Episode Description- On July 5, 1995, a disturbing 911 call was placed by a Park Slope resident, reporting that she had been assaulted and shot by a man who had broken into the apartment she shared with her girlfriend. When police responded, they could hear someone screaming inside the apartment for help, but the door was locked. It took several moments for the caller to reach the door to let them in, and what they would find inside was a horrible scene. This episode covers the vicious attack on Amanda Leach and Sylvia Lugo, that would leave Sylvia sadly deceased and Amanda looked at as the main suspect. Meanwhile the person actually responsible was left to continue to wreak havoc on Park Slope. This episode will discuss aspects of sexual violence, domestic violence and crime victimization. Please scroll further down the page for a list of resources if you or anyone know is struggling with any of these circumstances and would like information on available organizations to help.

Original Episode Publication Date- June 23, 2024

Date Page Last Updated- June 23, 2024

Amanda Leach had grown up in Guyana and came from a large family, she was one of seven children. She was incredibly smart and driven, in Guyana she had received straight A’s in school and this continued when she moved to Brooklyn. She attended the New York Institute of Technology in Long Island, New York on a softball scholarship, and when she graduated, she started working as a caseworker. At the time of the shooting, she was working for a foster care placement agency. 

Sylvia Lugo was born and raised in Park Slope, New York. She was the third of the eight Lugo children. Some of her siblings would interview on the episode of New York Homicide that covered this story, and they described Sylvia as a kind and generous person who would give ‘the shirt off her back’. She loved animals and she also loved playing softball, that in fact was how Sylvia met Amanda- through their softball league. Sylvia had come out to her family when she was 18 or 19 years old. She was very comfortable with her sexuality. Sylvia had been working for a factory, but the factory had closed and at the time of the shooting she was unemployed. 

On the evening of July 5, 1995, Amanda placed a call to 911 stating that she had been sexually assaulted and shot. She would later tell police that she and Sylvia had just returned home from the trip to Virginia to visit her relatives and were in the process of unloading things from their rental car. Amanda said she had noticed a couple of men hanging out near the apartment when they were collecting the first load of luggage, but the men didn’t approach them so they continued on with bringing in their belongings. When the women went out to get the second load of luggage from the car, they were approached from behind by a man with a gun who forced them back into their first-floor apartment. She said the man then instructed her to tie Sylvia up, which she did, but she said she had tied Sylvia up loosely so that she could escape. The man then forced Amanda into the bedroom and began to sexually assault her. While he was assaulting Amanda, Sylvia was able to get herself free and she burst into the bedroom. The man shot her once in the head and Amanda said Sylvia fell to the floor but then got up. This is when she was shot the second time in the head. Amanda tried to fight him for the gun, and this is when she was shot in the leg. She said the man tried to shoot her again, this time in the head, but the gun wouldn’t fire. The man then grabbed their keys to the rental car, some jewelry, and fled the apartment. The man she described was Latino, about five foot five inches, approximately 155 pounds. He was wearing a baseball cap and had a pencil mustache. She worked with the sketch artist to do a composite sketch for police, but this was not released to the public initially.

Amanda was looked at intensely as being the main suspect in the murder, to the point where police were even reporting this to the press. They claimed that her sexual assault exam came back inconclusive and that her gun shot wound appeared to be self-inflicted. The community of Park Slope would come together to march to let law enforcement know that they were keeping a close eye on the way that they investigated Sylvia's murder as there was concern in the community regarding other sexual assaults that were taking place in the area. 

What the community may not have realized, according to law enforcement officials that interviewed on the New York Homicide episode was that while they were investigating Amanda as a suspect in Sylvia’s murder, they were also running a parallel investigation into the park slope rapist. 

Two months after Sylvia’s murder, in mid-September, another woman was nearly assaulted in her apartment in Park Slope. Law enforcement had 26-year-old Tony Harrison under surveillance, and he was witnessed following a woman into her apartment building on Union Street in Park Slope. Police quickly intervened and he was taken into custody. After a ten-month spree of him stalking, robbing, and raping women in their apartment complexes at either knife or gun point, law enforcement had caught the Park Slope rapist. They would interrogate Harrison to see if he was in any way connected to Amanda and Sylvia’s attack, but due to the fact that he did not meet the description of the attacker that Amanda had given, and his interrogation gave them no indication to believe he was the one that had attacked them. At this point, a $10,000 reward is announced for information leading to the arrest of the individual responsible for killing Sylvia. But 1995 would end and a new year dawned before they would get their next break in the case. 

On March 30, 1996, a young woman named Gabrielle Kerns was sitting in her car when she was approached by a man with a gun who tried to car jack her. She refused to comply with him, and he shot her in the head. Police happened to be in the area and responded quickly, arresting 19-year-old Alex Villanueva. Gabrielle would survive the attack. Villanueva was a drifter, and they would find out he had an extensive history of doing push-in robberies. While interrogating him more, they would find out that he referred to himself as “Little Gotti” and thought he was basically untouchable. What they didn’t expect was that he would eventually confess to some additional crimes- the May 1995 murder of Michael Turrell, and to the rape of rape of Amanda Leach and murder of Sylvia Lugo. 

Villanueva would be charged with murder, attempted murder, and rape. In May of 1997, he would plead guilty and was sentenced to 50 years to life. Martin Lugo, Sylvia’s brother, would say on New York Homicide that the news that Amanda had not killed Sylvia “blew the family away. Not only that Amanda was innocent. But also that the person that had killed our sister also had attacked other people”.   

If you or someone you know has been a victim of sexual assault: 

RAINN (Rape, Abuse & Incest National Network) is the nation's largest anti-sexual violence organization. RAINN created and operates the National Sexual Assault Hotline (800.656.HOPE, online.rainn.org y rainn.org/es) in partnership with more than 1,000 local sexual assault service providers across the country and operates the DoD Safe Helpline for the Department of Defense. RAINN also carries out programs to prevent sexual violence, help survivors, and ensure that perpetrators are brought to justice.

If you or someone you know currently are or has been a victim of domestic violence:

24 hours a day, seven days a week, 365 days a year, the National Domestic Violence Hotline provides essential tools and support to help survivors of domestic violence so they can live their lives free of abuse. You can call 1-800-799-7223, chat with someone online at thehotline.org, or text the word 'start' to 88788 to connect with one via text message. 

If you or someone you know has been a victim of a crime: 

The mission of the National Center for Victims of Crime is to forge a national commitment to help victims of crime rebuild their lives. We are dedicated to serving individuals, families, and communities harmed by crime. You can learn more at their website: victimsofcrime.org

Culliton, K. (2018). NYPD Apologizes To Prospect Park Rape Victim 24 Years Later. Retrieved from Patch: https://patch.com/new-york/parkslope/nypd-apologizes-prospect-park-rape-victim-24-years-later\

Good Caper Content. (2022). Broken Pride. New York Homicide.

Pagnozzi, A. (1996). Amanda and Sylvia Were Lovers. In New York Magazine (pp. 38-45).

Pierre-Pierre, G. (1996). Drifter Charged in Case That Gay Groups Said Showed Police Bias. Retrieved from The New York Times: https://www.nytimes.com/1996/07/20/nyregion/drifter-charged-in-case-that-gay-groups-said-showed-police-bias.html

Reed, B. (2018). New York City police solve 1994 rape case that newspaper called a hoax. Retrieved from The Guardian: https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2018/jan/09/new-york-city-police-solve-1994-case-that-newspaper-called-a-hoax

The New York Times. (1995). Suspect in Series of Rapes Is Arrested in Park Slope. Retrieved from The New York Times: https://www.nytimes.com/1995/09/18/nyregion/suspect-in-series-of-rapes-is-arrested-in-park-slope.html