A Manhattan man was sentenced to nine years in prison Tuesday for fatally stabbing his downstairs neighbor, a beloved dad and devoted artist, after the victim knocked on his door late in the night about a leak.
The term was handed down to Kevin Young, 39, in Manhattan Supreme Court, after a jury found him guilty in November of first-degree manslaughter. Harrowing footage of the incident shown at his trial depicted him taking a knife to Monte McEvilley’s heart after the partial double amputee came upstairs to alert him about water leaking through the ceiling in their Midtown apartment complex on July 9 last year.
McEvilley, 55, was a multidisciplinary artist with significant experience in film — including some impressive Hollywood acting credits — whose devotion to his craft was undeterred by a tragic subway accident years ago that left him with the loss of his right hand and left leg below the knee. His loved ones previously told The News that he continued to paint with his left hand after the accident.
McEvilley raised his kids in the building where he and Young were neighbors, a supportive housing complex on W. 43rd St. near Eighth Ave., moving in in 2008 after the subway incident.
The victim’s daughter, Erin McEvilley, in devastated remarks Tuesday, told the court that her father was the kind of person she could talk to about anything, and lamented how she could not seek his counsel in her grief. In great detail, she recalled riding around on the back of his wheelchair as a child and laughing their heads off together watching reality TV dramas, memories of ordinary nights spent on the couch that she now holds as precious.
“The hospital my dad was rushed to and declared dead at after he was stabbed is directly across the street from my college,” Erin said. “Since this happened, I find myself struggling to pay attention to class, staring out the classroom window, wondering which side of the hospital my dad’s body was wheeled through.
“It destroys me that my dad will never be able to walk me down the aisle or meet his grandchildren or watch my brother graduate college. It destroys me even more that I’m slowly growing into a person that my dad never got the chance to know.”
The residential building where the incident occurred, The Times Square, operated by nonprofit Breaking Ground, provides affordable housing and support services for hundreds of formerly homeless and low-income New Yorkers, including people living with mental illness, HIV and AIDS, and is the nation’s largest permanent supportive housing residence.
When McEvilley noticed water leaking from his bathroom ceiling shortly after midnight, he went upstairs to let Young know, according to trial evidence. Young, at the time working as a pizza maker at a Wegmans grocery store, briefly opened the door and then tried to shut it, taking out the knife when McEvilley nudged it back.
Describing the incident as an “incredibly sad situation,” State Supreme Court Justice Laura Ward said two families had been destroyed by Young’s actions.
“Unfortunately, no sentence is ever going to bring back your dad. I wish I had that power,” Ward told McEvilley’s children.
The judge said trial evidence showed how tight-knit McEvilley’s family was, how he was a kind man who had experienced a lot of hardship, including the life-altering injuries he sustained in the subway incident and his battle with severe alcoholism. The News previously reported that McEvilley had lost a brother, Alex, to murder in Texas decades ago, a killing that was never solved.
Ward, who also imposed a term of five years post-release supervision, acknowledged letters from people in Young’s life describing his difficult upbringing in a neighborhood plagued by gang violence and noting he had managed never to get involved.
“He had difficulty growing up, in that, he stuttered, and he did graduate from public school and had multiple jobs throughout the years,” Ward said.
“It is clear from the videotape that was played during the trial that the defendant was immediately sorry for the action, not necessarily how it was caused, but he was sorry that a life was taken.”
In his statement before sentencing, Young wept and apologized to McEvilley’s kids, saying he’d acted without intention in a moment of impulsiveness that he’d forever regret.
“It happened so fast. I just reacted out of fear as he was forcibly pushing his way inside my apartment,” he said. “Not angry, but extremely terrified of my life during that moment, I was not thinking. I quickly grabbed whatever I could get my hands on, and it just so happened that the knife was right there, and without aiming, I struck him in the chest.”
While describing himself as solely responsible for the death of McEvilley and apologizing to his children, Young appeared to place some blame on the victim.
“All the time,” he said, “I tell myself I wish he never pushed his way into my home, then I will not be incarcerated, and he’d still be alive, and more importantly, his children would have their father. I am really sorry.”
McEvilley’s son, Liam McEvilley, directly addressed Young in his statement, saying he’d stolen not just a father from him but a best friend.
“How hard could it have been to reasonably overcome frustrations of being woken up in the middle of the night,” Liam said, “how the whole interaction should have ended in minutes rather than years, had you just engaged in a simple, neighborly conversation, rather than resorting to violence?”
“Now it is a horror and reality both for you and your family, as well as me and mine,” he added. “As I sat in the courtroom and watched the footage of my dad dying over and over again, I was faced with an imagery that will live inside my mind, uninvited, forever.”
