A Brooklyn judge has initially rebuffed efforts by defense attorneys in the Michael J. Sandy homicide case to obtain grand jury minutes so that they may use those records to challenge the use of the hate crime law in the case.

"It actually goes to whether they are interpreting the statute correctly," said Gerald J. DiChiara, the attorney for Anthony Fortunato, one of four defendants charged in the Sandy killing, during a March 14 hearing. "The premise that they are stretching this to has changed the whole nature of a hate crime."

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Judge Jill Konviser-Levine rejected defense efforts to obtain copies of the grand jury minutes, but she did allow the lawyers to file a motion seeking to inspect the minutes.

"Your argument is well taken, but that is an argument that you need to address to the Legislature," Konviser-Levine said.

Konviser-Levine granted a prosecution motion requiring the defendants to submit DNA samples and she scheduled a series of hearings on evidence in the case for April 24.

(New York City) The videotaped confessions of three men accused of killing a gay Brooklyn man last year were played in court Tuesday for a judge who must determine if the tapes can be used at trial.

Anthony Fortunato, 20, John Fox, 19, and Ilya Shurov, 20, are charged with murder and robbery as hate crimes in the death of Michael Sandy (pictured) last October.

After their arrests, under questioning by NYPD, each of the three pointed the finger at the others.

The trial of John Fox and Anthony Fortunato for the murder of Michael Sandy has opened in Brooklyn with a startling revelation.

Last October, Fox, 20, Fortunato, 21, Ilya Shurov, 21, and 16-year-old Gary Timmins lured Sandy via an internet chat room to a parking lot on the Belt Parkway where he was robbed, and, following a scuffle, forced into oncoming traffic. He was then hit by a car and sustained injuries that would keep him in a coma until his family later made the choice to remove him from life support. Sandy died October 13.

In an opening day bombshell intended to convince the jury that Sandy's murder was not a hate crime (for which the punishment would mean significantly more jail time), the lawyer for Fortunato, allegedly the "mastermind" behind the crime, told the courtroom that his client, like Sandy, is gay.

Said defense lawyer Gerald DiChiara: "This man has been tortured by a secret that he has carried for a long time. His secret is coming out in this courtroom and his family is listening to it. The stakes in this case are too high for him to keep this a secret any longer."