Appeals court upholds conviction of Catskill murderer

ALBANY, N.Y. (NEWS10) — On Thursday, a state appeals court upheld the conviction and sentence of Carlos Graham, of Catskill, in the January 2017 murder of Brandyn Foster. In his 2019 criminal trial, Graham admitted to the slaying, and to hiding Foster's body under his bedroom floor.

Foster and Graham lived next to one another, but their relationship was anything but neighborly. According to evidence presented at trial, Foster's girlfriend moved in with Graham shortly before the murder. Graham said he killed Foster to protect the woman who came between them.

In April 2019, Graham was sentenced on eight charges. On the top count of second-degree murder, he was sentenced to 25 years to life.

In recent months, Graham appealed for a new trial, claiming that the murder conviction was contrary to the weight of the evidence. The Appellate Division of the State Supreme Court disagreed, upholding both the conviction and the 25 years to life sentence.

"It is noteworthy that this case was particularly offensive to the prosecution as not only had Carlos Graham murdered the victim, but he then buried the body under the bedroom of the decedent’s ex-girlfriend’s home," a spokesperson for the Greene County District Attorney's Office stated in a press release. "He and the ex-girlfriend, Sade Knox, then knowingly slept in a bed directly above the decedent’s dead body."