MANHATTAN — The man convicted of terrorizing Stuyvesant Town residents with an ice pick in a series of bone-chilling muggings was sentenced to 18 years to life in prison Tuesday, according to reports.
Confessed criminal John Martinez was sentenced in the mugging two women in front of their young children in incidents just minutes apart in December 2010, cornering both victims in the elevator where he brandished an ice pick and demanded cash and property.
"Mr. Martinez seemed off, and unpredictable, and when he looked at my then 3-year-old son and threatened to stab him, I believed that he was capable of actually stabbing my little boy," one of the victims said in a letter read aloud at the sentencing, the New York Post reported.
Before the muggings, Martinez paced outside the buildings mimicking a cell phone conversation, sneaking in behind residents when they opened the door, members of the Stuyvesant Town-Peter Cooper Village Tenants Association told DNAinfo last December.
Martinez also pleaded guilty in a knifepoint mugging at Peter Cooper Village and an attempted mugging included in the sentence, which was reduced by two years after he agreed to return one of the victim's engagement ring.
He offered an apology to the victims in court on Tuesday, saying, he hoped he would receive help.
