ALBANY — Told that she brutally took her son’s life, Tracey Zetzsche accepted her sentencing on Nov. 1 as she recalled not how he died, but how much she loves him.
Zetzsche, 53, was sentenced to 20 years in prison for first-degree manslaughter based on extreme emotional disturbance, reduced from second-degree murder after both parties in the case determined she had legitimate amnesia, unable to remember any of the facts surrounding the killing of 22-year-old Gabriel Philby-Zetzsche by knives to his heart and a hammer to his skull. From July 26 to 30 during the summer of 2012, his body remained on the floor of their Westerlo apartment.
Judge Stephen Herrick described the “horrific nature” of the injuries to Philby-Zetzsche and said that evidence showed his mother tried to remove signs of his murder.
