Today, the NY Times and Daily News report that the police have video footage of State Senator Hiram Monserrate and his girlfriend Karla Giraldo during their apparent dispute last month. Giraldo ended up in the hospital, with a black eye and requiring 20 stitches for a gash near the eye, and the authorities arrested Monserrate, charging him with assault.
The video reportedly shows Monserrate tearing up a business card (apparently of an ex) and throwing it down a garbage chute—along with Giraldo's purse. The News adds, "The video shows Giraldo grabbing the apartment's front door as Monserrate tried to drag her out of the building, sources said. Other video clips show Giraldo clutching a towel to her injured left eye and banging on the door of a neighbor's apartment for help, sources said." The neighbor told the Times, "I heard a lot of crying and then she ran down the stairs screaming and rang on my bell frantically, three times" (the neighbor assumes it was Giraldo, but by the time she got to the door, the person was gone). A source said, "No one can look at the security video and think that this was an accident. The woman looks scared out of her mind and trying to get away from this guy."
Monserrate has repeated that it was a terrible accident, and Giraldo has refused to cooperate with the authorities, backing up Monserrate's claim that it was an accident. Yesterday, Monserrate told the Daily News columnist Juan Gonzalez, "The information the police and the DA are leaking to the press are absolute lies. I never hit Karla, yanked her hair or abused her in any way. Any videotapes the police obtained from my building will back me up." Two "sources close to Monserrate" also gave Gonzalez this story:
Giraldo was slightly drunk when she showed up at his apartment that night after a Christmas party. He found a cop's PBA card in her pocketbook. They argued, but then made up, went to bed and even had sex.
Around 2:30 a.m., Monserrate went to the kitchen to get Giraldo a glass of water.
When he returned to the bedroom, he tripped as he was getting into the high platform bed and fell on top of Giraldo. The glass shattered in his right hand. As his hand came down, the jagged glass gashed her above her left eye.
According to the Times, the police have taken the set of glasses to see if the glass could break that way.
Monserrate, a former cop, maintains that the NYPD and Queens DA's office is seeking revenge for his speaking out against them in the past.
