Joshua Wilck, New Hyde Park man charged with stabbing parents in 2024, arrested in courthouse after hugging his mother, violating judge's stay-away order

A New Hyde Park man charged with stabbing both his parents in their beds in 2024 was arrested in the Nassau County Courthouse on Tuesday afternoon after he hugged his mother in violation of a judge’s stay-away order.

Joshua Wilck, 26, appeared in court for a full day of evidentiary hearings on charges that he tried to kill his 62-year-old father and 66-year-old mother, Eric and Lubov Wilck, shortly after 11 p.m. as they slept in their Cherrywood Lane home on Feb. 24, 2024.

Their son, who occasionally stayed in the home, attacked his parents with a large kitchen knife, stabbing his father in the neck, face, shoulder and hand, then turning on his mother and stabbing her three times, lacerating her liver, according to prosecutors.

After Nassau County police arrived at the home, they saw Joshua Wilck with his arms around his father’s neck trying to choke him, records show.

Defense attorneys Bruce Barket and Nicole Aloise filed a motion to dismiss the charges on procedural grounds or, at least, suppress statements their client made to investigators implicating him in the crime.

State Supreme Court Justice Tammy Robbins held a hearing Tuesday to hear testimony from responding officers in the case.

Police body camera video had shown Joshua Wilck emerge from the family home covered in blood and asking police to kill him. As first responders attended to his wounded and bleeding father, the son could be seen in the video lying on the ground handcuffed, and heard cursing his father.

In the courtroom Tuesday, his mother sat in the audience as police officers testified.

At the lunch break, Joshua Wilck, who is out on bail posted by his parents, hugged his mother in the court atrium before she left for the day.

“I hope he’s let free,” Lubov Wilck told Newsday.

Nassau County police and the prosecutor on the case also witnessed the embrace, which they said was a violation of District Judge Madeleine Petrara-Perrin’s order that he not go within 100 yards of his parents.

Around 2 p.m. Tuesday, as the hearing resumed, the district attorney's office directed that Wilck be arrested again for hugging his mother and violating the order.

“This defendant is charged with committing a brutal and vicious attack on his parents, stabbing them multiple times with a large kitchen knife in an attempt to kill them both," District Attorney Anne Donnelly said in a statement to Newsday. "Protecting victims is paramount to this office and to every Assistant District Attorney working in the interest of justice. The importance of these court orders in ensuring the safety of victims cannot be overstated. These orders must be followed and enforced, and any violation that threatens to compromise the safety of victims will be prosecuted.”

Wilck was also in violation of a previous court stay-away order on the night of the stabbing, according to court papers.

After the attack, prosecutors charged him again with contempt and witness tampering after they said phone records show he called his mother 73 times between Feb. 26, 2024 and March 6, 2024.

“The idea that he should be arrested for that because the DA’s office has lost all sense of decorum and discretion is insane,” Barket told Newsday. “If ever a police officer or DA should be sued for stupidity, this would be it. It is insane. Who are they protecting?”

Barket said the mother had sat in the audience during the hearing for two hours and then walked out of the courtroom with her son during the lunch break.

“She kind of leans toward him and he asks, ‘Can I give her a hug?’ and I said 'yeah.' So, he hugged her and she left,” Barket said.

The hearing was adjourned until Wednesday at 2 p.m.

Afterward, Lubov Wilck told Newsday in a phone interview that she was outraged by the arrest.

“It’s the most ridiculous I’ve ever heard about. I was just hugging my son,” she said, adding she had embraced him while he was in jail.

“This is my son, I love my son, He was not attacking me, he was hugging me. The DA is obsessed with this. I don’t think they care about the victim at all,” she said. She said she was worried that the arrest would mean her son would be unable to continue his mental health and drug treatment program.

"He’s been doing quite well with the counseling and so forth. Him getting out [of jail] has been beneficial for everyone,” she said.