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New Milford busboy to stand trial in stabbing death, rape of estranged wife in Teaneck

ONLY ON CVP: A Colombian national from New Milford who is accused of stabbing his estranged wife to death after tying her up and raping her at knifepoint is set to go to trial on no fewer than a dozen counts in September.

Photo Credit: Mary K. Miraglia, CLIFFVIEW PILOT Courthouse Reporter
Photo Credit: Mary K. Miraglia, CLIFFVIEW PILOT Courthouse Reporter)
Jerry DeMarco

Pedro Gutierrez, 26, broke into the Teaneck home where Shaday Betancourth was living in October 2011 and stabbed her several times after raping her, authorities said. She died en route to a hospital.

Gutierrez fled to Orlando and was arrested as he prepared to board a flight to Colombia, authorities said.

Gutierrez, who worked as a busboy at a West Palisade Avenue restaurant, was married to Betancourth several years earlier in their native Colombia, then separated three months before she was killed. Authorities at the time said there was no record of trouble between them.

Defense attorney S. Emile Lisboa told a judge in Hackensack today that he will seek to suppress evidence, some of which investigators said they found in his car. These include a knife, white zip ties and rubber gloves, among other items, they said.

Eight of the dozen counts on which Gutierrez will be tried are first-degree:

  • causing the death of Shaday Betancourth;
  • causing her death during a burglary;
  • confining her during a crime while inflicting bodily injury to terrorize her;
  • causing Betancourth’s death during a kidnapping or attempted kidnapping;
  • aggravated sexual assault during a burglary, kidnapping or homicide;
  • causing her death while engaged in flight after committing a sexual assault;
  • aggravated sexual assault while armed with a deadly weapon;
  • aggravated sexual assault through the use of physical force or coercion to cause severe personal injury.

Lesser charges include burglary and various weapons offenses.

The relative whom Betancourth was living with found the mortally wounded woman and took her to Englewood Hospital and Medical Center, where she was pronounced dead a short time later.

After ditching his car at JFK Airport in Queens, Gutierrez bought a one-way ticket to Bogota, Colombia, Bergen County Prosecutor John L. Molinelli told CLIFFVIEW PILOT at the time.

But an alert already had gone out and federal authorities corraled him during a layover in Orlando — literally minutes before his flight left, Molinelli said.

Assistant Bergen County Prosecutor Wayne Mello, defense attorney Emile Lisboa, Pedro Gutierrez (STORY / PHOTOS: Mary K. Miraglia, CLIFFVIEW PILOT Courthouse Reporter)

 

 

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