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In his courtroom confession, Diego Pillco, an illegal immigrant from Ecuador, recounted how he choked Adrienne Shelly with a sheet, strung her body up from a shower rod and fled — hoping to make the murder look like a suicide.

"I was having a bad day," illegal immigrant Diego Pillco, 19, allegedly told cops. "I didn't mean to kill her. But I did kill her."

The confession differed radically from what Pillco had long told cops — that he sparred verbally with Shelly after she came downstairs to complain of construction noise.

He admitted that robbing Shelly of her purse as she arrived home was his real, more sinister motive — although investigative sources believe rape may have been an original motive as well, though thwarted by the violence that followed.

Pillco, 20, was sentenced to 25 years in prison — which will almost certainly be followed by deportation.

Neighbors at Mr. Pillco’s apartment building said he was hard-working and respectful. He lived in a basement apartment with his cousin and held a variety of odd jobs, they said.

“He sent money home to his mother and father,” said Frank Lingo, a neighbor. “He minded his business. He never bothered me or anyone else near here. He seemed like a good kid. I’ve never seen him hang out.”

Chris Pannhorse, another neighbor, said: “He was always respectful to me and my wife. He’s a good kid. Because that is what he is to me, just a kid.”

The suspect's stunned boss, contractor Louis Hernandez, called his employee "a good kid." "I don't know what happened. I don't think he did it," he said.

One woman from Michigan left a reader’s comment post for a People Magazine story about the killing: “It makes no sense that she was murdered. Stealing is one thing. How does that person also become a murderer?”

https://nypost.com/2008/02/14/adrienne-shellys-killer-pleads-guilty-gets-25-years/

http://murderpedia.org/male.P/p/pillco-diego.htm