Defendant shot his girlfriend’s former partner multiple times in front of their children
November 12, 2024
WHITE PLAINS, N.Y. – Westchester County District Attorney Miriam E. Rocah announced today that a Peekskill man was sentenced to 30 years in state prison for the fatal shooting of 53-year-old Ernest Wilson of Poughkeepsie.
DA Rocah said: “In this brazen and senseless act of gun violence this defendant left children traumatized and without a father. Now that this defendant is removed from our streets and brought to justice, we hope the family of Ernest Wilson can begin to find closure and healing.”
After pleading guilty on May 17, the defendant, Reginald McClure, 40, who has prior felony convictions, was sentenced on Nov. 7 before New York State Supreme Court Justice James McCarty in Westchester County to 25 years on the charge of Manslaughter in the First Degree and five years for each of the two counts of Criminal Possession of a Weapon in the Second Degree, all felonies.
The sentences for the gun charges will run concurrently to each other and consecutive to the 25-year sentence on the manslaughter charge.
At approximately 7:32 p.m. on May 21, 2023, the victim was dropping off his child with the child’s mother, the defendant’s girlfriend, at her Sherman Avenue home in Peekskill. Seeing the defendant walking up the street, the victim extended his hand to greet the defendant, who, in return, fired six rounds from a 9mm firearm striking the victim twice, in the arm and buttock.
The shooting was witnessed by the victim’s two children.
The victim was transported to Westchester Medical Center in Valhalla, where he died as a result of his injuries on May 24, 2023.
The defendant fled the scene but was apprehended and arrested at a Yonkers hotel on May 25, 2023, following an investigation by the Peekskill Police Department and the FBI’s Westchester Safe Streets Task Force.
At the time of capture, the defendant was illegally in possession of two loaded firearms.
The Westchester County Department of Public Safety, the Yonkers Police Department and the New York State Police assisted with the investigation.
In a victim impact statement read in court, one of the children said: “My father was a wonderful man...and now I can never share another birthday with my birthday twin, I could never crack another joke with my father and...I can never watch our favorite Marvel movies again....You took the most valuable thing of my life...my father.”
The case was prosecuted by Assistant District Attorney Celia Curtis of the Trials and Investigations Division.
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