By Madina Toure
A 25-year-old Fresh Meadows man has been sentenced to 23½ years in prison for fatally shooting a nurse and wounding her son as they sat in a car parked outside the Pomonok Houses during the July 4th weekend in 2011, the Queens district attorney said.
The man, identified as Malik Wallace, pleaded guilty to manslaughter on Sept. 11, 2015 before Queens Supreme Court Justice Gregory Lasak, who sentenced Wallace to a determinate term of 23 ½ years in prison and five years’ post-release supervision last Friday, DA Richard Brown said.
Wallace was charged with murder, attempted murder and criminal possession of a weapon, according to a complaint filed by the DA.
“In another example of the senseless gun violence plaguing our country, the defendant and another individual fired into the parked car of the victims—killing the woman and injuring the 18-year-old young man,” he said. “Today’s sentence is more than warranted.”
Christina Coleman, 39, and Hassan Gil, 18, were both shot at about 5:45 p.m. July 2, 2011 while they sat in her 2006 light blue Volkswagen in front of her home at 155-26 Jewel Ave. in the Pomonok Houses, police said.
Right after the shooting, Gil reported the crime to officers at Police Serve Area 9 a few buildings away at 155-09 Jewel Ave., officials said.
Coleman and Gil were taken to NewYork-Presbyterian/Queens, where Coleman was declared dead upon arrival from a gunshot to the head, police said.
Later that day, Gil, who suffered a gunshot wound to the chest, was listed in stable condition, police added. Robinson was previously sentenced to 22 years on his guilty plea to assault, Brown added.
The attack was described by police as payback for an earlier shooting that morning at 67-18 Parsons Blvd. that wounded two suspected drug dealers.
Authorities believed that it was a case of mistaken identity as sources told the New York Post at the time that the shooters were aiming for Coleman’s 22-year-old son, Mark, who also lived in Pomonok.
Reach reporter Madina Toure by e-mail at mtour
