Wendy's massacre site

The Wendy's Massacre was a mass murder that took place in a Wendy's fast-food restaurant at 40-12 Main Street in Flushing, Queens, New York City, New York, on May 24, 2000.

The killings were carried out by 36-year-old John Taylor, a former employee of the restaurant, and his accomplice Craig Godineaux. The robbery was carefully planned, as Taylor had the manager of the restaurant (whom he knew) summon the entire staff to the basement on the pretense of having an important meeting. Once in the basement, Taylor and Godineaux bound and gagged all seven of the employees at gunpoint and then shot each of them in the head at point-blank range with a Bryco-Jennings Model J38 .380 caliber semi-automatic pistol. All but two of the employees died. One of the survivors dialled 9-1-1, and police arrived to find the victims and discovered $2,400 missing from the safe.

The NYPD arrested Taylor and Godineaux less than 48 hours after the killings. Evidence quickly mounted against the pair, including eyewitness testimony, ballistics, and fingerprints. On January 22, 2001, Godineaux pleaded guilty and was later sentenced to life in prison. Judge Steven W. Fisher instructed the jury that he would most likely sentence Taylor to a sentence of 175 years in prison if the jury did not return a unanimous verdict on the death penalty. On November 19, 2002, Taylor was convicted on 20 counts of murder and attempted murder. One week later, on November 26, the jury sentenced Taylor to death.

On October 23, 2007, the Court of Appeals of the State of New York, New York's highest court, vacated the death penalty portion of the verdict.

The Queens prosecutor's office fought unsuccessfully to have Taylor's case declared an exception to a 2004 Appeals Court's decision that found New York's death penalty law unconstitutional because of a flaw in its mandated instructions to the jury. On November 29, 2007 Taylor was re-sentenced to life without parole for the five murders. As of 2007, he had been the only inmate on Death Row in New York.