Last Dance, Last Chance

have been played on every radio and television station in Buffalo and Erie County, and Anthony didn’t want that to happen.
    Claudia Ewing from WGRZ TV, Channel 2, was in Judge Rossetti’s courtroom with her film crew, hoping to videotape the proceedings. The defense didn’t want her there, and Frank Sedita said simply, “The People have no position, Your Honor.”
    Judge Rossetti, bound by New York State law, denied Ewing’s request.
    Frank Sedita explained that it was his understanding that Anthony Pignataro was going to withdraw his not guilty plea to the original charges against him and plead guilty to attempted assault in the first degree, a lesser offense included in Count 2 of his indictment.
    His guilty plea would be his admission that he had intended to cause serious physical injury to another person using a dangerous “instrument” (specifically, arsenic poison) and that person was his wife, Deborah Pignataro. The rest of the counts against him would be consolidated and dismissed.
    But there were several conditions that Pignataro had to agree to: he had to withdraw all motions made to date, agree to waive his right to appeal, and admit that he was a second felony offender.
    Frank Sedita had met with Debbie, and this plea bargain met with her approval. “Your Honor,” Sedita said, “myself and Ms. Bridge urge the Court to accept the plea disposition.”
    The ex-Dr. Anthony Pignataro stood before the judge in handcuffs, no longer swaggering in the courtroom. He said, “Yes, sir” and “No, sir.”
    It must have been humiliating for him to have Judge Rossetti ask him if he had graduated from high school and if he could read and write English, but he answered only a meek “Yes,” respectfully. He said he understood what it meant to plead guilty, and he understood his rights. He knew he had a right to a trial by a judge or a jury, and to confront witnesses against him. But he was afraid of what his sentence might be.
    “Do you understand, therefore…that the Court is restricted to a determinate five years up to a determinate fifteen years…as a second felony felon?”
    “Yes, Your Honor.”
    The judge explained that he had as yet made no commitment one way or the other.
    “Did you,” Judge Rossetti began, “on or before June 30 and August 10 of 1999 attempt with intent to cause physical injury by use of poison, that is, arsenic, attempt to cause the injury by preparing some food for your wife and having her consume that food?”
    “Once, yes, Your Honor.”
    Anthony was again downplaying his crimes, admitting to less than the truth. Judge Rossetti didn’t comment. Pignataro admitted that the poisoning had happened in Debbie’s home in West Seneca.
    “And you knew at that time, did you not, that the use of such poison, arsenic, could cause serious physical injury to your wife?” Rossetti continued.
    “At that time, I did not know it was arsenic. I knew it was harmful.”
    “You knew it was harmful?”
    “Yes.”
    “Did you attempt to use it with the intent to cause serious physical injury?”
    “Yes, Your Honor.”
    “Nobody forcing you to say that—is that correct?”
    “No, sir.”
    Judge Rossetti explained to Anthony that he would base his sentencing decision on documentation from Joel Daniels, a presentence memorandum, and any other documentation and letters he might receive. Any sentence would have to run consecutively with the sentence he was currently serving for probation violation.
    Anthony pleaded guilty. His sentencing date was set for January 2001. There was no bail. He would spend Thanksgiving and Christmas behind bars.
    Two days later, Erie County District Attorney Frank Clark broke the long silence of his office and spoke for his staff about the theory they had developed in Anthony’s crimes against Debbie. Heretofore, Frank Sedita, Carol Bridge, Chuck Craven, and Pat Finnerty had agreed with Clark that the less information the public knew about Anthony Pignataro’s game plan, the better.
    Now the “Poisoned Plot” headline swept across the final edition of the Buffalo News.
    Characterizing Pignataro’s thinking as fiendishly clever, Frank Clark said his office had never felt that Debbie was poisoned for something as mundane as insurance money or even to set her husband free to be with another woman. It appeared that Anthony Pignataro had a far more complicated motive. He had hoped to show that anyone’s wife could die in surgery—even his own.
    Anthony had