Judge to Laffer: 'Expect no mercy'

A Suffolk judge bluntly told Medford drugstore killer David Laffer he'd get no leniency just before Laffer admitted Thursday to slaughtering four people.

"You should expect no mercy from this court," Judge James Hudson said to Laffer. "Do you still want to proceed?"

"Yes, your honor," Laffer replied in a quiet but clear voice as he looked at the judge while wearing a green jail uniform.

Soon after, his wife, Melinda Brady, 29, pleaded guilty to first-degree robbery. Hudson told her she will be sentenced to between 21 and 25 years in prison after she admitted planning the robbery and serving as a lookout and getaway driver.

During questioning by Suffolk Chief Trial Prosecutor John Collins, Laffer, 33, of Medford, admitted planning the June 19 robbery of Haven Drugs with his wife and executing pharmacist Raymond Ferguson, 45, drugstore employee Jennifer Mejia, 17, and customers Jaime Taccetta, 33, and Bryon Sheffield, 71.

For a crime so brutal that even his attorney, Eric Naiburg, refused to minimize it, Laffer, 33, will be sentenced Oct. 17 to the maximum possible -- four consecutive sentences of life without parole, plus concurrent sentences for a fifth murder count and weapons charges.

"I make no excuses for my client's conduct," Naiburg said after the plea. "Obviously, there are no excuses."

About three dozen relatives of the victims watched silently as the couple admitted to what Collins called "probably the most cold-blooded robbery-homicide in Suffolk County history."

Taccetta's younger brother, Daniel, said that as he listened to the pleas, he thought, "Why? Why did you have to do this?"

Taccetta was wearing a gold medallion he had made with his sister's thumbprint embedded in it. "It's been around my neck since I got it, and it will never leave it," he said.

Taccetta's grandmother Mary Moran said the guilty plea meant she and others wouldn't have to relive the murders during weeks of trial, which would have included a video of the killings.

"It's very hard, but we don't have to think of my granddaughter and the way she died," Moran said. "We can remember the way she lived."

Outside the courtroom afterward, Suffolk District Attorney Thomas Spota said: "At the very beginning of this case, I said David Laffer should spend the rest of his life in prison. This is, as Mr. Collins has mentioned, one of the most gruesome, horrible crimes in the annals of Suffolk County history."

Spota said that although the pleas would spare the families of the victims weeks of testimony and having to watch the graphic video, "Their grief will always be there."

Naiburg said afterward that he still didn't know why Laffer killed everyone in the drugstore.

According to Naiburg, Laffer said only: "It was never supposed to happen that way."

Later Thursday, a woman who answered the door at David Laffer's sister's house in Ronkonkoma declined to comment. No one answered at Laffer's mother's home in Medford or at Brady's parents' home in West Sayville.

A sign at Haven Drugs said "No media. No interviews."

In court, Naiburg said Laffer had agreed to plead guilty "to offer the families of this horrible crime some closure" and said his client would waive all rights to appeal.

Officials said Laffer stole 10,000 hydrocodone pills in the fatal robbery to feed his and his wife's addictions.

The evidence against Laffer included fingerprints at the scene that matched his, the disassembled murder weapon recovered from his home, and 2,000 of the 10,000 stolen pills, also recovered from the home. Authorities believe the rest were flushed down the toilet.

Naiburg said after the plea: "What happened today in that courtroom was the right thing."

With Tania Lopez

and Sandra Peddie