NEW YORK (1010 WINS) -- "Sopranos'' actor Lillio Brancato Jr., who is charged with murder in the killing of a police officer, asked a judge on Thursday for a separate trial from a co-defendant who he expects will testify in his defense.
Brancato's lawyer, Mel Sachs, said co-defendant Steven Armento could testify that Brancato did not know that Armento had a gun with him when the shooting happened on Dec. 10, 2005.
Prosecutors agree that Armento was the shooter, but Brancato also is charged with felony murder because both men were allegedly in the midst of a burglary at a Bronx apartment when off-duty Police Officer Daniel Enchautegui was shot and killed.
Prosecutors say the defendants told police that they had been together at a strip club before deciding to break into an apartment in search of prescription drugs. Enchautegui, who lived next door, confronted them in an alley and was mortally wounded during a shootout.
``Lillo Brancato has an absolute defense as a matter of law to the murder charge,'' Sachs said after the court hearing. ``He did not know that Armento had a gun.''
Armento, 48, nodded his head ``no'' when Sachs suggested to state Supreme Court Justice Steven Barrett that the co-defendant would testify on behalf of Brancato.
Sachs also requested that some of Brancato's statements to police in the days immediately after the killing be kept out of any trial. He said because Brancato had been shot twice by Enchautegui before the officer died, his client was in no shape in the hospital to be making statements to police.
The judge did not immediately rule on the attorney's requests. The case was adjourned until July 11.
Brancato, who did not speak, appeared somber in the courtroom, which was jammed with relatives of the accused and the victim, as well as a large contingent of police officers and reporters.
Outside the courthouse, Patrick Lynch, president of the Patrolmen's Benevolent Association, decried the requests made by the defense attorney.
``It's outrageous that these two junkies want the evidence collected and their statements suppressed because they made bad choices,'' Lynch said. ``They both knew there was a weapon being carried.''
Brancato made his debut starring opposite Robert De Niro in ``A Bronx Tale'' in 1993 and went on to appear in more than a dozen movies. He also had a recurring role in ``The Sopranos'' as an aspiring mobster.
Armento allegedly was a low-level Genovese crime family associate with a drug problem and a rap sheet dating to 1979. Brancato befriended him after dating his daughter.
Brancato's life went into a tailspin in the last year, with a pair of drug-related arrests and a disorderly conduct incident just two days before the shooting. He was arrested once for heroin possession, and authorities said he and Armento were hoping to score Valium in the Bronx apartment.
When his father was asked to comment after Thursday's court proceeding, all he could say was, ``It's very painful.''
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