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Sniper ‘Toyed’ With Cops

By Ikimulisa Livingston

October 6, 2006 — The man accused of going on a deadly shooting spree in Queens this summer taunted cops from his hospital bed shortly after his arrest, saying, “What’s that, a Smith & Wesson? That’s nothing. Those are toys. I have something better.”

Matthew Colletta, 34, made several wild statements after the Aug. 25 shooting rampage, which killed 51-year-old Todd Upton and injured numerous others.

During his arraignment in Queens Supreme Court yesterday, the unemployed Woodhaven man stood silently.

But he was nothing if not chatty with cops at his bedside in Bellevue Hospital last August, said prosecutor Charissa Ilardi.

“Listen, bro. How much time am I looking at?” he asked one cop. “Can you help me out?”

Colletta, who claimed after the violence that “they were coming after me in red cars,” was suffering from a “psychotic episode,” his lawyer, Todd Greenberg, told reporters yesterday.