David Reese, an employee of the New York City Department of Environmental Protection who stands accused of fatally shooting his coworker in February, was indicted by an Ulster County grand jury on Tuesday, several news outlets report.
The shooting occurred in the DEP's Kingston office, early in the morning of Monday, February 3. Police say the 53-year-old Reese, a stationary engineer at the department who lived in Gilboa, shot and killed 33-year-old Aron Thomas, a watershed maintainer from Olivebridge.
An officer of the DEP Police, Lt. Justin Kight, testified at a February preliminary hearing in the case that immediately after the shooting, Reese admitted to shooting Thomas and allowed Kight to take his gun. At the hearing, Kight also alluded to an internal workplace incident report filed last November, the details of which have not been made public.
Reese, who is currently in the Ulster County Jail awaiting trial, faces second-degree murder charges in the case. If convicted, he faces a maximum sentence of 25 years to life.
Few details about the case have emerged since the preliminary hearing, and officials are keeping mum about possible motives for the case. Reporting on Reese's grand jury indictment on Tuesday, the Daily Freeman's Diane Pineiro-Zucker writes that the DEP has not yet released the incident report in response to a FOIL request by the newspaper.
Reese is currently being represented by a public defender on a provisional basis, until a county judge makes a ruling on whether Reese has sufficient funds to afford an attorney, the Freeman reports.
Reese is in phone contact with his brother, Joseph Reese, who remains baffled as to a possible motive for Thomas's killing, the Times Herald-Record's James Nani reports.
