While the main focus of the Michael Sandy case has been on Anthony Fortunato for the past week, attention has now turned to defendant John Fox, and prosecutors believe that Fox could be convicted of murder as a hate crime based on his videotaped confession alone.
Fox’s lawyer John Patten is trying to make the argument that Fox’s confession was coerced: “They were putting the heat on this kid. This young man has been broken …. There was nothing voluntary about that statement.”
Jurors are expected to get the case this morning, according to the New York Daily News, and could throw out the confession if they believe Patten’s argument to be valid.
Fox’s father, incidentally, was a high-ranking battalion chief in the New York Fire Department who was honored as a hero for saving a fellow rescue worker in the dangerous smoking pit at the bombed World Trade Center parking garage in 1993.
Closing arguments in Fortunato’s case are expected this afternoon.
