![\"Image_20260401_155717_961\"](\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/04\/Image_20260401_155717_961.jpeg\" "\\"Queens")
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NYPD officers file through a Queens courthouse at the trial against Guy Rivera, a Queens man whose gun fired the shot that killed 31-year-old NYPD Detective Jonathan Diller.<\/p>\n
Photo by Dean Moses<\/p>\n
After about eight hours of deliberation, a Queens jury on Wednesday delivered a mixed verdict against the man holding the gun that killed 31-year-old NYPD Detective Jonathan Diller during a March 2024<\/a> traffic stop.\u00a0<\/p>\n Though they found Guy Rivera, 35, not guilty of murdering Diller in the first degree, the jury still found him at fault in Diller\u2019s death, convicting him on the lesser charges of aggravated manslaughter and illegal weapons possession. They also found him guilty of the attempted first-degree murder of Diller\u2019s partner, Sergeant Sasha Rosen, who stopped Rivera\u2019s car along with Diller.<\/p>\n Prosecutors charged<\/a> Rivera after his gun shot and killed Diller<\/a> during a stop on Mott Avenue in Far Rockaway. Rivera was a passenger; officers pulled over the car, driven by his friend Lindy Jones, because Rosen<\/a> thought she saw Rivera carrying a gun earlier that evening.\u00a0<\/p>\n The pair, along with three other officers in their Community Response Team, asked Rivera and Jones to lower the windows, open the doors and step out of the car, but Rivera remained inside, triggering a brief scuffle between him and police through the car window. It concluded<\/a> with gunshots that ended Diller\u2019s life.\u00a0\u00a0<\/p>\n Over a three-week trial, jurors repeatedly watched<\/a>, and attorneys picked apart, body-worn camera footage of the incident.\u00a0<\/p>\n Rivera\u2019s attorney, Jamal Johnson of the Legal Aid Society, argued<\/a> that Rivera did not intend to kill Diller, or even for his gun to go off. He said it was actually Rosen whose finger hit the trigger when she reached into Rivera\u2019s car.\u00a0<\/p>\n Johnson also told the jury the officers who took the stand had a motive to lie about what happened to protect themselves. Rivera was also shot<\/a> in the March 2024 scuffle.\u00a0<\/p>\n Assistant District Attorney John Kosinski argued there was no doubt Rivera intended to kill Diller, who lived in Massapequa Park, saying he declined to cooperate with officers and acted with a disregard for life<\/a> to save himself from potential arrest after being caught with an illegal weapon.\u00a0<\/p>\n Rivera\u2019s verdict came after contention among the jurors. After the jury\u2019s foreperson initially read out its verdict, the court clerk asked each juror whether that was their truthful verdict, a process that\u2019s typically considered a formality. Juror No. 5, however, said no.\u00a0<\/p>\n That sent the jury back into deliberations just before 5 p.m. Wednesday. They returned the verdict about two hours later.\u00a0\n<\/p>\n