Overview

• A Queens jury convicted Peter Zisopoulos in May of second-degree murder and criminal weapons possession for shoving Alison Russo to the ground outside her Astoria station and stabbing her 20 times.
• Judge Ushir Pandit-Durant imposed the maximum 25-to-life term on June 30 in Queens Supreme Court after less than an hour of jury deliberations following a 12-day trial.
• Prosecutors relied on chilling surveillance video of the unprovoked attack, DNA analysis of a serrated kitchen knife found in the defendant’s pocket and eyewitness testimony from a scooter-riding bystander.
• The case was delayed for nearly two years by court-ordered psychiatric competency evaluations prompted by Zisopoulos’s schizophrenia diagnosis before he was ruled fit to stand trial.
• FDNY Commissioner Robert Tucker, Queens DA Melinda Katz and Russo’s family delivered impact statements emphasizing her 24 years of service, 9/11 first-responder role and posthumous promotion to captain.