A parolee charged in a Yonkers homicide in July told detectives he had no recollection of the fatal shooting and that he took a dozen anti-psychotic pills in a suicide attempt as police were trying to take him into custody hours after the killing, according to court documents.
Fidencio Abreu, 41, pleaded not guilty in Westchester County Court Tuesday, Aug. 12, to an indictment charging him with second-degree murder and second- and third-degree criminal possession of a weapon.
Abreu is accused of killing an acquaintance, Francisco Vallejo, with a single gunshot to the head at Ludlow Street and Riverdale Avenue early on July 11.
He surrendered to police late that morning after barricading himself in a room of a Radford Street apartment where he was staying. Police recovered a Polymer 80 semi-automatic pistol in the apartment that ballistics tests have since determined was the gun used in the killing.
Abreu was hospitalized briefly after his arrest and interviewed the following day at police headquarters.
Court documents reveal Abreu’s recollection of events
According to the court documents, he told detectives that he and Vallejo had been in Manhattan that night before returning to Yonkers and hanging out with some women on Ludlow Street.
After Vallejo was berated for an altercation he’d had earlier with a woman, Abreu claimed he took two ecstasy pills and blacked out, according to the statement attributed to him. He claimed to have woken up in a driveway near the Radford Street building, went into the apartment and fell asleep.
He said he awoke to the sound of police knocking and took 12 Seroquel pills hoping to overdose. While locked in the room, according to the documents, he told police he had suicidal thoughts and would point his gun at them if they entered the room.
Although he claimed not to have any recollection of the shooting, he did tell detectives he wanted to apologize to Vallejo’s family. He said he was a frequent drug user and was high on PCP, cocaine, ecstasy and Percocet the night of the shooting.
Westchester Judge Robert Prisco ordered Abreu back to the county jail until his next court date Nov. 18.
Abreu served three prison terms for theft-related convictions, including a 6-year stint for a string of burglaries and attempted burglaries in Larchmont, Rye, Yonkers and Bronxville in the fall of 2016. He was paroled in July 2024.
This article originally appeared on Rockland/Westchester Journal News: Suspect pleads not guilty in fatal Yonkers shooting of Francisco Vallejo
Reporting by Jonathan Bandler, Rockland/Westchester Journal News / Rockland/Westchester Journal News
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