An Upper West Side woman convicted of mercilessly beating to death her teenage cousin with special needs was sentenced to 20 years in prison Monday after telling the court she’d take whatever punishment she got.
Manhattan Supreme Court Judge Cori Weston told the court that the case against Johnette Booker for 15-year-old Jallen McConnie’s killing was the saddest she’d seen as a judge and in her time practicing law.
“I don’t usually say much during sentencings,” the judge said. “This is one of the saddest cases in all the years I was an attorney and a judge. I find it to be a very, very sad case in many different ways.”
A jury found Booker, 43, guilty of charges including manslaughter, assault, and endangering the welfare of a child on Feb. 7 for the brutal attack on Jallen inside the Wise Towers on W. 94th St. near Columbus Ave. on June 28, 2021.
Jallen McConnie, left, and right, with his mother Reta McConnie-Murphy. (Courtesy Mykarsha Rogers)
Jallen, who lived with his adopted sister in Georgia, had been staying with Booker in the city for about a month before his killing. During that time, he was physically and emotionally tortured, including beatings, being forced to sleep on the floor, and doing strenuous, hours-long exercises, according to trial evidence.
The teen was diagnosed with post-traumatic stress disorder, attention deficit hyperactivity disorder, and oppositional defiant disorder and was believed to be autistic, according to court papers.
Booker and another family member beat the boy for more than an hour before bringing him into a bathroom, where he collapsed in the bathtub, according to prosecutors. The city Medical Examiner ruled his cause of death as homicidal asphyxia or suffocation.
Jallen was found inside the family’s apartment covered in bruises and cuts on his arms, legs, the back of his neck, chest, and back and face, consistent with being beaten with a belt, jurors heard at the trial.
Mitchaux Booker, the teen’s brother, was also charged in connection to the killing and is waiting to go on trial. The Daily News reported in 2021 that he had told cops that Jallen was beaten for interrupting him while he was watching Netflix.
Another relative, Joevon McConnie, last year pleaded guilty to assault in the case and received a 3½-year sentence.
Assistant District Attorney Nicole Blumberg requested Weston impose the maximum term, saying Booker had repeatedly lied about her role in “terrorizing a 15-year old special needs child.” She noted Booker brazenly tried to pin the teen’s killing on him by claiming he’d tried to kill himself.
“There’s simply no line that this defendant is not willing to cross to benefit herself,” the prosecutor said, calling her lies about the teen trying to strangle himself “absurd and unconscionable.”
“His loss was tragic for those who knew and loved him — his family, his teachers, and his social workers,” Blumberg said. “She deserves absolutely no sympathy from the court because she showed absolutely no sympathy to the young boy who was entrusted under her care.”
Booker’s attorney, Gary Sunden, asked the court to impose a 10-year sentence — the term offered to his client in a plea deal offer she turned down.
“She’s not a predator, she’s not a thief,” Sunden said. “The likelihood of a repeat offense is virtually nil.”
Johnette Booker during her sentencing Monday, March 24, 2024. (Barry Williams/ New York Daily News)
But the judge said much more information had come out at the trial than was known when the deal was offered to Booker and said the lenient term was intended to save her son from having to testify.
Asked if she had anything to say before the sentence was imposed, Booker said, “I just want to say I appreciate and I thank you and whatever’s imposed, I humbly accept.”
This story will be updated.