Tabitha Bundrick, 39, was sentenced to 27 years to life in prison Tuesday for murdering three men with fentanyl during a robbery spree that spanned ten months.
The Manhattan Supreme Court hearing drew seven relatives of victims Mario Paullan, Miguel Navez and Abrihan Fernandez, who used their victim impact statements to condemn the prostitute they described as a heartless predator. Bundrick had pleaded guilty on Sept. 8 to three counts of second-degree murder and one count of second-degree assault, capping a case that Manhattan Assistant District Attorney Dafna Yoran said followed a chillingly consistent pattern.
“Robberies were the motive, fentanyl was the means and murder was the result,” Yoran said in court. The prosecutor detailed how Bundrick pumped her victims with fentanyl until they passed out, then stripped them of phones, cash, watches, clothing and sneakers during encounters from April 2023 through February 2024.
Brigida Rodriguez, mother of the final victim, directed her anguish straight at the defendant while pointing from the gallery. “She took part of my heart,” Rodriguez said, fighting through tears during her emotional statement. The grieving mother wore her son’s college ring, which she said Bundrick had been unable to pry off Fernandez’s hand after drugging him inside his Washington Heights apartment on Feb. 25, 2024.
“Half of my heart is missing because she doesn’t have one,” Rodriguez continued. She remembered Fernandez, 34, as a college graduate who had come to the United States seeking “a better future.”
Bundrick’s first killing came in April 2023, when she lured Paullan, 42, and a friend to an apartment with the promise of trading cash for sex. Yoran said the prostitute then offered what she claimed was cocaine and repeatedly pressured the men to keep using it, telling Paullan — who said he had never done drugs before — to “do it again” three separate times. Paullan died at the scene, and his friend woke up in the empty apartment next to his body.
“My father was a happy man. He liked to joke and was very hard working, a man who loved his children who is no longer here,” Paullan’s daughter Aylin told the court.
Five months later, Bundrick met Navez, 39, went back to his apartment and laced his cocaine with fentanyl. His brother discovered the body two days afterward, pants down around his knees, with numerous personal items missing from the apartment.
Bundrick was arrested in March 2024 after surveillance footage captured her hauling several “giant laundry bags” with sneakers out of Fernandez’s Manhattan apartment. She has also faced federal charges, pleading guilty to narcotics distribution and receiving a 13-year sentence that will run concurrently with her new state term, according to Judge Kathryn Paak.
Wearing a large wooden cross around her neck, Bundrick addressed the families before sentencing and apologized for the deaths. She blamed her drug addiction for the killings, telling the court Tuesday that it caused her to “make bad choices and bad decisions just to get high.”
Manhattan District Attorney Alvin Bragg issued a statement following the hearing. “Tabitha Bundrick’s absolutely callous conduct has left three devastated families,” Bragg said. “Today in court, we heard powerful statements from the loved ones of the defendants victims, who are still mourning in anguish. I hope this prison sentence will allow for some measure of healing.”