A long, dark stretch of road

Dennis Murphy Correspondent • Profile

How quickly life can tumble. From candelit dinner to this...

Hi, we just got shot. My wife got shot.

The long-married couple's date night in Manhattan wasn't supposed to end this way. Not out here on a dark road. Not with a gunman besides the window of their Mitsubishi. Not with the crack of gunfire.

I'm taking my wife to the hospital, I think she was murdered. She got shot.

The day had begun like so many other lazy Saturday mornings in a well-heeled New York City suburb of good homes, good schools and solid families.

Carlos Perez-Olivo, 58, a well-known criminal defense attorney was puttering around the family's two-story cobalt-blue center-hall colonial - just three doors down from their very famous neighbors Bill and Hillary Clinton - in the desirable village of Chappaqua. 

Carlos' wife, Peggy, 55, worked as a teaching assistant during the week and, as Carlos joked, reported to her second job of shopping the town's upscale boutiques on the weekends. Carlos and Peggy's two older boys were off on their own now. Carlitos, 29, had followed in his dad's footsteps and was now lawyer. Merced, 23, was out in Colorado finishing college. Alysia, 16, a bubbly high school cheerleader, was still living at home. She was going out with friends that night.

After raising three children in their almost 30 years of marriage, Carlos and Peggy were enjoying their new freedom from the unrelenting pace of  full-time parenting duties.

Carlos Perez-Olivo: We wanted to enjoy ourselves while we were young. I think we were both deathly afraid of getting old, we saw too many people who became old, they had money, but then couldn't really enjoy themselves.

So that evening they'd decided to make a night on the town of it. Peggy went on the Internet and bought some movie tickets. The plan: drive into New York, see the film, maybe do a little shopping and have a nice dinner. 

Carlos Perez-Olivo: We were going to go in her car but it didn't have gas. So we went in mine that had a little bit of gas.

It was Nov. 18, 2006 -- the week before Thanksgiving, and New York wasn't yet overrun with the usual madness the Christmas season would bring. The calm before the holiday storm.

Carlos Perez-Olivo: And we walked around for 20 minutes 'cause we were quite early she wanted to see the stores and we walked back. We saw the movie.

It was "Volver" -- starring Penelope Cruz -- a dark comedy dealing in part with a widow trying to conceal the body of her abusive husband. Later, they went to a favorite French bistro.

Carlos Perez-Olivo: We had a wonderful dinner.

Dennis Dennis Murphy: A lot of Cosmopolitans on the table that night?

Carlos Perez-Olivo: Yes, Peggy had two or three. I had about five or six. We enjoyed going out to dinner and we enjoyed having a drink.

But now it was time for the hour-drive home north to Chappaqua. As they started to make their way out of the city, Frank Furillo, one of Carlos's closest friends from their college days at Columbia, had played telephone tag with Peggy's that evening.

Frank Furillo: I could tell that they'd been out to dinner or something because she was very happy and very bubbly and she was actually even trying to speak with a French accent.

Carlos, as usual, did the driving. 

Carlos Perez-Olivo: Normally, we'd get in the car. And she's put on the classic rock station and invariably, she would fall asleep

Alysia, their 16-year-old, called her mom's cell phone as they as they were driving home from the city, asking them to pick her up at a friend's house later that night.

Alysia Perez-Olivo: She was having a really good time.  I told her I loved her and she loved me.  And my dad says he loves me, too.

Carlos said Peggy soon then drowsed back to sleep.

Meanwhile, the fuel gauge was reading low. Carlos said he was determined to make it to his favorite gas station ... the one with the rock-bottom prices, but also off the highway down a dark stretch of road.

When it came to a gallon of gas, Carlos was as tight as a tick.

Carlos Perez-Olivo: Whereas I might spend whatever I wanted to spend on meals or a bottle of wine, for whatever reason, the idea of spending 15 cents more for a gallon from one station to another was offensive to me.

The stretch of Route 100 he exited onto was quiet at that hour, but Carlos wasn't apprehensive. He was on familiar turf.

Even though he was an attorney who'd defended some of the worst low-lifes New York City had to offer, once he crossed that county line he always breathed a sigh of relief. 

Carlos Perez-Olivo: That's why we moved up to Westchester, because we felt up here it was safer.

But this autumn night, something was very different. In the past three months, Carlos had stopped practicing law. He'd been disbarred after some clients had accused him of running off with their money. And, while he said he was relieved to be moving on to a new stage in his life, he'd left behind a trail of angry former clients.

Carlos Perez-Olivo: There'd been some threats and some problems obviously. People that weren't happy with me.

Dennis Dennis Murphy: You represented some tough customers?

Carlos Perez-Olivo: Yes, I did.

Dennis Dennis Murphy: Were any of them present tense in your life at that point on that day?

Carlos Perez-Olivo: I had gotten some threats the year before or six months before. They'd been communicated to the U.S. attorneys.

Carlos made his way toward the gas station. Peggy was sound asleep in the seat behind him, the radio droning oldies. He'd look back at that moment later thinking life had never seemed better. What a nice evening out it had been. A marriage still intact after 30 years, three accomplished children, and he was finally out from under the relentless pressure of practicing law.

Carlos Perez-Olivo: It was like a big load had been taken off my shoulders.  I was enjoying myself. I was able to be more at home than I was before.

But the concept of home -- time with Peggy -- was about to be changed forever. A car had loomed up out of nowhere, overtaking him, now cutting him off. The car had stopped and a ballcapped man with a gun had jumped out of the back.

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