Prosecutors: Co-worker threatened Manorville farmhand before killing

A Manorville farmhand killed a co-worker after the two got into a physical altercation and she threatened to have him deported, a Suffolk prosecutor told jurors Monday during opening arguments in the man's murder trial.

Faustino Marquez Cruz, 30, is on trial for second-degree murder in the July 28, 2020 killing of Carmelina Maria Velasquez-Zhau, 37, whose body was found days later in a wooded area on the outskirts of the five-acre farm where they both worked. Police at the time said Velasquez-Zhau had been strangled. On Monday, Assistant Suffolk County District Attorney Timothy Gough told the jurors she died of “homicidal violence consistent with asphyxiation" at the hands of Cruz, while his defense team said he is innocent of the crime and his behavior afterward proves it.

Velasquez had confronted Cruz, an immigrant from Mexico, about a greenhouse door that was left shut, causing produce from the farm to spoil, Gough told the jury.

“That farm was her world,” Gough said, adding that she picked vegetables for as much as 12 hours every day starting in the early morning.

Gough said Velasquez-Zhau, who lived with the owner of the farm and his family in the property's main house — separate from living quarters Cruz shared with another worker — had yelled at Cruz after she learned certain vegetables had “burned.”

As the verbal altercation turned physical, Gough told jurors, Velasquez-Zhau struck Cruz with a pan. The other worker, Javier Moreno, left the house as Cruz retaliated, the prosecutor said.

One of the last things Moreno heard was Velasquez-Zhau telling Cruz: " ‘I'm going to call the cops, you're going to get deported,'” Gough said.

As Moreno walked away, Gough told jurors, he heard Velasquez cry for help.

Prosecutors said they intend to introduce physical evidence of Cruz’s partial DNA found underneath the left fingernails of Velasquez-Zhau. They also will attempt to convince the jury that scratch marks on his neck came from his alleged victim. Cruz admitted to Moreno that he killed Velasquez-Zhau and threatened to do the same to him if he reported it, according to prosecutors.

In her opening argument, defense attorney Danielle Coysh, who is representing Cruz along with co-counsels Dan Russo and retired judge Peter Mayer Sr., said that in the two months following Velasquez-Zhau's death and her client’s arrest, he continued to work at the farm and cooperated with investigators.

“He never fled, never hid, never ran,” Coysh said, adding that he has a wife and two young children in Mexico. Cruz has been living in the United States illegally, according Coysh.

Coysh asked the jury to question whether potential witnesses are telling the truth when they testify. She said Moreno’s brother, Carlos Castillo, who left for Mexico after testifying to a grand jury about Velasquez-Zhau's death, later called her family pretending to be Moreno. 

“The U.S. Marshals are looking for him as we speak,” Coysh told the jury, saying it was unclear if he would testify at trial.

Prosecutors said Velasquez-Zhau's body was discovered July 30 by a jogger about 10 feet into the woods off Winding Path in Manorville, where prosecutors said Cruz had moved her. She was reported missing earlier that day after a sister in Queens was notified by the owner of the farm that she did not report to work the day before.

By Grant Parpan

grant.parpan@newsday.com@GrantParpan

Grant Parpan covers Suffolk County courts and federal courts for Newsday. A Long Island native, he joined Newsday in 2022.