NEW YORK (1010 WINS/WCBS 880) -- A former NYPD officer was sentenced on Friday to 70 months in prison for assisting a gang leader flee from the US after committing a murder, Damian Williams, the United States Attorney for the Southern District of New York, said.
In the summer of 2020, Gina Mestre was an NYPD Officer assigned to the 52nd Precinct's Public Safety Unit with a major focus of the reduction of gun violence in the area.
Much of that violence was attributed to members of the Shooting Boys, a violent street gang based in the University Heights section of the Bronx.
In or about June 2020, Mestre began communicating with Andrew Done, aka "Caballo," the leader of the Shooting Boys. Mestre and Done communicated through secret social media accounts and phone numbers and eventually began an intimate relationship, during which Mestre provided Done and other gang members with confidential, non-public law enforcement information about the federal grand jury investigation into the Shooting Boys, prosecutors said.
Mestre warned Done, and other gang members, that federal investigators were preparing to bring a federal indictment against the Shooting Boys. She also warned Done about impending law enforcement operations, which enabled Done and other gang members to dispose of weapons and conceal other criminal activity before law enforcement arrived on scene.
Additionally, Mestre disclosed the identity of a cooperating witness who provided information about the gang to law enforcement.
Done and other Shooting Boys then assaulted the witness to prevent them from further cooperation and to send a clear message within the gang that the punishment for cooperation would be severe, officials said.
On or about November 5, 2020, Done shot and killed a rival gang member as he sat in his car on Cromwell Avenue in the Bronx.
NYPD Detectives investigating the murder recovered security camera video capturing Done carry out the murder. Several members of the 52nd Precinct, including Mestre, were tasked with identifying the shooter in the video.
Mestre was one of several officers who identified Done as the perpetrator, authorities said.
Despite identifying Done as the shooter and participating in the NYPD's efforts to apprehend him, Mestre sent Done a copy of the video to his phone and secretly communicated with Done the day of the murder and in the weeks afterwards.
Mestre then warned Done about law enforcement's efforts to capture him, allowing Done to eventually flee from the US.
In March 2022, 10 members of the Shooting Boys were charged in a 15-count indictment with various federal crimes, including racketeering conspiracy and murder, prosecutors said.
Done was charged with the murder of the first victim and was apprehended in the Dominican Republic several months later.
Done pled guilty to racketeering conspiracy and admitted to his role in the murder of the first victim. He was sentenced to 35 years in prison.
Mestre was also sentenced to two years of supervised release.
"Gina Mestre betrayed and abused the trust placed in her by the NYPD and the people of New York. She swore to protect the public from criminal activity, but instead participated in significant crimes of her own by passing confidential information to a gang leader and helping him evade capture for the murder of a rival gang member," Williams said. "For violating her oath to the citizens of New York City and her fellow police officers, Mestre has been sentenced to spend more than five years in federal prison."
