Trial Opens in duFresne Slaying
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 man accused of shooting actress Nicole duFresne during a street stickup last year killed her because she challenged him, a prosecutor said yesterday in opening statements.
Assistant District Attorney Robert Hettleman said Rudy Fleming “pointed the gun at her chest and shot her” during the robbery.
DuFresne, a native of Wayzata, Minn., who lived in Brooklyn, also was a playwright and producer.
Mr. Fleming, 20, is accused of fatally shooting duFresne, 28, while he and some of his companions robbed her and her three friends around 2 a.m. on January 27, 2005, on Manhattan’s Lower East Side.
Witnesses said Mr. Fleming shot duFresne after she pushed him and yelled, “You got what you wanted? What’re you going to do, shoot us?”
But Mr. Fleming’s lawyer, Anthony L. Ricco, said the shooting was an accident, that his client’s gun fired only after duFresne pushed him. Mr. Ricco said duFresne acted because she was angered that Fleming had hit her boyfriend, Jeffrey Sparks.
