The hulking ex-con who coldly gunned down a rookie cop rather than go back to jail will now spend the rest of his miserable days in prison, after a Brooklyn judge sentenced him yesterday to life plus 55 years – with no possibility of parole.
Dexter Bostic was defiant to the end, blaming everyone but himself and even reading the poem “Invictus,” as Justice Plummer Lott consigned him to die an old man behind bars.
“It astonishes me, how our justice system could allow so many injustices to be thrusted upon me, before, during and even after my trial,” he said. “I’ve sat here, for the duration of 19 months, and it seems like the judicial process was circumvented for me at every turn.”
Bostic, 36, then treated some 200 cops and loved ones of the man he gunned down, Russel Timoshenko, to a reading of “Invictus,” which means “unconquerable” in Latin.
Lott had little patience for Bostic’s theatrics, quickly handing down sentences of life without parole for Timoshenko’s killing, 40 years to life for the attempted murder to his partner, Herman Yan, and 15 years for weapons possession.
“Make no mistake, sir, the evidence at trial established overwhelmingly that you shot Russel Timoshenko,” the judge told the four-time convict. “That .45 was in your hands and you pulled the trigger.”
The stiff sentence brought some joy to Timoshenko’s mother, Tatyana.
“He’s evil,” she said. “He’ll be out of the street and never hurt anyone again.”
Prosecutors alleged that Bostic was one of three men inside a stolen BMW SUV that Timoshenko and Yan pulled over the morning of Aug. 9, 2007. The officers were fired upon as they approached the vehicle.
Bostic, who was on parole at the time, later told his buddies, “I wasn’t going back to jail for no guns.”
He was convicted of aggravated murder following a joint trial of all three men. Co-defendant Robert Ellis, who was accused of firing the shots which struck Yan in the arm and the chest, was acquitted of the more serious charges, and is now doing 15 years for weapons possession.
A jury deadlocked on the fate of a third man, Lee Woods, 31, who prosecutors said was the driver. Immediately after Bostic’s sentencing yesterday, Woods went on trial anew with a fresh jury.