Real estate broker Michael McMorrow liked to have a beer or two as he strolled home through Central Park after work. Sometimes he would stop to sit and drink with a few co-workers. On May 23, 1997, he spent the evening with Daphne Abdela and her boyfriend Christopher Vasquez, both 15.
Wealthy teen Daphne Abdela pleaded guilty to first-degree manslaughter in the gruesome 1997 stabbing death of Michael McMorrow in Central Park.
The innocent night of boozing turned brutal when Abdela told her boyfriend Vasquez to slash McMorrow's throat from ear to ear. The teenager then stabbed McMorrow 34 times, disemboweled the body and dumped the corpse into the lake near Strawberry Fields, the picturesque John Lennon memorial.
Abdela pleaded guilty to first-degree manslaughter and was sentenced to 3-to-10 years in prison. A jury acquitted Vasquez of second-degree murder but convicted him of first-degree manslaughter and a judge sentenced him to 3-to-10 years.