A Bronx hood convicted in the vicious gang slaying of 15-year-old Lesandro “Junior” Guzman-Feliz was hit with a new prison sentence after a state appeals court tossed his first-degree murder rap.
Jonaiki Martinez-Estrella, 27, was among two dozen members of the “Trinitarios” street gang busted in the shocking June 20, 2018, caught-on-video attack on the teenager at the Zesarina Grocery store in Belmont, in what authorities said was a case of mistaken identity.
Martinez-Estrella was found guilty of first- and second-degree murder in the case in 2019, and was sentenced to a prison term of life without parole for allegedly delivering the death blow to the teen.
But the convicted killer appealed and, in 2023, a New York State Appellate Division panel threw out the top charge, which carries the life without parole sentence.
“The evidence established that defendant committed an extremely heinous second-degree murder,” the panel’s decision said. “However, we vacate his conviction of first-degree murder under [the law] because the evidence did not establish the very specific element of that crime.”
Shipped back to Bronx Supreme Court, Martinez-Estrella was hit with the top sentence of 25 years to life behind bars on the second-degree murder charge, Bronx prosecutors said.
The vicious murder shocked the Big Apple for its senseless brutality.
Martinez-Estrella and his cowardly crew were out looking for members of the rival “Sunsets” gang when they spotted Guzman-Feliz near the bodega — and chased him inside.
Despite the teen’s claims that he wasn’t a gang member, the mob beat him in the store, then dragged him into the street and hacked him to death with knives and machetes, leaving his lifeless body behind.
Following the arrests, the smug killers smiled and flashed gang signs in court.
But justice eventually caught up with all of the suspects.
“Thirteen other defendants who had a role in Junior’s murder on June 20, 2018, have been held accountable for their actions and remain in prison serving their respective sentences,” the Bronx District Attorney’s Office said in a press release Friday.
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