Murder Suspect Stabs Fellow Rikers Inmate Multiple Times: Officials

QUEENS, NY — A murder suspect viciously — and repeatedly — stabbed a fellow Rikers Island inmate in an attack that likely will add to the long list of violent felonies he faces, officials said.

Phillip Moreno used a metal shiv during the Tuesday morning attack that left with serious, but non-life-threatening, stab wounds to his head, neck, arms and hands, Department of Correction officials said.

City jails Commissioner Lynelle Maginley-Liddle said officials will seek attempted murder charges against Moreno.

"Vicious, violent attacks on individuals in custody will not be tolerated," Maginley-Liddle said in a statement.

The attack — which officials said appears to have stemmed from a dispute — is only the latest accusation of violence that Moreno faces.

Moreno is behind bars awaiting trial on first-degree murder charges, among other felonies, in the killing of a pregnant Staten Island woman and her boyfriend in 2020, records show and the New York Daily News reported.

Authorities accused Moreno of fatally shooting Ana DeSousa, 33, who was seven months pregnant, and her boyfriend Alafia Rodriguez, 46, the New York Post reported. He also shot and wounded a 43-year-old woman who was DeSousa's friend during the home invasion, according to the report.

Moreno had previously served more than a decade in prison for the manslaughter of 22-year-old Theodis Watson on Staten Island in 1992, the Post reported.