Author to discuss memoir of sister’s prosecution for killing partner
In September 2017, a Town of Poughkeepsie woman, Nicole “Nikki” Addimando, shot and killed her partner, Christopher Grover. After Addimando told police during a traffic stop that she had killed him, authorities found the 29-year-old dead on a couch.
Addimando and Grover had met in 2008 when both were gymnastics coaches. They began living together in 2012 after Addimando became pregnant with the first of their two children. She claimed she suffered years of physical and sexual abuse.
“It was kill or be killed,” she told ABC’s 20/20 in a jailhouse interview in February 2023. Grover’s family noted he had never been charged with domestic violence, and prosecutors argued during the trial that Addimando could have left at any time or alerted authorities. She said she believed she was protecting her children by staying and that if she could make Grover happy, the abuse would stop.
In March 2019, Addimando was convicted of second-degree murder and later sentenced to 19 years in prison. But after an appeal, a state court, citing the state’s newly enacted Domestic Violence Survivors Justice Act, reduced her sentence in 2021 to 7½ years. She was released on parole on Jan. 4.
The case was one of the first to test the law, which gives judges more discretion in sentencing for crimes involving domestic violence if the abuse is determined to be a significant contributing factor to the criminal behavior.
It wasn’t until after Addimando’s arrest in 2017 that her sister, Michelle Horton, heard her sister’s descriptions of abuse. After Addimando began her sentence, Horton rearranged her life to care for her niece and nephew and began a campaign to get their mother out of prison.
At 2 p.m. on Feb. 3, at the Garrison Institute, Horton will discuss her book, Dear Sister: A Memoir of Secrets, Survival and Unbreakable Bonds, which will be published on Tuesday (Jan. 30) and is as much a memoir of a bond between sisters as an indictment of the criminal justice system. The event will be hosted by Robyn Moreno, a Cold Spring author, and co-sponsored by the Desmond-Fish Public Library and Split Rock Books.
Horton says that nothing about writing the book was easy, describing it as “akin to secondary trauma. But even in the darkest situation, there’s levity, resilience and deep hope.
“If I can move the needle showing my own experience from a different perspective, and not just telling people why this was such an injustice, I can show that our experience is not that unique,” Horton says. “What happened in the court system is indicative of most survivors who end up in the system.”
When her sister was arrested, “I was in the mom-blogging world,” Horton says. “But by the time of the sentencing, when everything went wrong, I needed to tell the story and our experiences, because my sister’s case has been so exploited. I wanted to add to the narrative out there, reclaim it for myself.”
She says her book “takes a hard look at the reality of the courts and the prisons,” and “the cost and harm that is perpetuated by the system, which is determined not to change.
(Nicole Addimando Community Defense Committee)
“I also would like people to know that grassroots advocacy is still very active and needs people to contribute, support and offer solidarity,” she adds. “Domestic violence is an epidemic. We can’t [easily] make systemic changes, but the little ways people helped me added up. We used anger and sadness to fuel and help in a positive way.”
The memoir also describes the strength of their relationship. “My sister is a powerful writer, and I could have used just the letters she sent me,” she says. “But it was important for me to start the book when the police came to my door and end with the sentencing, because it reinforces that no matter what you do, if you take a plea, it ends in prison.”
Horton says her sister contributed to the book. “She truly has been the biggest supporter. I wrote it from 2020 to 2022, and sometimes it was hard to get drafts to her, but I was able to read some things to her over the phone.”
That her sister’s release and the book’s release are happening within weeks of each other is “a very happy accident,” Horton says.
The Garrison Institute is located at 14 Mary’s Way, near the Philipstown Recreation Center. To register for the free event, visit bit.ly/horton-book-2024.
