In the spring of 2014, Richard Salvia, a 50-year-old man from Turnersville, New Jersey, was working as a food delivery driver for the Crown Palace restaurant in Staten Island, a job he had only held for a few weeks. On the evening of April 1st, a call came in for a delivery to Grandview Avenue in the Mariners Harbor neighborhood, a desolate dead-end street known to be a spot for muggings of delivery drivers.
Unaware of the danger, Salvia set out to deliver the order.
When he arrived at the location, he was ambushed by three teenagers who had placed the fake order with the intention of robbing him. The trio, identified as 16-year-old James Sanders, 17-year-old Otoniel Carty, and 19-year-old Devin Hill, confronted Salvia. Sanders held a gun to Salvia's chest while the other two went through his pockets. In what the suspects later claimed was an accident, Salvia jumped back, and the gun went off. Richard Salvia was shot in the head. He was found lying in the street with bags of Chinese food near his body and was rushed to Richmond University Medical Center, where he was pronounced dead. The assailants fled the scene, leaving behind over one hundred dollars and car keys in Salvia’s pockets.
The investigation that followed led to the swift arrest of the three teenagers. Surveillance footage and interviews helped police identify Sanders, Carty, and Hill as the primary suspects. All three had prior run-ins with the law. They were charged with second-degree murder and other offenses related to the robbery and killing of Richard Salvia.
Ultimately, all three young men were held accountable for their roles in the senseless murder. James Sanders, the shooter, pleaded guilty to two counts of murder and was sentenced to 16-and-a-half years to life in prison. He also received a concurrent sentence of 14 years for attempted robbery and criminal possession of a weapon. Devin Hill pleaded guilty to attempted robbery and was sentenced to 15 years behind bars. Otoniel Carty, who provided the gun and acted as a lookout, pleaded guilty to attempted murder and received a 22-year prison sentence. The Staten Island District Attorney stated that with the sentencing of all three defendants, justice had been served for the cold-blooded killing of a man who was simply trying to make an honest living.
