Michael Valva weeps at mention of son's death during jury selection in Riverhead

The ex-NYPD officer charged with killing his 8-year-old son Thomas Valva cried in a Riverhead courtroom Tuesday as his defense attorney referenced the boy's death during jury selection.

"Let's remember, that was Michael's son," said Michael Valva's defense attorney John LoTurco, as he queried potential jurors. "Let's not forget that."

Valva, 43, seated at the defense table, took off his black eyeglasses and wiped tears from his face as he sat just feet from potential jurors on the fifth day of jury selection in the case.

Valva and his ex-fiancee, Angela Pollina, 45, have pleaded not guilty to charges of second-degree murder and child endangerment in the Jan. 17, 2020 hypothermia death of Thomas and the alleged abuse of his older brother, Anthony, then 10.

Prosecutors have alleged Thomas died after Valva and Pollina forced the child to sleep in the unheated garage of their Center Moriches home at night when it was just 19 degrees outside. 

Valva's defense attorneys have alleged Thomas' death was an accident and said it was Pollina who forced Thomas to sleep in the garage. Pollina's attorney has said Valva was solely responsible for his son's death. 

Valva has remained composed during many past court appearances, although he also cried in court last year when prosecutors played a 911 call he made on the day Thomas died.

LoTurco said after court Tuesday that Valva's display of emotion was spontaneous. 

"It was not prepared; he didn't know it was coming, so he was reacting emotionally from my comment that obviously this case is more about, from our perspective, the loss of Michael's son," said LoTurco. "It was a tragic accident and Michael reacted naturally as a father who is grieving still to this day about the loss of his son." 

Tuesday's jury selection process included voir dire, during which the judge, prosecutors and defense attorneys asked potential jurors questions in an attempt to weed out anyone with biases that could unfairly impact the jury's ability to be fair and impartial. By the close of court Tuesday, 10 jurors had been seated. Another two jurors and six alternates must still be chosen. Jury selection is scheduled to continue Wednesday. 

The judge said previously that he would likely sequester the jury during deliberations. 

LoTurco said the defense would not petition the court to move the trial outside of Suffolk County, despite his concerns about media accounts of the case influencing the jury pool. 

"Quite honestly, we feel that we have a highly intelligent group of jurors who can hopefully scrutinize this evidence carefully," LoTurco said. "We think that we do. Even despite all the pretrial publicity, we've accomplished our goal, which is we have a group of people that we think can be fair and impartial. We had our doubts." 

Suffolk County Supreme Court Justice William Condon, who is presiding over the case, ruled Monday that Valva and Pollina, who were slated to be tried together but with separate juries early next month, would instead have separate trials.

Valva's attorneys sought the severance of the two cases after Valva alleged that he spoke about the facts of the case to Pollina's attorney Matthew Tuohy in a brief meeting before Tuohy represented Valva at his initial district court arraignment. Valva's attorney said the interaction could represent a conflict and hurt Valva's chance for a fair trial if Tuohy used any information he learned during the conversation to assist in Pollina's defense. 

Tuohy denied the pair had discussed the substance of the case, but Condon said he wanted to ensure both defendants received fair trials. 

By Nicole Fuller

nicole.fuller@newsday.com@NicoleFuller

Nicole Fuller is Newsday's senior criminal justice reporter. She began working at Newsday in 2012 and previously covered local government.