NYC Stockbroker Who Strangled Millionaire Wife In 2009 Gets 25 Years To Life
NEW YORK (CBSNewYork/AP) — A former Manhattan stockbroker convicted of killing his estranged wife has been sentenced to 25 years to life in prison.
Last month, a jury found 46-year-old Rod Covlin guilty of murder.
Prosecutors say he strangled his wife, Shele Danishefsky Covlin, in the bathtub of her luxury Upper West Side apartment on New Year's Eve 2009 before she could cut him out of her will.
"The Danishefsky family never gave up, and neither did we," said District Attorney Vance. "Roderick Covlin will now spend decades in prison for his domestic violence, depravity and deception, but family and intimate partner violence continues on in apartments across New York City.
The two were embroiled in a bitter divorce and custody battle over their children. Police initially thought her death an accident. For religious reasons her Orthodox Jewish family objected to an autopsy. But as suspicions mounted her body was exhumed and the medical examiner determined she'd been strangled.
The trader and noted figure in the backgammon world was finally charged nearly six years later.
Covlin denied killing her, saying he performed CPR and called 911.
(© Copyright 2019 CBS Broadcasting Inc. All Rights Reserved. The Associated Press contributed to this report.)