NEW YORK MAN COULD SERVE TIME FOR TAKING THE LAW INTO HIS OWN HANDS

“He [David Carlson] did everything he possibly could to work with the police to get this man apprehended. The police obviously blew it.”

By Susan Edelman

New York Post
October 15, 2016

David Carlson was fishing with a pal when a bearded man in shorts popped out of the woods and introduced himself. “Daniel” said he was the caretaker of a vacant cabin next to Carlson’s home in upstate Sparrowbush. Carlson, a carpenter, befriended the stranger, giving him odd jobs in exchange for fresh eggs and his wife’s homemade bread.

While drinking beer beside a bonfire one night, “Daniel” suddenly confided that his real first name was Norris — and that he was wanted for having sex with a 14-year-old girl in Ramapo, N.Y. He grumbled that the charges were unfair because the girl had consented.

“That little bitch,” Carlson played along, but he was alarmed.

The confession set off a chain of events that terrified the rural mountainside community and led to not one, but three bungled attempts by law enforcement to arrest the fugitive. It ended with Carlson blasting Norris Acosta Sanchez, a 35-year-old CUNY graduate, in the face with a 12-gauge shotgun.

The District Attorney called it vigilante justice, saying Carlson “chose to take the law into his own hands,” killing an unarmed man without provocation. Carlson says he was fighting for his life. In a dangerous bind, he tried to help catch a desperate criminal after cops let him escape.

“He was threatening me,” Carlson told a 911 operator after the killing. “The guy you were chasing yesterday.”

Carlson, 45, is now standing trial in Orange County on charges of murder and manslaughter in a case that has fired up locals who blame an unjust system for targeting the wrong man.

Carlson lived in quiet, woodsy Sparrowbush with his wife Sarah, who home-schooled their three sons, then ages 5, 8 and 13, in a three-bedroom home off Old Plank Road, a 90-minute drive from Manhattan. They had horses, hens, two dogs and an old goat. He kept three guns for hunting and protection.

Acosta Sanchez was a Spanish citizen and world traveler who had a sister living in Brooklyn. On a student visa, he attended Manhattan’s Hunter College, receiving a BA in political science and religion in 2007. As a senior, he worked briefly as an volunteer intern for the New York City Council. He had one prosthetic eye from a childhood accident.

In mid-2013, Acosta Sanchez worked as a handyman for an Orthodox Jewish family in suburban Rockland County. Despite their close friendship, he repeatedly had sex with their 14-year-old daughter, according to a wiretapped conversation with the girl’s grandmother.

The young teen was “after me for a year,” he told the grandma. “Under the law, I did a crime. But in her body, she is a woman.”

A Rockland County judge issued a warrant for his arrest on rape charges in September 2013. Acosta Sanchez — who also faced deportation if convicted — vowed never to surrender.

“Once I turn myself in, there is no going back,” he told the grandma. “Let me make one thing clear: I am not going to jail for one day … I don’t want to obey the laws of this country.”

He hid out on the porch of the vacant Sparrowbush cabin, a place he knew from going on spiritual retreats there. The cabin owner was unaware of the squatter.

After introducing himself as the “caretaker,” Acosta Sanchez did yard work, odd jobs, and tutored one of Carlson’s sons in Spanish in exchange for food. But the deal wore thin. Daniel was a lousy handyman and would “pop up out of nowhere,” Carlson recalled..

One Saturday night on Oct. 5, 2013, Daniel joined Carlson and his wife by a bonfire for drinks “and we got pretty loaded.”

“I haven’t been honest with you,” he told the couple, giving his real first name and admitting he was on the run for sex with an underage girl. “He made it out like he’s the victim,” Carlson told cops after the killing.

That night in bed, Carlson and his wife were “creeped out.” They agreed to alert the local Deerpark police, which covered Sparrowbush, but didn’t want Norris to know they were ratting him out.

That Tuesday, Oct. 8, a Deerpark officer hatched a scheme with David’s wife Sarah: “Get him in the car, go on (Route) 42, and do 65 mph, so you’re speeding, and they’ll pull you over.”

That day, Carlson went ahead with the plan. He invited Norris to join him on a beer run. He raced at 65 mph as advised. Carlson told Deerpark police about the trip, but because of a “shift change” on the force, which had three full-time cops, no one went out in time to stop Carlson.

The next day, Carlson told Norris he was going to the scrap yard to sell copper from a knocked-down power line. Norris had salvaged some scrap lead, so went along.

This time, Sgt. Elizabeth Sullivan pulled Carlson over for speeding. Detective Thomas Kalin arrived in a second car. The cops asked both men for ID, but Norris had none — identifying himself as “Daniel Costa.” Sullivan ran a check on the name from her cruiser, but found nothing. “Daniel” offered to show his ID if they drove him back to his cabin. He rode in Sullivan’s car without handcuffs.

When both cop cars pulled in behind the cabin, Norris jumped out, shoved past Sullivan and bolted down a dry creek bed with big rocks and steep drops. Kalin started to chase, but quickly “lost sight of him.” They gave up, saying it was all they could do.

Carlson, unaware of the escape, went back home and chopped wood. He felt relieved that it was “all over with,” he said.

“All of a sudden I hear, ‘Hey! Hey!’” Norris was back — “agitated.” But he still didn’t know the Carlsons were working with cops. “He still trusted me,” said Carlson.

That evening, Carlson rummaged through a box Norris had stored in his garage. It had condoms, lubricant, a Brooklyn Public Library book on becoming a child-protective services specialist, and a Progressive car-insurance card for Norris Acosta Sanchez.

With that name, Sgt. Sullivan found the Rockland County arrest warrant.

“I’m so freaked out about this,” Sarah said in a call to state police that night after taking the kids to stay with a neighbor. “Why is this not being taken more seriously?” The trooper was not alarmed. “You might stop watching CSI stuff,” he told her.

On Oct. 10, Deerpark police obtained a “no knock” warrant to raid the cabin, because Ramapo cited the statutory rape as a violent felony and advised: “ Use caution.”

Joining local police departments, the Orange County Sheriff’s Office sent a 23-member SWAT team armed with M-4 assault rifles, two sharpshooters, and canine units. They toted night-vision goggles. A state police helicopter had a heat-image scanner.

The operation was botched.

Hearing the break-in, Acosta Sanchez burst out of a wooden box where he was hiding just 20 yards from two snipers watching the cabin. He ran down the same creekbed he had used to flee the day before — but cops had not surrounded the area. He dove into the Rio Reservoir and swam across a narrow stretch in about 10 minutes — escaping again.

Neighbors were “scared to death,” as one put it. His wife and kids still with a neighbor, David was home alone. He swallowed some Xanax from his mother-in-law and took out his .22-caliber rifle and two shotguns, including a 12-gauge Remington 870.

The next day, about 9 a.m., a “pissed” Acosta Sanchez banged on Carlson’s front door. “Hold on, go to the back door,” Carlson told him. That’s where he had the Remington.

He went out the back and put the shotgun to Acosta Sanchez’s head. “I was like, “F–k you … I’m turning you in.” Holding the gun with both hands and aiming it Acosta Sanchez, Carlson ordered the fugitive to walk up a hill to another house so the neighbors could call 911.

Acosta Sanchez layed down, crying “Don’t shoot!” He begged to pay Carlson to let him go.

Carlson fired a shot into the ground to force the fugitive to get up.

“I didn’t want to shoot him at all,” he recalled.

Carlson yelled for the neighbor in a house at the top of the hill, but no one was home. He fired another shot in the ground to force Acosta Sanchez to get going.

He then marched Acosta Sanchez down Old Plank Road to Carmine Ferrara’s tiny clapboard house, where he lived with two women and five kids. Ferrara, who had tried to stay up all night because “a rapist was running around the woods,” he testified, had dozed off.

According to Carlson, as he turned his head and yelled “Carmine!” Acosta Sanchez started coming at him. Carlson fired, shooting his prisoner in the left arm. Acosta Sanchez spit curses. “You f-uck!”

“That’s where I should have stopped, but I didn’t,” a shaken Carlson told detectives that day.

As the two men faced off about five feet apart, he said, Acosta Sanchez lunged at him. Carlson shot Acosta Sanchez in the head, killing him instantly. An autopsy found his brain stem severed, with traces of alcohol and pot in his blood.

Ferrara, who had peeked out the window in that instant, said he saw Carlson “backpedaling” up a slope, almost falling backward, while Acosta Sanchez moved toward Carlson.

In a dramatic courtroom demonstration this month, Ferrara showed the jury how Acosta Sanchez reached toward Carlson with his right arm raised in a hook — close enough to grab the gun — when Carlson fired the fatal shot.

Carlson, who had immediately waived his Miranda right to remain silent, was torn with self- doubt within hours. After telling his story to detectives that day, he blurted sadly, “I’m a murderer, basically.”

But now Carlson, who faces up to 20 years in prison if convicted, is fighting to vindicate himself. Criminal defense lawyers Michael Mazzariello and Benjamin Ostrer contend Carlson is taking the fall for the cops’ failure. Judge Robert Freehill dismissed a first indictment because state police misrepresented what Carlson had told them.

“Incompetence by the Deerpark Police not only jeopardized the safety of the SWAT team, but led to Carlson having to defend himself while making a citizens arrest,” said Mazzariello, who is working pro bono.

Carlson has lost a lot in the three years since the killing. He is free on $100,000 bail because a neighbor put up her house as collateral. His wife left him. “I’m physically and mentally exhausted,” he told The Post.

But neighbors who believe Carlson protected the community have rallied around him. They threw a spaghetti dinner to raise funds for expenses, and some attend his trial in Goshen to show support.

“He did everything he possibly could to work with the police to get this man apprehended. The police obviously blew it,” said Dean Fippinger, a retired gym teacher who lives across the road. “Now they want to show they’re tough on crime, but they’re going after the wrong guy.”

The case is expected to go to the jury in the next two weeks.

EDITOR’S NOTE: In California, Carlson would have faced the death penalty. In Texas, the police would have given Carlson the ‘Citizen of the Year’ award.