Adrienne Shelly’s Killer Sentenced to 25 Years in PrisonDiego Pillco, the construction worker who killed actress-director Adrienne Shelly in November 2006, pleaded guilty to manslaughter earlier today. He confessed to strangling her while attempting to rob her (he later set up the crime scene to make it look like it was a suicide). Pillco will serve 25 years in prison. Adrienne is survived by her husband, Andrew, and their young daughter, Sophie. Not long after her death, Shelly’s award-winning film Waitress debuted at the Sundance Film Festival. Her next screenplay, Serious Moonlight, is soon to be produced.
Related: Shelly Lives [NYM]
Cop Cover-Up
• A seven-months-pregnant Brooklyn cop stands accused of covering up for her ex-con husband, who shot another (plainclothes) officer. We give it seven weeks until it’s a Law & Order plotline. [NYDN]
• Speaking of ripping things from the headlines, the speed with which the Law & Order machine has absorbed Adrienne Shelly’s murder is rubbing a lot of people the wrong way — even the actress playing her corpse. [NYT]
• With the U.N. building set for a $1.2 billion spruce-up, diplomats are looking for a temporary home; Bloomberg has scheduled a private talk with Condoleezza Rice about keeping the august institution in NYC for the time being. We suggest HoJo’s. [NYP]
• The 55-story Bank of America Tower at 42nd and Sixth is going to be the greenest building in town, with a 300-ton icebox for a cooling system and recyclable tap water (it will feed the sprinklers in the rooftop garden). If, you know, costs allow. [amNY]
• And the state is hiring marketers to fuck up, sorry, “invigorate” the iconic “I ♥ N.Y.” ad campaign. Because leaving good enough alone is just not the New York way. [WNBC]
cultural capital
Sundance Report: ‘Waitress’ Has Successful Debut, SadlyAnticipated screenings at the Sundance Film Festival are always special, but Sunday afternoon’s premiere of Waitress was more special than usual. It was the directorial debut of Adrienne Shelly, the veteran indie-film actress who was murdered in November in her Greenwich Village apartment. “This is not a wake,” festival director Geoffrey Gilmore told the capacity crowd at the Eccles Center, more than 1,000 people. “We picked the film before her death, although she did not know it. Needless to say, Adrienne Shelly is not here in person, but she is here in spirit.”
the morning line
Everything Is Beautiful; It’s Morning in America
• While bleary-eyed Democrats are gloating like Posties on circ day, let’s go over the entirely unsurprising results of local races. Hillary made quick work of John Spencer (Blues Explosion! Get it?), Spitzer is your new and already boring governor, Cuomo crushed Pirro, and Alan Hevesi is back, uh, behind the wheel. [NYT, NYDN, NYP]
• The suspect is talking, and more lurid and ultimately depressing details of the Adrienne Shelly murder are emerging. Nineteen-year-old illegal immigrant Diego Pillco says he strangled the actress with a sheet after she called him a “son of a bitch,” because he took the insult literally. [NYP]
• The Transit Authority is installing digital cameras on 450 city buses — and up to seven cameras per bus. We’re not sure how to feel about this one, and the manufacturers are not helping much by saying things like “The bus is always recording, everywhere, all of the time.” [NYDN]
• The city is mulling the Lower East Side rezoning proposal that would put the kibosh on the future skyscrapers in the neighborhood. The Department of Planning says it wants new buildings capped at 80 feet (about eight stories); activists want the bar lowered to 60. No word on color restrictions. [amNY]
• And finally, we’ll just slavishly repeat the headline here: “Woman Hurt In ‘Shake-It-Like-Shakira’ Contest Sues NYC Bar.” Because, really, what can be added to that? Only a lame joke about how hips make good witnesses (they don’t lie). But we’re above that. [WNBC]
it just happened
Actress’s ‘Suicide’ Was MurderThere was a shocking twist today in the supposed — and unlikely — suicide of indie film star Adrienne Shelly. WCBS is reporting that a suspect in the actress’s murder — yes, murder — has confessed and is now in custody. Early reports from the scene mentioned a suspicious set of sneaker footprints in the bathroom where her body was found; those, it now turns out, belonged to 19-year-old Diego Pillco. A construction worker, Pillco allegedly punched Shelly when she complained about the noise he was making. The hit, which evidently made her fall, proved fatal; Pillco then reportedly dragged the body into the bathroom and arranged it to look like a suicide. With the confession on the table, the D.A.’s office has already charged Pillco with second-degree murder; we are sure to hear more about the story as it develops.
Brooklyn Man Charged With Murdering Actress [WCBS]
