Esteban Carpio after conviction

Carpio found guilty

The jury rejects Esteban Carpio's insanity defense, convicting him of the murder of Detective Sgt. James L. Allen and the stabbing of Madeline Gatta.

01:00 AM EDT on Wednesday, June 28, 2006

BY GREGORY SMITH
Journal Staff Writer

PROVIDENCE -- A Superior Court jury yesterday convicted Esteban Carpio of the murder of Providence police Detective Sgt. James L. Allen and the stabbing of an elderly woman, concluding that he was not insane at the time.

<snip>

The verdict by an all-white jury of nine women and three men was reported at 3:25 p.m. on the 14th day of the trial, after about nine hours of deliberation over two days.

Carpio's relatives in the gallery began crying, including Yvonne Carpio, his mother and a teacher in the Boston public schools, who had taken the stand in her son's defense. She recalled how she had him picked up in an ambulance and treated at a hospital when he began acting strangely in the weeks before Allen's murder.

She and her son's girlfriend, Samein "Soul" Phin, who lawyers for both sides called a prostitute during the trial, testified that they warned Allen and other officers who took Carpio into custody for questioning in the stabbing that their suspect was mentally disturbed.

When Carpio's guards stood him up at the defense table after the proceedings yesterday, he turned to his mother and mouthed the words, "I love you, Mom." "I love you, Stevie," she called out, using the English translation of her son's first name.


Yvonne Carpio