Queens dad, an MTA driver, told sons to ‘keep your seat belts on’ before running down wife with SUV, then stabbing her: prosecutors
A deranged Queens dad, in the moments before slamming the accelerator to mow down his estranged wife with his SUV, delivered a chilling messages to his three sons, prosecutors said Wednesday: “Everyone keep your seat belts on.”
The boys then watched in horror from their seats in the speeding white 2005 Ford Explorer as their father, Stephen Giraldo, an MTA bus driver, plowed into his helpless wife before jumping from the flipped SUV to stab her, authorities said.
“I think I killed my wife,” the 36-year-old Giraldo dialed 911 to confess, prosecutors said Wednesday at his Queens Criminal Court arraignment, where he was ordered held without bail.
“I hit my wife, arrest me,” he told responding officers in an admission caught by NYPD body cameras, according to prosecutors.
Victim Sophia Giraldo suffered severe neurological damage, is in a vegetative state and may not survive, prosecutors revealed in court. She is the host of a podcast on domestic violence where she shared details of her troubled marriage.
“The brutality of the attack, and the fact that it was committed in full view of the victim’s three young children, stirs heartbreak and outrage in all of us,” said Queens District Attorney Melinda Katz.
The couple was living apart after the collapse of their 13-year marriage described by the victim as “toxic.”
“I suddenly found myself in the middle of a marriage filled with betrayal and abuse,” Sophia Giraldo, 41, wrote last month on Facebook.
“The picture that I THOUGHT was my reality had totally shattered. As confused as I was, I KNEW one thing — I didn’t want to stay in a place of brokenness and shame. It was out of that desire to be FREE that God began to show me who I REALLY was — what HE thought of me. He began to REDEFINE my beauty.”
After loading their sons into his SUV and driving them to his wife’s apartment on Parsons Blvd. near Franklin Ave. in Flushing to drop them off, Stephen Giraldo lay in wait for her to appear at 5:20 a.m. on Tuesday, officials said.
He was even caught on video getting out of the SUV to move a trash bag out of his path before calling his wife to summon her outside, prosecutors said.
As she approached, he allegedly hit the gas and slammed into her. The impact sent her sailing over a nearby fence and caused the SUV to flip on its side.
Stephen Giraldo climbed over his oldest son, who was in the front passenger seat, to get out of the crashed SUV and continue the attack, stabbing his wife in the chest, according to Assistant District Attorney Audra Beerman.
Sophia Giraldo had filed for divorce only four months earlier, court papers show.
The criminal complaint against Stephen Giraldo recounted the chilling seat-belt instructions delivered to the boys, aged 11, 9, and 6 — with the horrific details provided to cops by the suspect’s eldest son.
The defendant got the three sons out of the overturned vehicle before dialing 911. The boys were not hurt in the crash.
A knife was recovered about 15 feet from the crashed SUV, and police found the victim covered in blood.
Sophia Giraldo remained in critical condition at New York-Presbyterian Hospital Queens one day after the attack. She suffered a broken femur, broken fibula, punctured liver, a cut to her leg and severe neurological damage.
Stephen Giraldo, with stubble on his bald head, wore a white Tyvek suit when he appeared in Queens Criminal Court. Defense attorney Mary Beth Anderson said her client has no prior arrests. She asked for the suspect’s placement under suicide watch and protective custody.
Judge Scott Dunn issued an order of protection barring Stephen Giraldo from any contact with his hospitalized wife or their traumatized sons.
The victim hosted a podcast called “Unfiltered and Free” where she shared tales of what she called her toxic and abusive marriage. The couple was married in 2009, but the new bride soon realized the couple had problems, she recounted in an episode just two months ago.
“I spent a long time in the thick of emotional unrest, a lot of toxicity, a lot of abuse,” she recalled in one episode. “One of the things I thought was, ‘Am I willing to let my children grow up in toxicity just to have a male in the home?’ ”
A Facebook post indicated she and the three boys had spent time in a domestic violence shelter in 2019.
Stephen Giraldo is charged with attempted murder, assault, criminal possession of a weapon, reckless endangerment and endangering the welfare of a child.
He was suspended without pay from his job as an MTA bus driver pending an investigation, authorities said.
With Julie Coleman
