Man charged with killing ex-wife and her boyfriend while his daughter waited in his car
ST. JAMES, N.Y. — A New York man is accused of shooting his former wife and her new boyfriend to death after first texting his 15-year-old daughter to exit the couple's house and wait outside in his car, authorities said Friday.
Daniel Coppola, 50, was charged with two counts of murder in the deaths of his ex-wife, Kelly Coppola, 50, and her boyfriend, Kenneth Polhman Jr., 53, in the Long Island hamlet of St. James on Wednesday.
Suffolk County prosecutors said Coppola plotted the killings "in excruciating detail” in a typewritten note police found in his home, even planning to kill the lawyers involved in his contentious divorce, Newsday reports.
Coppola pleaded not guilty at his arraignment and defense lawyer Jason Cohen asked that his client be placed on suicide watch.
Assistant District Attorney Eric Aboulafia said at the arraignment that Coppola texted his teenage daughter to come out of the house shortly before midnight Wednesday.
Coppola then shot through the lock on the front door, went upstairs and shot Pohlman and Kelly Coppola dead, Aboulafia said.
“He put a premeditated plan into action,” the prosecutor said, while his daughter waited in the car.
Coppola then drove the teen to his own home a short distance away and threatened to kill himself, the prosecutor said.
The teenager called 911 and police responded to Coppola's home, where he was recorded on an officer's body camera admitting to the killings, Aboulafia said.
Police searched Coppola's home and found a semiautomatic pistol along with a planning document "describing in excruciating detail” what he planned to do, Aboulafia said.
Coppola blamed his financial woes on his ex-wife "in an attempt to legitimize his actions,” the prosecutor said.
“The letter states that he had a bullet with the names of each of the attorneys involved in the case,” Aboulafia said. “He even had a bullet for his own attorney.”
Included in the letter, Coppola wrote: “I am of sound mind and I know exactly what I am going to do.”
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