Former Police Officer Admits Helping Her Lover, a Gang Leader, Flee the Country

A former New York City police officer confessed on Thursday to helping a man who prosecutors said was her lover, the leader of a Bronx gang called the Shooting Boys, flee a homicide investigation and escape to the Dominican Republic.

The former officer, Gina L. Mestre, 33, of Mohegan Lake, N.Y., admitted in Federal District Court in Manhattan that she had “impeded law enforcement’s efforts” when she shared security camera footage of the killing with the gang leader and helped him escape to avoid being charged with killing a rival.

Wearing black pants and a houndstooth blazer, Ms. Mestre pleaded guilty before Judge Denise L. Cote to a charge of accessory after the fact to murder in aid of racketeering, which carries a maximum sentence of 15 years in prison.

Ms. Mestre, who had previously pleaded not guilty, is scheduled to be sentenced on March 21. At the conclusion of the court appearance, Ms. Mestre’s face was blank, and she disappeared into a bathroom with another woman. Her lawyer, Matthew Kluger, declined to comment.

Ms. Mestre, who left the Police Department in May 2022, had been an officer for about seven years when she was assigned to the 52nd Precinct in the Bronx in 2020, prosecutors said in the August indictment. One of her unit’s goals was to reduce gun violence, much of which was connected to the Shooting Boys.

The Shooting Boys had operated in the University Heights section of the Bronx since at least 2017, according to court documents, and members of the gang sold drugs, used guns and engaged in violence against rival gangs.

Not long after her transfer to the Bronx, prosecutors said, Ms. Mestre began an “intimate relationship” with Andrew Done, the leader of the Shooting Boys, who went by the nickname Caballo.

Over about two years, Ms. Mestre fed confidential information to gang members to help them conceal their crimes and avoid arrest, according to prosecutors. Ms. Mestre leaked information about police operations and grand jury proceedings, prosecutors said, and she shared the identity of a witness who was later assaulted by members of the Shooting Boys who wanted to stop the witness’s cooperation with law enforcement.

In July 2020, Ms. Mestre warned a member of the Shooting Boys that a federal indictment against the gang was coming, and she instructed him to relay the information to Mr. Done, according to the indictment. She told the gang member that Mr. Done should be careful because things “were hot” and he needed to “slow down.”

When Mr. Done fatally shot a member of a rival gang November of that year, Ms. Mestre informed him that the authorities were looking for him and shared the video of the killing, prosecutors said. She continued for weeks to secretly communicate with Mr. Done and share confidential information about efforts to capture him, until he managed to flee the country.

Several months later, Mr. Done was found in the Dominican Republic and taken into custody, according to prosecutors, and he pleaded guilty last year to charges related to the killing. He was sentenced to 35 years in prison in February.

During the nine years Ms. Mestre was a member of the New York Police Department, she was named in at least 12 lawsuits — which have resulted in $765,000 in settlements — and nearly a dozen complaints were filed against her with the Civilian Complaint Review Board.

Ms. Mestre “abused her position of public trust and betrayed the oath she took to protect and serve the citizens of New York City,” Damian Williams, the United States attorney in Manhattan, said in a news release. “When law enforcement officers break the laws they are sworn to uphold, they do a disservice to their fellow officers, to the departments that employ them and to the public they serve.”