Hudson River Pier 84 Stabber Pleads Guilty to 2023 Murder

One of the most senseless and shocking waterfront murders of recent years reached its judicial climax without a trial.

Manhattan District Attorney Alvin Bragg recently announced the guilty plea of Luis Gil, 21, for fatally stabbing 33-year-old Hugo Morales in an unprovoked attack on Pier 84, in July 2023.

Gil pleaded guilty in New York State Supreme Court to one count of Murder in the Second Degree. Under the terms of his plea, he is expected to be sentenced on Jan. 14, 2026, to a promised sentence of 18-years-to-life in state prison.

Pier 84 is located within Hudson River Park at West 44th Street, between the Circle Line terminal to the south and the Intrepid Museum to the north.

“Today, Luis Gil is facing accountability for fatally stabbing 33-year-old Hugo Morales in an unprovoked attack on Pier 84. The defendant’s egregious actions abruptly cut Mr. Morales’s life short,” said D.A. Bragg.

“Mr. Morales immigrated to America with the hopes of earning enough money to eventually build his mother a house in Guatemala. My thoughts are with Mr. Morales’s loved ones as they continue to mourn his tragic loss.”

It was reported that Morales was living in West New York, N.J., at the time of his death.

According to court documents, statements made on the record in court, and as admitted in the defendant’s guilty plea, on July 13, 2023, at approximately 6 a.m., Gil was sitting on a patch of grass on Pier 84 with his friends when Hugo Morales went to lie down on a nearby bench.

Gil approached Morales and tried to bother him by standing over him, looking at him, putting his bookbag near Morales’s feet, and walking on the bench. Morales did not engage with him.

Gil took a large knife out of his backpack and hid it in the pocket of his shorts. A few moments later, Gil walked away, then returned and stabbed Morales once in the chest.

Gil immediately fled the scene with five friends and then jumped the turnstile into the subway station at West 42nd Street and Eighth Avenue. Surveillance images pertaining to both incidents were released by NYPD soon after the slaying.

At the time, the then-unidentified Gil was described as a “light-skinned man with a Caesar-style haircut and wearing a white shirt, light shorts, and white sneakers” carrying a cross-body bag (or man-purse) and a black backpack.

Morales was taken to Mount Sinai Morningside Hospital, where he later died from his stab wound.

Gil, meanwhile, lammed it on an Amtrak train to Chicago, where he was apprehended a few days later, on July 17, 2023.

After his arrest, NYPD Chief of Detectives James Essig said Gil told cops he’d seen his girlfriend dancing with another man on social media and vowed to stab the next guy he saw.

Interestingly, Essig also noted that Gil had been arrested just weeks earlier for robbery, allegedly stealing marijuana and cash.

Department of Correction records describe Gil as Venezuelan, 5-foot-6, 147 pounds. Since his arrest, he’s been held at Rikers Island without bail.