Richard Fantauzzi-Aviles may have killed his girlfriend, but her light shines 20 times brighter now than it did before, according to the victim’s mother.
The 40-year-old Wilson Borough man also stabbed his then 4-year-old daughter, the girl he fathered with murder victim Shante Mason.
But he didn’t kill the love and support his daughter continues to receive from her family, according to Mason’s mother, Tanya Bynum.
“So you messed up,” she told the scowling Fantauzzi-Aviles as he bowed his head. “You messed up. You thought you were taking was her whole life, when actually you gave her more life.”
Northampton County Judge Michael Koury sentenced Fantauzzi-Aviles on Thursday to 40 to 80 years in state prison. The sentence was agreed to by both sides. Fantauzzi-Aviles pleaded guilty to third-degree murder and attempted murder, and in exchange a first-degree murder charge was dropped.
It’s unclear why he committed the crimes on Aug. 29 and Aug. 30, 2023, in the apartment he shared with Mason on South 25th Street in Wilson Borough. Northampton County First Assistant District Attorney Robert Eyer said Fantauzzi stabbed Mason multiple times. He stabbed their daughter in the abdomen, back and upper arm, causing life-threatening injuries, Eyer said.
Neither Eyer nor Chief Public Defender Nuria DiLuzio addressed why Fantauzzi-Aviles committed the crimes. Fantauzzi declined the judge’s offer to explain his actions.
Court records say Fantauzzi-Aviles flagged down police after the stabbings and said “they” made him do it. It remains unclear who he was talking about.
Court records say police found the young girl in a blood-stained room with her mother, and she told them, “Daddy had a knife.”
Mason’s friend, Melyssa Wood, suggested the crime stemmed from domestic abuse. She said Fantauzzi-Aviles made Mason stop contacting her friends during their relationship.
“I knew (the abuse) was bad, but never in my wildest dreams did I know what she experienced during this time,” Wood said.
She said her sole consolation is that Mason won’t suffer any more abuse now that she’s gone.
Fantauzzi-Aviles filed a motion without telling his lawyer asking to withdraw the plea, go to trial and pursue an insanity defense. He admitted to the judge he filed the motion on the advice of “the people on the (cell) block.”
The stocky man with a bushy beard, glasses, ponytail, and frown said he had doctors available to argue he is schizophrenic and that he was delusional when he committed the crimes.
It’s not clear why that defense wasn’t pursued.
Fantauzzi-Aviles said Thursday he changed his mind, wanted to go ahead with the plea and accept the advice of his attorneys.
When the judge asked him why he had a change of heart, Fantauzzi-Aviles said “it’s hard for me to say.”
After a pause he said, “My daughter was involved. She’s still too young to come to trial and testify against me. … I came up with the conclusion I don’t want her to suffer any longer, her reliving that day.”
Bynum said she wouldn’t give Fantauzzi-Aviles the satisfaction of describing her suffering and loss during the sentencing hearing.
While Wood was overwrought with grief, Bynum paused frequently during her statement to steel her nerves and remain calm and deliberate.
“It would be a waste of time explaining how (the crimes) have affected me and my family,” she told Fantauzzi-Aviles. “I feel like you would feed off our pain and our energy, the same energy I’m now trying to contain.”
Later, she gestured to the full gallery on her side of the courtroom, a testament to Mason’s legacy.
“You killed her body. You didn’t kill her spirit,” she said.
The suffering Fantauzzi-Aviles put Mason through during their relationship and ultimately through her murder will be Fantauzzi-Aviles’ eternal torment, Bynum said.
“So welcome home. Welcome to your hell that you orchestrated and created. You live in it. You die in it. It’s yours.”
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