Former Coast Guard Member Faces Life In Prison
An East New York man and former Coast Guard officer has been convicted of fatally shooting a 22-year-old Astoria Houses resident in February 2010 while the victim was packing his car to move to North Carolina with his girlfriend, it was announced last Thursday, May 10.
Marcus Ayala, 22, of Sheffield Avenue in Brooklyn, was convicted May 9 of second-degree murder and second-degree criminal possession of a weapon.
Queens Supreme Court Justice Michael B. Aloise, who presided at the nine-day jury trial set sentencing for June 6, at which time he faces 25 years to life in prison.
At the time of the murder, Ayala was on active duty in the Coast Guard and stationed in Virginia.
According to trial testimony, during the early morning hours of Feb. 20, 2010, Kalif Canady was packing his black 2000 GMC Denali SUV outside of his 27th Avenue home, preparing to move to North Carolina with his girlfriend and her child.
As Canady and his girlfriend completed loading the vehicle, Ayala, wearing a hoodie and with his face covered from the nose down, started to approach them.
As Canady’s girlfriend, who noticed that Ayala was holding a gun in one hand, attempted to alert Canady to his approach, Ayala began shooting, striking Canady twice in the head, as well as in his left forearm and thigh.
Canady was declared dead at the scene. Cell phone records placed Ayala in the vicinity of Canady’s murder at the time shots were fired.
According to trial testimony, Ayala, who was stationed in Norfolk, Va., rented a car and traveled from Virginia to New York City on Feb. 18, 2010, telling a shipmate that he was going to New York with friends to find the person who had killed his cousin, Daud Abdul-Hakim, on June 14, 2009. Eight months earlier, Ayala had told police that he believed that either Canady or individuals from the “Bama” Houses in Brooklyn were responsible for his cousin’s death.
“The victim, who had made the decision to leave New York rather than stay and be drawn into a violent feud with individuals from his old Brooklyn neighborhood, was shot and killed cold-bloodedly by the deagency fendant in front of his girlfriend,” Queens District Attorney Richard A. Brown said in a statement. “Such a senseless act of violence demonstrates that this defendant is a threat to society and deserving of a lengthy prison sentence.”
Senior Assistant District Attorney Debra Lynn Pomodore, of the District Attorney’s Homicide Trials Bureau, prosecuted the case under the supervision of Assistant District Attorneys Brad A. Leventhal, Bureau Chief, and Jack Warsawsky, Deputy Bureau Chief, and the overall supervision of Executive Assistant District Attorney for Major Crimes Charles A. Testagrossa and Deputy Executive Assistant District Attorney for Major Crimes Daniel A. Saunders.
