Ex-police officer Michael Valva sentenced to 25 years imprisonment after his autistic 8-year-old froze to death in his garage

A former NYPD officer whose 8-year-old autistic son froze to death in a Long Island garage was sentenced to 25 years to life on Thursday, December 8, a month after a jury found him guilty of murder and child endangerment.

The former police officer Michael Valva will get a bed, pillow and heat while he is behind bars, which is more than his son Tommy had in January 2020 during a cold night in his garage when Valva and his girlfriend forced the boy to sleep in an unheated garage and then hosed the child down with freezing water taking the little boy’s body temperature below 76 degrees.

Prosecutors said home video surveillance showed Thomas and his older brother Anthony shivering inside the bitterly cold garage two nights before the younger boy’s death, when the temperature dropped to a bone-chilling 19 degrees.

Valva was also convicted of child endangerment as a result of abuse suffered by Thomas’ autistic brother, Anthony.

A tearful Valva read a statement to Judge William Condon before being sentenced.

“How did all of us as a community allow this to happen?” The judge, who was emotional asked out loud to the Riverhead courtroom.

“I don’t think you intended to kill Thomas, not at all,” he said to Valva, who was still crying.