Tuesday, October 20, 2009

Man Convicted Of 2 Murders


October 30, 1986

A 25-year-old man was convicted yesterday of murder and burglary in the stabbing and beating deaths of a Southampton couple just weeks before they were to be married.

A jury convicted the man, Anthony Crippen of Queens, of four counts of second-degree murder and two counts of first-degree burglary in the Jan. 5 stabbing deaths of the couple -Thomas Fehmel and his fiancee, Winifred Alice Danz, both 28 - in their apartment above The Still, a bar that Mr. Fehmel managed.

An assistant district attorney, Steven Wilutis, said in his closing arguments that Mr. Crippen was guilty of a ''horrendous, outrageous, brutal'' crime.

The jury announced the conviction less than two and a half hours later after having reviewed only Mr. Crippen's confession, one of 78 pieces of evidence entered in the trial.

During the two-week Suffolk County Court trial before Judge Charles Cacciabaudo, William H. Booth, the defense lawyer, had argued that there was insufficient evidence to convict his client.

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