Grieving mother and widow share story of unexpected bond amid gruesome murder trial

Nikki Siplin's memories of her son can arise out of nowhere, pangs of a connection that is no more.

There were the hugs from Ricky; tight hugs, strong hugs, comforting hugs. There were the chats about his budding rap career. There were the daily phone calls, the "how are you doing, Mom?" check-ins that she could count on.

Lynn Mazurkiewicz thinks of her husband in the most mundane moments, during the necessary drudgery of daily life.

She's paying the bills. Tony would have done that. She's at the bank. Tony typically made that stop. Cleaning her basement recently, another of his chores, she knew what he'd say: "Well, that was a good start."

Over the past six months, Lynn Mazurkiewicz and Nikki Siplin have found themselves talking to each other about these moments and their shared grief. They have regular phone calls, ever since a killer and a trial brought them together in a friendship forged through mourning.

The trial last year of Kelvin Vickers Jr. was a crucible for both of them.

Vickers was convicted of murdering Nikki's son, Ricky Collinge, and MyJel Rand on June 20, 2022, and then murdering Lynn's husband, Rochester Police Officer Anthony Mazurkiewicz, the next night as he and partner Sino Seng conducted surveillance in an undercover van. Seng was shot and survived.

Sitting next to each other in court, Lynn and Nikki sometimes held hands or grasped onto the other during the most grueling portions of testimony.

Lynn says she saw her husband gunned down by Vickers on video 16 times.

Multiple times, Nikki listened to the medical testimony about the bodily devastation done to her son as well. He was shot so many times the medical examiner could not definitively count the wounds.

"Watching her when she was seeing what happened to her son was gut-wrenching," Lynn said.

She held onto Nikki, and handed her tissues. "... When it was my turn, she did the same thing."

Rochester murder trial leads to an unlikely friendship

It is, they acknowledge, an unlikely friendship. Had it not been for their losses, they probably would have never met. In that friendship, they have found solace, tears and even laughs.

"We talked about everything, things related to what happened, things unrelated," Nikki said in a recent exclusive D&C interview alongside Lynn.

"She knows about all of my kids" and grandchildren, Lynn said. "She knows about Ricky," Nikki said. "... We just talked a lot about us missing our loved ones."

"Unfortunately something horrific brought us together," Lynn said. "... You don't have to be similar to form a bond. You don't have to understand everybody, what they're going through. You have to just be able to jump in with each other's grief and I think that's what we did."

Fallen NY police officer: Not just about Tony

Early in Vickers' court proceedings, Lynn approached Nikki to tell her something: This trial was not solely about the murder of Anthony Mazurkiewicz.

Yes, her husband had received most of the media attention, and, yes, the throng of law enforcement and media at the trial were there because of the homicide of a cop.

Lynn emphasized that the trial was, to her, also about the loss of Richard Collinge and MyJel Rand.

"She literally just walked up to me and gave me a hug," Nikki remembered. "... It melted my heart and made me feel good."

Lynn said she had a message: "This was not just about Tony. This was about Ricky and MyJel as well. They were all three going to get justice."

MyJel Rand's family found the testimony and revelations from the trial too painful to attend on a regular basis. Lynn said her youngest son felt the same way, and also avoided the court.

Lynn and Nikki meanwhile wanted to know about the homicides, even as difficult as the knowing could be. Plus, they both wanted Vickers to know of their presence. Every time Vickers was escorted from the court, Lynn would stand, wanting him to see her.

When convicted, court security placed the same handcuffs on Vickers that Mazurkiewicz carried. County Court Judge Julie Hahn this month sentenced Vickers to multiple terms of life without parole.

There were times, Nikki said, when some of her friends and family complained that the trial's publicity focused too much on Officer Mazurkiewicz. She found herself responding with two points: First, the trial was bringing more attention to the death of her son and MyJel Rand.

Second, she said, Mazurkiewicz died while conducting surveillance, trying to find the men who'd killed Collinge and Rand.

Mazurkiewicz could have been retired or working days. But he chose to work nights so, one day a week, he could babysit his grandchildren.

Nikki and Lynn have talked about what a five-minute difference each evening could have meant in 2022. Collinge was waiting for an Uber that arrived minutes later, Nikki said. Perhaps Mazurkiewicz and Sino Seng would have been somewhere else on surveillance with a difference of minutes.

In conversations, these two women's thoughts can sometimes merge as one. As empty nesters with retirement on the horizon, Lynn believed she and her husband had fun years ahead of them.

"I'm thinking we've got the rest of our lives," she said.

"You think you have a lot of time," Nikki answered.

"And there's nothing left," said Lynn.

Nikki now has a Yorkie. That was Lynn's doing.

"I've been telling her. You've got to get a puppy. You’ve got to get a puppy,'" Lynn said. "I'm big on 'you have to have a pet.'"

Lynn's pet is a rescue cat, though it was truly her husband's pet more than hers.

"They were best friends," Lynn said. "He will still wake me up at the same time Tony would get home."

Another Rochester trial ahead for an alleged accomplice

At the trial of Kelvin Vickers, there was a time during the jury deliberations when Lynn's appreciation of the friendship grew even more.

The jury was allowed to deliver its guilty verdicts with the murders of Collinge and Rand then return to deliberations over the question of whether Vickers likely knew he was ambushing police.

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Nikki stayed for the later verdict, guilty also. She could have gone home. The verdict with her son's murder had been delivered. But she stayed.

"That was huge to me," Lynn said.

In mid-March, Nikki had to return to court for the murder trial of another man, Raheim Robinson, accused of being an accomplice with Vickers in the homicides of Collinge and Rand.

The courtroom was largely empty as opening statements began.

The 14-person jury, including two alternates, slightly outnumbered those in the court's audience.

Moments before the first opening statement, Lynn walked into the courtroom and took a familiar seat, next to Nikki. More evidence, more testimony, more difficult memories lay ahead, as did more tissues and more hand-holding. There would never be closure, but there would always be friendship.

It had helped them navigate one trial. It would do so again.

— Gary Craig is a veteran reporter with the Democrat and Chronicle, covering courts and crime and more. He is the author of two books, including "Seven Million: A Cop, a Priest, a Soldier for the IRA, and the Still-Unsolved Rochester Brink's Heist."

This article originally appeared on Rochester Democrat and Chronicle: Lynn Mazurkiewicz, Nikki Siplin form bond during Rochester murder trial