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Ex-Con Who Murdered Community Board Member Sentenced to 25 Years to Life

By Maya Rajamani | December 1, 2015 10:56am
 Jeffrey Wong, 41, was arraigned in Manhattan Criminal Court on Oct. 17, 2014, after killing Khemraj Singh, 46, in his Hell's Kitchen home.
Jeffrey Wong, 41, was arraigned in Manhattan Criminal Court on Oct. 17, 2014, after killing Khemraj Singh, 46, in his Hell's Kitchen home.
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Jefferson Siegel/New York Daily News

MANHATTAN — An ex-con who fatally stabbed a former Community Board 4 member in his Hell’s Kitchen home last year was sentenced to 25 years to life in prison for the crime, prosecutors said.

A state Supreme Court jury found Jeffrey Wong, 42, guilty of second-degree murder for stabbing, strangling and beating 47-year-old Khemraj Singh in Singh’s apartment at 375 W. 48th St., near Ninth Avenue, Manhattan District Attorney Cyrus R. Vance Jr. said in a statement.

“The viciousness of this crime is staggering,” Vance said on Monday, following the Nov. 13 verdict. “As soon as the assault began, Jeffrey Wong’s murderous intent was crystal clear, and I thank the jury for their service and recognition of this horrific crime.”

Wong met Singh, who joined Community Board 4 in the spring of 2012, at a bar in Midtown last October, and the two decided to return to Singh’s Hell’s Kitchen apartment, according to prosecutors.

At the time, Wong claimed Singh invited him over to do cocaine but that Singh threatened him with a knife when he tried to leave the apartment after Singh put on a pornographic film and returned from the bathroom naked, prosecutors said.

Wong said he punched Singh and shoved him away to try to escape when Singh pulled a knife to keep him from leaving, prosecutors said. But the jury found on Nov. 13 that Wong strangled Singh and stabbed him with enough force to “fatally [sever] an artery.”

One of Singh's friends discovered the body the next day in the apartment's bathtub covered with a shower curtain and a bath mat, prosecutors said.

Wong claimed Singh "must have fallen on the knife,” prosecutors said during his arraignment.

Wong previously spent time in jail after he was convicted in July 1996 for stabbing a man in the head in Manhattan, according to court records. He was released from prison in June 2000, but was locked up again in 2002 for a parole violation, records showed.

After Singh’s death last year, CB4 officials released a statement remembering him as “upbeat and jovial.”

“We hope his death will not go unpunished. Our sincere condolences to his family and friends,” the board said at the time.

Board 4 did not immediately respond to request for comment Monday regarding Wong’s sentencing.