The ex-hooker who allegedly hired a hitman to kill his Chelsea art-dealer hubby coolly sat in Manhattan federal court Tuesday as prosecutors showed jurors grisly photos of the victim’s bloodied corpse.
Daniel Carrera Sikkema, wearing a gray blazer over a white shirt, showed no emotion during opening statements at the kick-off of his trial — even as prosecutors displayed images of the body of his much older estranged husband, Brent Sikkema, who was riddled with stab wounds from the January 2024 killing inside his home in Rio de Janeiro.
Federal prosecutors alleged that Sikkema, in his mid-50s, hired Cuban national Alejandro Triana Prevez to sneak into his 77-year-old spouse’s Brazilian apartment and fatally stab the prominent dealer while the couple was locked in a bitter divorce and custody fight over their young son.
“In the year 2024, Brent Sikkema was brutally murdered,” Assistant US Attorney Nicholas Pavlis told jurors. “A hitman snuck into his home in Brazil, took a knife and stabbed Brent over and over again.”
The killer “immediately made a phone call,” Pavlis said. “Who did he call? He called that man, Daniel Sikkema, that man who hired and paid him to kill Brent.”
Pavlis said the defendant “orchestrated his husband’s murder from a continent away,” believing he would receive more money as a widower than through the couple’s split.
“He didn’t want a divorce. He wanted Brent dead,” the prosecutor said.
Sikkema allegedly funneled thousands of dollars to Prevez and people close to him through a web of intermediaries that included a housekeeper, her daughter, a handyman and even the suspect’s romantic partner.
“The defendant paid the hitman every step of the way, making payment after payment after payment,” Pavlis said.
Authorities said Prevez was arrested by Brazilian police just days after the slaying and later confessed to stabbing Brent Sikkema 18 times in the face, chest and throat.
At Tuesday’s trial, prosecutors quoted a series of voice notes they said Sikkema sent to friends and relatives during the couple’s divorce.
“It won’t be over until this man passes away,” Sikkema said in one of the recordings, according to Pavlis.
The suspect said in another, “I’m still fighting with this old bastard who won’t die,” the prosecutor said.
Sikkema’s lawyer, Florian Miedel, acknowledged there was “no dispute” that Prevez stabbed Brent Sikkema 18 times inside the Rio home — but insisted prosecutors had no direct proof linking his client to the murder.
“Daniel did not hire Alejandro to kill Brent,” Miedel told jurors.
“No one is going to come into this courtroom and say Daniel did it. No one is going to come into this courtroom and say, ‘I have personal knowledge that Daniel hired Alejandro to do it.’ ”
The trial’s first witness, family friend Angela Liriano, testified that Daniel Sikkema complained repeatedly about money during the divorce.
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“He was saying that he felt he wasn’t getting enough money,” Liriano testified. “ ‘Six million is not enough — I want $8 million.’ ”
She also recalled a chilling phone conversation she had with Sikkema while at work.
“I told him, ‘Brent was just here. He told me he was going to Brazil.’ [Sikkema] said he wished [Brent] will die.
