This just in:
Wetzel Road black widow Stacey Castor actually had a heart.
Last week, Onondaga County District Attorney William Fitzpatrick – who sent Castor to state prison in 2009 – announced that she died of a heart attack.
The convicted husband-killer was found dead in her cell on June 11, at Bedford Hills Correctional Facility where she was serving 51 and 1/3 years in state prison. She was just 48 years old.
At the time, the state Department of Corrections declined to cite a cause of death. An autopsy was conducted by the Westchester County Medical Examiner’s office.
When I contacted the ME in October, his staff cited Health Insurance Portability and Accountability Act regulations prohibiting release of cause of death to anyone except family members.
On Dec. 7, Westchester County DA spokesman Robert Wolf told me that the DA’s homicide investigators found “no sign of criminality” in Castor’s untimely death.
A couple days later, Fitzpatrick told a reporter that Castor died from cardiac arrest.
Convicted in 2009
Castor was convicted in 2009 of fatally poisoning her second husband, David Castor, with antifreeze at their home at 4127 Wetzel Road and of attempting to similarly murder her daughter, Ashley Wallace.
An Onondaga County Court jury of two men and 10 women pronounced her guilty on Thursday Feb. 5, 2009, of second-degree murder and attempted second-degree murder. She was also suspected of killing her first husband, Michael Wallace, in Auburn five year before Castor’s murder, though she was never charged with the crime.
Jurors found that Stacey Castor had both the opportunity and motive to poison at least one (and probably two) husbands with antifreeze. She wanted their money. She wanted them out of her life.
When she also dosed her daughter two years after David Castor died, it was to pin the murder rap(s) on someone other than herself. Ashley Wallace was then a student at Liverpool High School.
On March 5, 2009, Onondaga County Court Judge Joseph Fahey ordered Stacey Castor to serve the maximum sentence allowed by law.
Sensational trial
Castor’s murder trial was a local and national sensation. Testimony was carried live over WSYR-TV channel 9.2HD, and Time Warner News 10 Now carried Castor’s testimony and the lawyers’ closing arguments. The case was covered by ABC-TV’s newsmagazine, “20/20,” and became the subject of at least one true-crime book, “Mommy Deadliest” by Michael Benson.
In December 2013, Judge Fahey denied Castor’s motion to retry the case on grounds that authorities deprived her of the right to counsel before a police interrogation in 2007. In June 2015, a state appeals court affirmed Fahey’s ruling, effectively ending Castor’s appeal.
She died 12 months later, having served seven years of her 51-year sentence.
Old L’pool Road shooting
Speaking of violent crimes, New York State Police say that in the early-morning hours of Saturday, Dec. 10, a 22-year-old man was driving south on Old Liverpool Road near the I-81 South ramp when he was shot twice in the back by someone in another vehicle.
The injured man drove his burgundy-colored compact car to St. Joseph’s Hospital Health Center on the city’s North Side. The car had been struck by a half dozen bullets. The victim himself was treated and released.
Troopers are continuing their investigation into the incident.
Lambros in ‘Wonderful Life’
One of the world’s most beloved holiday films, Frank Capra’s “It’s a Wonderful Life,” has been adapted for the stage, and CNY Playhouse in DeWitt has mounted a marvelous stage version starring Jordan Glaski and Kimberly Grader and running through Dec. 17.
The play also features young Lambros Alamond, a seventh-grader at Liverpool Middle School.
In Act 1, Lambros, 12, portrays a young George Bailey, and in Act 2 he plays George’s son, Peter. Lambros also sings with the barbershop-style Harmonic Collective, which will perform a free concert at 7 p.m. Thursday, Dec. 29, at the Liverpool Public Library.
“It’s a Wonderful Life” concludes its three-week run at 8 p.m. Thursday, Friday, Saturday Dec. 15, 16 and 17, at CNY Playhouse located near the Macy’s entrance at DeWitt’s Shoppingtown Mall; Tickets cost $17 on Thursday, and $20 on Friday and Saturday; 885-8960; cnyplayhouse.com.
Handbells for the holidays
The Belle Aire Handbell Choir will perform a free concert at 2 p.m. Sunday, Dec. 18, at Liverpool Public Library. The bell ringers, René Hebert, Sarah Gilmore and Linda Yonteff, will entertain with seasonal tunes; lpl.org; 457-0310.
Sunday’s concert is presented in partnership with the Liverpool is The Place Committee.
The columnist can be contacted at [email protected].
