, pointing to the beefy defendant. "I don't think a Mack truck can make him do anything he doesn't want to."
'Why me?'
Also Tuesday, Merrifield asked jurors to imagine what must have been going through Algeri's mind when he got into his black GMC Yukon at about 7:25 p.m. that night and was shot five times with a snub-nosed .38.
"He must have thought, 'Why is this happening? Why me?" Merrifield told jurors before pointing to Salierno. "It happened because that man, right there, got hired to kill Paul Reidel and he's too stupid to find the right guy."
Most damning, Merrifield reminded jurors, was a small detail from Salierno's sworn statement: He remembered that the interior light of Algeri's Yukon was on. If he had been sitting in the getaway car, parked on the street, and not near the Yukon, he could not have known that detail, which was later confirmed by forensics.
Reidel's attorney, who never called a single witness, delivered his closing argument Monday. Saying there was a "lack of any credible evidence that implicates Lee Ann Reidel," Bruce Barket argued Reidel had merely wanted someone to protect her in the event her estranged husband came looking for her in Florida, where she had fled with some of his money. Salierno carried out the killing on his own without her knowledge, Barket said.
Reidel's jury, which is sequestered, will begin deliberating again Wednesday morning.
