Former Manhasset resident Nikolaos Kotsopoulos, who murdered wife in front of children, denied parole

The sons of Nikolaos Kotsopoulos, the Manhasset man serving 25 years to life in prison for fatally shooting his wife in the face in front of them in 2002, said they felt their own fleeting reprieve this week after a New York parole board turned down their father's bid for release.

George and Nikos Kotsopoulos were 12 and 10, respectively, when their father flew into a rage at their mother, Carol Lyn Fraser Kotsopoulos, and gunned her down as she prepared the Greek Orthodox Easter dinner more than two decades ago.

The brothers expressed their fears in a Newsday story last month, ahead of a July 14 parole board hearing, saying they wished their father is never released from prison.

Kotsopoulos, who claimed for years that a masked intruder had killed his wife, had made at least four attempts to upend his murder conviction. He finally admitted the shooting in 2009, but said that the gun had accidentally gone off.

He had coerced his sons to tell the story of the masked man to police until months after the murder, when they finally told authorities what they witnessed. George testified against his father at his trial.

Last month George told Newsday that he believes that his father would seek revenge on him and his brother for helping put him behind bars.

“We’re very relieved by the news of the denial,” the brothers said in a joint statement. “[We’re] just embracing the limited time of rest we’re able to get without fearing if our lives will be turned upside down again in 6 months.”

Kotsopoulos qualified for a release program called “limited credit time allowance,” which permits an inmate to go before the parole board six months before their earliest release date.

The state parole board denied his release after two members of the parole board met with him on July 14, according to spokeswoman Nicole March. She did not say why he was denied.

Kotsopoulos will have another opportunity to appeal to the board for release in another six months after he’s served his full 25 years behind bars. If he is denied, then he may apply for parole every two years for the rest of his life.

The Nassau County District Attorney’s Office and the prosecutor on the case, Frank Schroeder, who now works in Suffolk County, both wrote to the board adamant that Kotsopoulos remain in prison.

“Nikolaos Kotsopoulos committed a barbaric crime, beating and pistol-whipping the mother of his children and shooting her in the head while the children were home,” Nassau District Attorney Anne Donnelly said in a statement. “He should never be allowed to walk free.”

Last month, the brothers recounted the years of abuse from their father and the threats that he would one day kill their mother, then them and then himself.

Nikos Kotsopoulos told Newsday that moments after witnessing his mother’s murder, he thought that he would be killed next when his father sat him in a chair facing the wall.

In addition to the fatal bullet wound, Schroeder said that the autopsy report showed bruises and broken bones from a beating the abuse that Carol Lyn Fraser Kotsopoulos had suffered that day.

“We have faith in the justice system to see any fast-forward excuse/apology Nick Kotsopoulos attempts to make after his first denial will be of strategic advantage for his own personal gain after learning the system more in depth, and not one of true remorse and rehabilitation," the brothers said in a statement to Newsday. "We hope he will be held accountable for justice for our mother, but also to serve as an example of the seriousness of domestic violence in the homes of many people that we’ll never know about.”