Who is Lauren Pazienza? Long-Island event planner pleads guilty in shoving beloved NYC voice coach
LONG ISLAND, NEW YORK: Long Island resident Lauren Pazienza, 27, who is accused of shoving beloved 87-year-old vocal coach Barbara Maier Gustern to her death on a Manhattan street last year, has pleaded guilty to manslaughter, according to Manhattan prosecutors, Fox News reports.
On March 10, 2022, Gustern was admitted to a medical facility after she cracked her head on the concrete from the fall. She died from her injuries after spending five days in the hospital. Pazienza admitted to hurling abuses at Gustern and deliberately shoving her to the ground as part of a plea deal, although her intentions remain unclear.
Manhattan District Attorney issued a statement
According to the prosecutors, Pazienza rushed Gustern on a Chelsea sidewalk, called her a "b***h," and smacked her to the ground from behind. Bystanders dialed the emergency services after Gustern suffered "a massive hemorrhage" on the left side of her brain.
"Lauren Pazienza aggressively shoved Barbara Gustern to the ground and walked away as the beloved New Yorker lay there bleeding," Manhattan District Attorney Alvin Bragg said in a statement. "Today’s plea holds Pazienza accountable for her deadly actions."
What did Pazienza do after committing the crime?
The accused stayed at the scene for about 20 minutes as she watched the first responders but then alongside her fiancee, Naveen Pereira, she took a subway to Astoria, Queens. She then removed her social media accounts after hiding out for a few days. The Big Apple event planner also took down her wedding website and fled to her family's home in the affluent village of Belle Terre on Long Island.
For how long will Pazienza be behind bars?
Pazienza pleaded guilty to one count of first-degree manslaughter Wednesday, more than a year after her arrest. She is expected to receive a sentence of eight years in prison and five years of post-release supervision as part of the plea deal. Formal sentencing is scheduled for September 29.
She faced between five and 25 years behind bars on the original charges, of first-degree manslaughter and multiple assault charges.
Who was Barbara Maier Gustern?
Barbara Maier Gustern was a vocal coach whose clients include celebrities such as Blondie singer Debbie Harry, as well as Kimilee Bryant, a South Carolinian performer who called her former mentor as her "New York mom". Harry told the outlet that Gustern and her late husband had taken her in when she arrived in the Big Apple years ago for her first stint on Broadway in "The Phantom of the Opera."
"We'd really become close, because they really adopted lots of sort of strays, as they would call us, for holidays because we couldn't go home," she said before adding "I couldn’t go home for Thanksgiving. We had a show."
