LOCKPORT — A Falls woman appears poised to ask a Niagara County Court judge to withdraw her guilty plea to a charge of first-degree manslaughter in the slaying of a Buffalo man.
Chanel Nicole Groom has also previously filed a motion seeking to postpone the sentencing in her case after filing a motion to have her potential prison time determined under the provisions of New York’s Domestic Violence Survivors Justice Act (DVSJA).
That motion was filed by attorneys in the Niagara County Public Defender’s Office. Groom has now fired those lawyers and Niagara County Court Judge Caroline Wojtaszek has appointed a new attorney to be selected from the Public Defender’s Conflicts Office to continue to represent Groom.
Niagara County prosecutors had no comment on the lawyer shuffling or the potential of Groom to ask to withdraw her guilty plea. They have, in prior cases, opposed plea withdrawals and the use of sentencing provisions under the DVSJA.
Groom, 38, pleaded guilty during a January hearing to a single count of first-degree manslaughter in a plea deal with prosecutors. She had originally been charged with second-degree murder.
Under the terms of her plea, Groom is facing up to 18 years behind bars. However, her public defenders asked Wojtaszek to reduce that potential sentence to as little as 5 years under the DVSJA.
The DVSJA, which was signed into law by Gov. Andrew Cuomo in 2019, is intended to expand the situations that judges can consider in determining appropriate sentences for domestic violence survivors who commit criminal offenses. It can be applied both in pending criminal cases and in motions for resentencing.
The law requires that a person “must show that they were a victim of abuse at the time of their criminal offense.” The abuse may be “physical, sexual, or psychological (in nature), committed by a family member or person in the (victim’s) household, and must be a significant contributing factor in the criminal conduct.”
Groom admitted to killing Timothy Day, 36, of Buffalo, during a confrontation inside her home in the 1300 block of Vanderbilt Avenue in the early morning hours of June 1, 2024.
Niagara County District Attorney Brian Seaman, who handled the prosecution of the case, called the slaying senseless.
“This domestic incident was quickly escalated by the defendant to extreme violence,” Seaman said at the time. “There was no reason for Mr. Day to lose his life that night.”
Falls Police patrol officers were first called to the Vanderbilt Avenue home at around 2:35 a.m. for a report of a domestic disturbance. When the officers arrived, they said they found Day suffering from a stab wound to the chest.
Day was described as unresponsive and was rushed to Niagara Falls Memorial Medical Center, where he was later pronounced dead. Law enforcement sources said the stabbing occurred during a domestic disturbance between the victim, Groom and another woman.