By Jerry Burke
Thomas Maloney, 20, of Elmont, was arrested on June 28 on a charge of first-degree manslaughter for the stabbing death of 19-year-old Thomas Battaglia outside the victim's Third Avenue home. The charge was upgraded to second-degree murder after police discovered a phone call to the victim just before the brawl.
"In the moments just prior to this murder, there was a phone call to Thomas in his home to lure him out for the purpose of instigating this confrontation," said Detective Sgt. Dennis Barry at a press conference last week.
Barry said that the events leading up to the June 26 incident began a few hours before, when Battaglia agreed to let his ex-girlfriend, Jessica Laurita, and Maloney, her new boyfriend, visit the dog she and Battaglia had purchased together while they were dating. Police say the meeting did not go well, and that over the next few hours, angry phone calls were exchanged. Police say that at 10:20 p.m., Maloney made his last phone call to Battaglia.
After the phone call, police say, the two men got into an armed brawl, with Battaglia wielding a baseball bat and Maloney a knife. Within minutes, Battaglia had been stabbed twice in the chest. His mother, whom witnesses described as hysterical with grief, held her son until help arrived. He was brought to Winthrop University Hospital, where he was declared dead at 11:41 p.m.
"If this was just to air out the matter, [Maloney] would have gone alone," said Barry. "He wouldn't have gone with somebody to back him up. He certainly wouldn't have gone with a knife."
The backup Barry referred to was Maloney's 22-year-old brother, Ryan, who has not been charged in the incident.
Maloney was arraigned in First District Court in Hempstead on the second-degree murder charge and held at the Nassau County jail in lieu of $500,000 bail. He faces a term of 25 years to life if convicted.
Maloney's attorney, Joseph Tacopina of Manhattan, offered a different theory of what happened that night. Tacopina told reporters that it was Battaglia who was threatening the Maloneys and Laurita, and that the brothers went back to Third Avenue "to resolve the issue peacefully." He further stated that Laurita made the last call, and that Battaglia "came out swinging" at Ryan Maloney, forcing his brother to defend him. "Anyone looking at the evidence will see that Tommy acted lawfully and reasonably," Tacopina said.
Neither Laurita nor members of the Maloney family could be reached for comment.
