Actress Thought To Have Been Suicide Was Murdered; Suspect Is in Custody
This article is from the archive of The New York Sun before the launch of its new website in 2022. The Sun has neither altered nor updated such articles but will seek to correct any errors, mis-categorizations or other problems introduced during transfer.
A construction worker murdered the film actress Adrienne Shelly and then tried to make it look like she committed suicide, police charged last night.
An Ecuadorian man, Diego Pillco, 19, who was hired to do some work in Shelly’s office in Greenwich Village, was charged with murder in the second degree after confessing to the crime yesterday, police officials said.
Shelly, 40, whose birth name was Adrienne Levine, was found by her husband and a doorman hanging from a shower rod by a bed sheet in the apartment at 15 Abingdon Square at about 6 p.m. November 1. Although it had the immediate appearance of a suicide, police found suspicious footprints in the bathtub and were puzzled by the absence of a suicide note. Shelly also had bruises on her face and body that weren’t consistent with a self-hanging, police said.
A spokeswoman for the Medical Examiner’s Office, Ellen Borakove, said the cause of death is under investigation.
On Sunday night, detectives arrived in three unmarked cars and a paddy wagon to the building where Mr. Pillco lived at 328 Prospect Ave. in Park Slope, neighbors said. They removed him and two others in handcuffs, and spent several hours going through items in the basement apartment. A man who lives on the third floor of the building, Angel LaFalle, 19, said as many as nine Central and South American men lived in the basement apartment at any given time.
Another neighbor, who identified himself only as Frank, said police took Mr. Pillco’s work clothes from the apartment in evidence bags.
“These people are really quiet,” Mr. LaFalle said, “but when they get drunk they start fighting in the street.”
Mr. Pillco moved to New York from Ecuador in July, police said.
Shelly is known for roles in Hal Hartley’s dark comedies “The Unbelievable Truth” and “Trust.” She starred in “Factotum” alongside Matt Dillon and Marisa Tomei in 2005, but in recent years she has devoted her time to working as a director and screenwriter, as well as acting in off-Broadway shows. She had just finished working on a film she wrote and directed, “Waitress,” which is being considered for this year’s Sundance Film Festival.
Shelly is survived by her husband, Andy Ostroy, and 3-year-old daughter, Sophie.
