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Phillip Ferrell's murder trial opens with the murder of a teenager from Mount Vernon, New York

A 14-year-old Mount Vernon boy was fatally shot last year because the killer's stepfather gave the killer the gun and urged him to “do what he had to do,” a prosecutor told jurors Wednesday in the murder trial stepfather.

“Without this defendant providing this weapon, Zyaire Fernandez would still be alive today,” Assistant District Attorney Adrian Murphy said in his opening statement in Westchester County Court.

Phillip Ferrell, 48, is charged with second-degree murder, second- and third-degree criminal possession of a weapon, hindering prosecution and tampering with physical evidence for his alleged actions before and after the March 9, 2023, killing of Fernandez in the courtyard of the Levister Towers apartment complex.

Killer Tyrese Coghiel has pleaded guilty to murder and agreed to cooperate with prosecutors. If he testifies truthfully, his murder conviction would be reduced to manslaughter, sparing him a possible life sentence, and he would be sentenced to 15 years in prison.

Defense attorney Angelo MacDonald told jurors the deal was intended to give them pause because Coghiel would take the stand and say what was expected of him.

“Does the deal trump the truthfulness?” asked MacDonald. “How will we ever know if he’s telling the truth?”

What happened the day Zyaire Fernandez was killed?

On the morning of the murder, Coghiel and a relative helped Ferrell move from his apartment in Levister Towers to Yonkers.

Fernandez was with two other teenagers – a nephew of Ferrell's. When they saw Coghiel, they asked him if he was “rolling,” slang for belonging to a gang. Coghiel continued walking and was confronted by the three again a short time later. However, this time one had a gun and another had a knife.

Coghiel walked away again and soon Ferrell was yelling at his nephew. Murphy said there was a simmering feud between them as Ferrell believed his nephew had stolen from him in the past.

Ferrell went up to his apartment to get the keys. But at that point, Murphy said, there was no longer an “immediate threat” because the nephew and Fernandez were on the other side of the building.

“The die was cast,” Murphy said as Ferrell returned, went to the trunk, opened a locker and produced a loaded 9mm semi-automatic handgun. The prosecutor said Coghiel already knew what was about to happen when Ferrell told him to “do what he had to do.”

Coghiel took the gun, chased the three and fired at least five shots. But while Ferrell's nephew was the target, Fernandez was hit in the back and soon lay dying in the yard.

ADA: The video captured what Coghiel and Ferrell did next

Murphy told jurors that video surveillance would later show Coghiel being taken to his girlfriend's apartment, where he wrapped the gun in clothing and hid it under a bed. The video would also show Ferrell going there and getting the gun because, Murphy said, he knew it was what linked her to the murder.

Coghiel was arrested days later in Brooklyn. The gun was later found in the locker alongside ammunition and two improvised explosive devices in the oven of Ferrell's Yonkers apartment.

Ferrell initially only faced gun, obstruction and tampering charges. But the murder charge was added in a second indictment after Coghiel detailed his stepfather's role.

MacDonald said jurors must weigh a killer's motivations for getting a deal and that otherwise prosecutors would be unable to prove Ferrell's intent to commit murder.

“If they can’t prove his intent, he’s not guilty,” MacDonald said.

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