A 37-year-old Yonkers man strangled his girlfriend with his own shirt until she lost consciousness, then bit her face and sliced her nose with a knife before she escaped by pepper-spraying him, prosecutors allege. Otoniel Morel Tejeda was arraigned Friday on a 12-count indictment that includes two counts of second-degree strangulation, and he remains free on $1,000 cash bail despite the district attorney's push to have that amount increased.
According to Westchester County District Attorney Susan Cacace, the attack unfolded inside the Yonkers home Tejeda shared with his girlfriend, where prosecutors say he punched her in the face several times, pushed her into a wall, and pointed a knife at her while allegedly threatening to kill her. As Daily Voice reports, the woman escaped only after using pepper spray on Tejeda, then called police and was taken to a hospital for treatment. Yonkers police officers arrested him at the scene.
Prosecutors say Tejeda destroyed his girlfriend's cell phone while she tried calling police for help. He is charged with three counts of third-degree assault, second-degree menacing, second-degree aggravated harassment, fourth-degree criminal possession of a weapon, and two counts of fourth-degree criminal mischief, in addition to the strangulation counts.
Second Arrest After Protection Order Allegedly Violated
A court issued a temporary order of protection after Tejeda's initial arrest, but prosecutors allege he violated it twice in the following weeks. On March 22, they say he called and texted the woman with threatening messages, and on March 29, he allegedly applied pressure to her throat again. Yonkers police arrested Tejeda a second time on April 6, and he now faces two counts of first-degree criminal contempt tied to those alleged violations.
Officers were legally required to make those arrests under New York Criminal Procedure Law § 140.10(4), which imposes a mandatory arrest rule whenever police have probable cause to believe a felony or an order-of-protection violation occurred between intimate partners, according to the New York State Unified Court System. Hoodline has reported on a similar case in Brewster where the same mandatory-arrest statute applied. Tejeda was arraigned before Westchester County Court Judge George Fufidio and pleaded not guilty to all charges. He is scheduled to return to court on November 10.
DA Says She Was 'Deeply Disappointed' by Bail Ruling
The Westchester County District Attorney's Office requested an increase in Tejeda's bail, but Fufidio denied that request, according to prosecutors. Cacace said she was deeply disappointed that the bail increase request was denied, and she publicly criticized the decision given the severity of the allegations and the alleged protection-order violations.
Prosecutors had the legal standing to seek that increase because New York's Criminal Procedure Law § 530.40 was amended between 2020 and 2023 to classify second-degree strangulation and criminal contempt violations against a domestic partner as qualifying offenses, giving judges the authority to set cash bail or remand defendants, per the New York State Senate. Fufidio, who was elected to the county bench in 2016 after previously serving as both a Westchester Assistant District Attorney and a criminal defense attorney, retains broad judicial discretion in setting securing orders even for bail-eligible charges, according to the Westchester Bar Journal.
Why Non-Fatal Strangulation Raises Red Flags
Cacace's alarm over the bail decision tracks with research the DA's office has cited before: victims who survive non-fatal strangulation by an intimate partner face a 750% increased risk of becoming victims of attempted or completed intimate partner homicide, according to research published in PMC. Medical literature in the American Nurse Journal notes that as little as 4 to 11 pounds of pressure — far less force than a standard handshake — can occlude the carotid arteries or jugular veins and cause unconsciousness within seconds, often without leaving visible injury.
Second-degree strangulation is a Class D violent felony under New York Penal Law § 121.12, carrying a mandatory minimum sentence and up to seven years in state prison upon conviction. The first-degree criminal contempt counts Tejeda faces are Class E felonies punishable by up to four years in prison, a charge Hoodline has also detailed in an Ossining strangulation case.
Cacace, who took office as Westchester County District Attorney in January 2025 after 19 years as a county trial judge, has pressed similar cases before. In July 2025, her office announced the indictment of another Yonkers resident, Tairon Drake, on felony contempt and strangulation charges, with Cacace warning at the time that non-fatal strangulation ranks among the highest risk factors for intimate partner homicide, according to the Westchester County District Attorney's Office. Effective October 2025, New York Chapter 466 now requires responding officers to temporarily seize any firearms found at domestic violence scenes when lethality assessments indicate elevated risk to a victim, per the New York State Association of Chiefs of Police.
