LI Man Convicted Of Murdering Pregnant Girlfriend In Queens: DA

QUEENS, NY - A Long Island man has been convicted of murdering his pregnant girlfriend whose body was found on the side of the road in Bayside in 2020, the Queens District Attorney's Office said Wednesday.

Goey Charles, 33, of Uniondale, was convicted of second-degree murder Tuesday, Queens District Attorney Melinda Katz said in a statement. Charles faces 25 years to life in prison.

Charles was arrested in October 2020 after police said surveillance footage caught him pulling 29-year-old Vanessa Pierre's body from the backseat of his car and leaving her on the sidewalk alongside the Horace Harding Expressway. The pregnant victim could be seen moving in the car beforehand, the DA's office said.

Less than two hours later, an MTA bus driver found Pierre lying on the ground with a pair of gray sweatpants wrapped around her neck, according to prosecutors. Emergency responders pronounced her dead at the scene.

“We achieved justice for Vanessa,” Katz said Wednesday. “The verdict does not bring her back, but it holds her killer accountable. We will be asking the court to send the defendant to prison for a very long time for the brutality and callousness he showed in murdering and abandoning the lifeless body of his girlfriend, the woman who was to be the mother of his child.”

Charles’ sentencing is set for Nov. 29.