KINGSTON, N.Y., Nov. 15 (UPI) -- A man who killed a New York City woman 22 years ago was convicted of murdering his 2-year-old niece after she wet her diaper while at his Hudson Valley home.
Joseph Rodriguez, 44, was found guilty of second-degree murder in the death of Asia Perez, the daughter of a Dominican diplomat, who was visiting Rodriguez and his wife.
Rodriguez faces 25 years to life in prison when he is sentenced in January.
Defense lawyer Cappy Weiner said he would appeal the jury's verdict.
The toddler was found bludgeoned to death June 20, 2012, behind the New Paltz, N.Y., home rented by Rodriguez and his wife, Dalia Rodriguez.
Asia Perez, visiting from the Dominican Republic, had awakened with a wet diaper, and Rodriguez brutally beat her, said Ulster County District Attorney Holley Carnright, who tried the case himself.
Rodriguez had come home tired after being out all night with a prostitute, Carnright told the jury.
Rodriguez then set up a phony crime scene to make it look like a stranger broke into the home, investigators determined.
Asia's mother, Katidy Medina-Perez, who is Dalia Rodriguez's sister, cried as the verdict was read out loud, the Middletown Times Herald-Record reported.
She and her envoy husband Cesar Perez had come for the trial from the Dominican Republic.
"There are no words," an emotional Medina-Perez said through a translator, the Record reported.
The U.S. justice system prevailed, Cesar Perez said.
The Ulster County Court jury in Kingston was not told about Rodriguez's deadly crime history.
He was in and out of prison since 1989 and pleaded guilty to first-degree manslaughter in the 1991 beating death of a 29-year-old woman in New York City, 90 miles south of Kingston.
Asia's parents did not know the details of Rodriguez's criminal record, a cousin of Cesar Perez told the Record in April. If they had, they would not have allowed Asia anywhere near him, he said.
