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Erick Corado-Gonzales, age 27, of Glen Cove, was indicted on second-degree murder and related charges in Nassau County Court on Tuesday, Oct. 22, in the death of Ana Ruth Espinoza.
The incident happened in West Hempstead, outside the La Candela Restaurant on Hempstead Turnpike, just after midnight Sunday, Sept. 29.
Prosecutors said Espinoza and other family members were leaving the restaurant after celebrating her adult daughter’s birthday when Corado-Gonzales – her daughter’s estranged husband – approached and stabbed Espinoza seven times in the torso.
When her husband tried to intervene, the man stabbed him in his hand, prosecutors said. Espinoza’s adult son also tried helping his mother, and the defendant allegedly pointed an imitation pistol at the man and threatened him not to follow him.
The attack unfolded in front of Corado-Gonzales’ 2-year-old son.
Espinoza and her husband were taken to NYU Langone Hospital in Mineola, where she died three hours later after suffering hemorrhagic shock from being stabbed in the neck.
Corado-Gonzales reportedly fled the state after the stabbing and was arrested later the same day in Linden, New Jersey. He was extradited to Nassau County on Tuesday, Oct. 22.
Detectives found the murder weapon in the restaurant’s parking lot and recovered an imitation pistol from his car trunk, prosecutors said.
In court Tuesday, Corado-Gonzales was charged with the following:
- Murder in the second degree (felony)
- Attempted murder in the second degree (felony)
- Attempted assault in the first degree (felony)
- Menacing (misdemeanor)
- Criminal possession of a weapon (misdemeanor)
- Endangering the welfare of a child (misdemeanor)
If convicted, he faces up to 50 years to life in prison
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