Eddy Coello, being arraigned yesterday on charges he killed his wife, Tina Adovasio, frightened onlookers earlier with his stare (Pool photo)
Tina Adovasio (
)
Bronx prosecutors said yesterday they’ve caught a sadistic ex-cop in a web of lies — and have a mountain of evidence proving he strangled his wife and dumped her body in Westchester.
“He told police that he had a fight with his wife, Tina [Adovasio], who left the house at 9:30,” Assistant DA Edward Talty said at the arraignment for Eddy Coello.
“We were able to prove that it was a lie, that she never left the house. We have video surveillance, forensic evidence and statements from the defendant’s own mouth that the night of March 11 and morning of March 12, after strangling her, he carried her dead body, put it in his car, and dumped her in Westchester County.”
Coello, 38, was stone-faced as the prosecutor spoke, and then pleaded not guilty to second-degree murder. He was held without bail.
His courtroom demeanor was markedly different from the face of “pure evil” he wore at the 45th Precinct following his arrest Tuesday.
“He was very, very cold. He seemed like he didn’t care,” said John Correa, 44, who was waiting for a nephew arrested for fighting when cops marched Coello through a hallway of the Throggs Neck station house.
“I’ll never forget that stare. He had a cold, cold stare, like he’s pure evil,” said Correa. “I can’t believe I came face to face with that guy.”
Police Commissioner Ray Kelly also said yesterday that Coello had implicated himself in the murder, as first reported in yesterday’s Post.
“The individual has made incriminating statements and the forensic aspects of this case will continue to go forward,” Kelly said.
Law-enforcement sources said Coello admitted to a female colleague at WestMed in White Plains that he’d killed his 40-year-old wife, and that his high-priced lawyers would help him beat the rap.
Coello’s estranged father pledged yesterday to stand by his son — whom he hadn’t seen in 30 years.
“I have to help him. He’s my blood,” said Felix Coello, 68. “I finally found my son, on the news.”
Felix said his wife took the couple’s four kids and left him 30 years ago, when Eddy was 7 or 8, and Felix was never able to find them.
Glory Perez, Eddy’s ex-girlfriend and the mother of one of his children, has told The Post that Eddy said Felix had beaten both him and his mother, a charge the elder Coello denied.
“No one knows what happened in that house except for me and my ex-wife,” Felix said.
Perez was also beaten by Eddy, an incident that forced his resignation as an NYPD housing cop in 2000.