The gay man who attempted to throw himself out of a window after stabbing his boyfriend nearly 30 times in December of 2022 was just arraigned on murder charges. He has been held without bail since his arrest in December.
The man arraigned on murder charges is 37-year-old Michael Perry. He and his 43-year-old boyfriend, Jose Aponte, were having relationship trouble because Perry believed that Aponte was seeing someone else. Despite the fighting, Perry stayed at Aponte’s apartment after Aponte had a medical procedure on December 9th,
Then things went awry, with neighbors hearing unusual, loud noises coming from Aponte’s apartment. Then, Aponte’s manager received a message from Aponte’s phone number saying that he would not be coming to work. The message was suspicious because it was, according to prosecutors, written in a very different manner than Aponte’s usual writing style.
Additionally, Aponte had gone dark and his friends and family grew worried as a result, having not heard from him. A concerned friend visited and heard rustling in the kitchen area and a cold draft coming from under the locked door.
That then led to authorities arriving and attempting to gain entry to the apartment. They were initially unable to get in, however, as Aponte’s dead body was pressed against it, as was a fridge. Police officers, while trying to get into the apartment, yelled, “What happened?” Perry, in response, screamed, “You know what happened. Come in and find out.”
Eventually, a SWAT team was able to breach the door and enter the apartment. There they discovered Perry holding both a knife and pair of scissors and tried to disable him by shooting him in the head with a pellet gun. However, when Perry collapsed into the clutter of the trash-strewn apartment, the police officers lost track of him and only required sight of him as he rushed toward the open window from with the draft discovered by Aponte’s friend was likely coming. When he tried leaping out the window and to his death nine stories below, however, Perry’s waistband caught and he was found hanging by it in the open air. Boston 25 News, describing that, reported:
Michael Perry was wearing a white Tyvek suit when he appeared in Boston Municipal Court days after – his clothes saved his life when police say he tried jumping out a 12th floor window during a standoff. “A piece of clothing caught on the handle so he was literally hanging 12 stories above the ground,” said Suffolk Assistant District Attorney Ian Polumbaum.
Police then arrested Perry, how was arrested in 2019 over a domestic violence incident that ended with Perry asking the police to shoot him. They did not do so and Perry was eventually released, leading to him stabbing Aponte 29 times. Aponte suffered stab wounds to the head, neck, and chest area during Perry’s assault.
Police, describing the incident, said, “At that time, the suspect dove out a 12th-floor window but was caught up and was hanging from the window. SWAT officers were able to enter an apartment on the 11th floor and pull the suspect through the window. The suspect was secured and transported to a local hospital suffering from non-life-threatening injuries.”
Watch Perry in court here:
Featured image credit: screengrab from the embedded video
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