Man Guilty of Manslaughter, Not Murder, in Killing of NYPD Officer

Jurors convicted a man of aggravated manslaughter in the 2024 fatal shooting of NYPD Officer Jonathan Diller after deliberations were briefly disrupted by a juror’s initial rejection of the verdict.

By John Annese

Source New York Daily News

April 2, 2026

5 min read

What to know

A jury convicted Guy Rivera of aggravated manslaughter, attempted murder and weapons charges in the 2024 killing of NYPD police officer Jonathan Diller, but acquitted him of murder.
The verdict followed dramatic deliberations that briefly stalled after a juror initially rejected the panel’s finding before the jury returned with a unanimous decision.
Prosecutors said Rivera deliberately fired at Diller during a daylight encounter in Far Rockaway, while defense attorneys argued the shooting was accidental.

A Queens jury Wednesday found an ex-con guilty of manslaughter in the death of NYPD Officer Jonathan Diller in a trial marked by blistering emotional testimony from the slain cop’s widow and his grieving partners — plus a lone juror’s last-minute waffling that threatened to send the trial into disarray.

A Queens Supreme Court jury convicted Guy Rivera, 35, of aggravated manslaughter for Diller’s killing on Mott Ave. in Far Rockway on March 25, 2024. He was also found guilty of attempted murder and two counts of criminal possession of a weapon.

However, Rivera was found not guilty of murder.

Diller’s family cried and shook their heads in court at the verdict after Rivera ducked the murder charge. His widow, Stephanie, though, remained composed after the verdict was read aloud for a second time, nodding her head as Queens District Attorney Melinda Katz spoke to her.

Earlier, the jury had been on the brink of convicting Rivera of manslaughter, but after the foreman read their verdict, a lone juror shockingly almost threw the trial off the rails after they were individually polled.

Asked “Is this your verdict?” Juror No. 5 answered, “No.”

The judge thought about sending the jurors home for the evening, but later reconsidered, announcing, “Belay that order,” and they returned to deliberating, this time reaching a final, unanimous decision.

Speaking to the media afterward, Katz said a conviction on first-degree murder was definitely warranted.

“When Rivera encountered Detective Diller, Sgt. Rosen and their team, he made the decision to fight,” she said. “The shooting was not accidental, and it wasn’t impulsive.”

Katz said first-degree murder, or Murder 1, would have meant the possibility of life without parole, but that, in the aggregate, the remaining four charges could amount to 90 years to life, if the sentences are consecutive. Aggravated manslaughter alone carries a sentence of 25-to-40 years to life.

As for the juror chaos, Katz said members of her team have seen cases where this had happened. “But at the end of the day, the system worked,” she said. “The jury was polled.”

Police Benevolent Association President Patrick Hendry said Diller’s family is devastated by the verdict.

“These police officers know behind me that this was Murder 1 on a New York City police officer,” Hendry said. “No doubt about it.”

“This decision at least gives Jonathan and his family some justice, but it doesn’t give them full closure. The pain will never go away.”

“This cold-blooded killer who has no regard for human life, on March, 25, 2024, every decision he made, he put New Yorkers and police officers in jeopardy,” Hendry said.

Posting on X, NYPD Commissioner Jessica Tisch also said Diller’s killer should have been convicted of murder.

“While I am deeply disappointed that Jonathan’s killer was not convicted of the top murder charge, I am grateful that he has been convicted on all other counts,” Tisch wrote, in part. “My hope is that the ultimate sentence in this case will reflect the gravity of his actions, and the profound loss he caused for Stephanie, Ryan (their 2-year-old son), the Diller family, the NYPD and the entire City of New York.”

Rivera’s mother was present for the verdict, sitting beside a woman who is a family friend. The friend told reporters, “It was a lot. It was a long day.”

Diller’s daylight slaying shocked the city. At his wake in Massapequa, L.I., two years ago, a sea of police officers showed up to honor the three-year cop and family man who was hailed as a hero for his dedication to public safety.

Diller, 31, was working on his day off, as part of a five-officer team in the 101st Precinct, when another member of the unit, Sgt. Sasha Rosen, spotted an L-shaped object in the pocket of the suspect’s hooded sweatshirt.

Rosen and Diller followed Rivera until he got into the passenger seat of a parked Kia sedan, and within two minutes the officers and a third cop, Detective Dario Fernandez, surrounded the vehicle.

Diller got the attention of the other two members of his team, Detectives Veckash Khedna and Derval Whyte — and the tragic crack of a gunshot threw everything into chaos.

Prosecutors argued that Rivera reached for his gun and fired a single shot at Diller, hitting him in the stomach, then pointed his gun at Rosen’s chest, but the gun jammed. Khedna fired twice after the fatal shot, wounding Rivera.

Rivera’s defense team tried to argue that the officers were involved in racial profiling when they stopped Rivera and that he didn’t deliberately shoot Diller. Rather, they argued, the gun went off inadvertently in a struggle after Rosen reached into the car and grabbed Rivera.

But jurors didn’t buy that argument, siding with prosecutors, who described Rivera as a cold-blooded killer, desperate to fight his way free of the cops surrounding the car, and who “made a calculated and deliberate action to point a loaded and operable firearm.”

Over the past three weeks, jurors saw video of the shooting from several angles, including the officers’ body-worn cameras, and heard testimony from Diller’s grief-stricken widow, the ER doctor who literally held the fallen cop’s heart in his hands as he tried to save his life, and all of the other officers present for the shooting.

DIller’s widow described their last morning together, their final “I love you’s,” and their final phone call, when Diller said that he expected to be home early for dinner.

Khedna, who shot and wounded Rivera after Diller was hit, told jurors he had a clearer view than the body-worn camera on his chest, and that he saw the gun in Rivera’s hand, stating, “He had full control of the gun.”

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