Nicholas “Fat Nick” Minucci, 23, is going to be in prison until at least March 28, 2019, now that a four-judge appellate panel upheld his July conviction for the racially motivated assault and robbery of Glenn Moore, 23, in Howard Beach.
Moore suffered a fractured skull resulting from being beaten with an aluminum baseball bat by Minucci, who also stole his sneakers and other property.
Minucci had been charged with numerous hate crimes, including first-degree assault and first- and second-degree robbery, along with then 22-year-old co-defendant Anthony Ench in the 2005 incident.
Ench pleaded guilty to second-degree attempted robbery and second-degree attempted assault as a hate crime and was sentenced to serve three years.
Minucci decided to put his fate in the hands of a jury and after eight hours of deliberations, a multi-ethnic jury acquitted him of the most serious charge, but convicted him of the lesser charges
During his trial, defense lawyer Albert Gaudelli tried unsuccessfully to convince jurors that Minucci was just using the “N-word” as a common hip-hop greeting, and attempted to call a witness to testify that Minucci didn’t have a reputation for being a racist – but trial Judge Richard Buchter didn’t allow the testimony.
The Appellate panel found that “the Supreme Court erred in not permitting one of the defendant’s character witnesses to testify” and that Minucci’s “lack of reputation for prejudice against black people was relevant to his guilt or innocence.”
“Nevertheless, the error was harmless in light of the overwhelming evidence,” the decision reads, “There is no significant probability that the error contributed to the convictions.”
Under cross-examination by the prosecution, a character witness that was allowed to testify revealed to the jury that Minucci participated in a baseball bat and paintball gun attack on a Sikh man on September 11, 2001.
Minucci had also been charged as a teen with stabbing another youth – who died before he could testify in that case.
