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New Rochelle resident Sincere Smith, 24, has been sentenced to 23 years in prison after pleading guilty to manslaughter for his role in the death of Mount Vernon resident Trevon Boswell, an intended robbery victim, in 2017.
Smith was indicted with Eric Lee, Allen Copeland, and Leroy Garcia. Between May 21, 2017, and May 22, 2017, for a series of violent events in Mount Vernon, New Rochelle, and Yonkers. All three are now behind bars.
Mount Vernon residents Lee, and Copeland, Smith, Waterbury, Conn., resident Leroy Garcia and John Oquendo from the Bronx, participated in a conspiracy to commit robberies in Westchester, which led to the death of one of their intended victims.
After successfully completing armed robberies of their fourth and fifth victims, Lee and Smith attempted to rob their sixth victim while Garcia stood as a lookout and Copeland served as a getaway driver. When the victim, Boswell, attempted to get away, Lee shot him in the back in the stairwell to his own residence.
Following the shooting, their spree continued - armed with illegal handguns - to Bonnefoy Place in New Rochelle and the 45th Precinct in the Bronx. While in the Bronx, near the Mount Vernon border, they attempted to take a chain from around their 11th victim’s neck, and when their cab driver attempted to get the chain back, Lee shot him twice.
The spree continued to Yonkers, where Lee, Smith, Copeland, and Oquendo robbed their victims at a cab stand. In total, during the 12-hour spree, 16 people were victimized, including the shooting death of Boswell.
Law enforcement officials from Mount Vernon, New Rochelle, Yonkers, and the NYPD worked together to investigate the spree.
The charges against the five men included murder, attempted murder, robbery, assault, attempted robbery, criminal possession of a weapon, conspiracy, unlawful imprisonment and criminal possession of stolen property. They were charged in a 50-count indictment.
At the time of the spree, Copeland was on parole for a 2014 conviction for possession of a firearm. Garcia had three New York warrants, including one from the Westchester County Department of Probation, as well as warrants in the State of Connecticut. He was also on probation supervision for a felony DWI conviction.
Westchester County District Attorney Anthony Scarpino, Jr., noted that Smith was also sentenced to 14 years in state prison for a robbery in Ossining on Feb. 12, 2017. He pleaded guilty in March last year, to first-degree robbery.
Additionally, he was sentenced to seven years in prison for assault for an incident on Feb. 28, last year. Smith was convicted by a Westchester County jury after a weeklong trial regarding an incident on May 13, 2017, at a Main Street New Rochelle barbershop where he and another man pistol-whipped a victim.
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