POUGHKEEPSIE – Tom Case, 54, a retired LAPD cop and owner of Bilmar Nursery/Christmas Tree Farm in Pleasant Valley, has begun testifying in his own defense in his murder trial. Case is accused of killing his girlfriend’s son, Anthony Cuozzo, a 20-year-old autistic man, during a domestic violence incident on Rawls Road on October 5, 2024.
Cuozzo allegedly stabbed Case in the chest with a pocketknife before leaving the premises and calling his grandmother for a ride to her house. Cuozzo was on the phone with a 911 operator when Case fired four shots toward Cuozzo’s back, striking him three times. Cuozzo was pronounced dead at Vassar Brothers Medical Center later that night.
Case, under direct examination from his attorney, Ray Baierlein, said Cuozzo was on a rampage and threatening to kill both his mother and sister before stabbing Case. Case said that despite the loss of blood from his wound, he retrieved a Glock pistol from his car and slowly pursued the victim down the driveway, before stopping approximately 17 yards away and shooting the victim in the back.
“We had a mentally-ill young man who just stabbed me and he was armed with a knife,” Case told the jurors. He also indicated that he was trying to keep Cuozzo’s mother and sister safe, as the reason for firing the gun. He also said that “He was a dangerous threat to the tenants of the corporation,” in justifying the shooting. Case owns the Bilmar Nursery Corporation, which owns the house at 26 Rawls Road, which is rented to tenants. Case also said, “I felt like my death was imminent,” in another version of why he fired the four to five shots at the victim.
“I was trying to protect and preserve life,” Case told the jury, saying again that he thought he was dying and he thought Cuozzo was going to kill his mother and sister. Neither woman was injured during the incident.
Cross-examination of Case is scheduled to resume in Dutchess County Court on Wednesday before Judge Karen Edelman-Reyes.
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