New Year, new Mary Jo! How Joey Buttafuoco's ex has changed her name and her life as documentary about her near-fatal shooting at the hands of 'Long Island Lolita' Amy Fisher is set to air | Retrui News | Retrui
New Year, new Mary Jo! How Joey Buttafuoco's ex has changed her name and her life as documentary about her near-fatal shooting at the hands of 'Long Island Lolita' Amy Fisher is set to air
SOURCE:Daily Mail
Thirty years after surviving a near-fatal shooting by her husband's teenage mistress, Mary Jo Connery reflects on survival, sobriety and her new Lifetime movie.
More than thirty years after being shot in the face by her husband's teenage mistress, Mary Jo Buttafuoco has transformed unimaginable trauma into a highly anticipated Lifetime movie – and a renewed commitment to living life on her own terms.
Speaking exclusively to the Daily Mail, the bubbly 70-year-old, who now goes by her maiden name Connery, reflected on her life today, saying: 'My full-time job these days is keeping my body going and in good shape!'
Mary Jo was thrust into the national spotlight on May 19, 1992, when her husband Joey Buttafuoco's 17-year-old mistress, Amy Fisher, attempted to kill her on the front porch of their home in Massapequa, New York.
Using a .25-caliber semi-automatic pistol, Fisher – who soon picked up the nickname 'Long Island Lolita' – shot the then-37-year-old mother of two in the face, lodging a bullet at the base of her brain near her spinal column.
Doctors later said she was lucky to survive.
Now living a quiet life in Los Angeles, Mary Jo's story continues to captivate true-crime fans, many of whom will tune in for the movie, I Am Mary Jo Buttafuoco, that premieres on January 17.
She is also a New York Times bestselling author, publishing Getting It Through My Thick Skull: Why I Stayed, What I Learned, and What Millions of People Involved With Sociopaths Need To Know in 2009.
Despite undergoing multiple surgeries to save her life, Mary Jo still lives with lasting effects from the shooting, including facial paralysis and deafness in her right ear. But she refuses to let those limitations define her.
Mary Jo, who dropped the Buttafuoco name and returned to her maiden name, Connery, told the Daily Mail how her life has changed since being shot by her husband's teenage mistress, ahead of her upcoming Lifetime documentary
Mary Jo's husband, Joey, was carrying on an affair with Amy Fisher, who was just 16 years old when it started. They had two children, Paul and Jessica
Amy Fisher was 17 when she used a .25-caliber semi-automatic pistol to shoot Mary Jo. Her attorne Eric Naiburg escorted her into court in July 1992
Her upcoming documentary I Am Mary Jo Buttafuoco is set to premiere on January 17
She admitted working out can be a challenge. 'I have a lot of vascular issues as a result of the shooting. I had one carotid artery severed. So here I am living off the other one, and that's okay but now that I'm older it's taking a toll on me.'
'I move. I can't do the weight machines it's too much. I stretch, I use five-pound dumb bells, bands, I have problems with my shoulders, and my hips, so I work around that.
'What I can do is the treadmill and walk, and I do that for thirty minutes. I try to do an hour of exercise total.'
Music, she said, keeps her motivated.
'I put on my headphones and listen to my favorite music, you know, my era, anything from the 1960's, 70's, 80's, disco, dance music, anything that inspires me to move my body. The music from my era.'
And on the dawn of the New Year, Mary Jo said she has one resolution for 2026.
'I'm going to be more spontaneous. Try new things, different things. I was like that when I was young, but I've gotten pretty comfortable.
Amy ended up serving seven years in prison for assault with a deadly weapon
Due to her extensive injuries from the shooting and multiple surgeries, Mary Jo said working out can be a challenge, but that she's committed to staying active
The Buttafuocco case became a national obsession in the early 1990s leading to Mary Jo giving a press conference at her home.
'I don't do things I don't want to, but I used to do a whole lotta things I didn't want to. I need a balance now. Take a chance, have fun.'
Her journey to healing has not been easy. In the years following the shooting, Mary Jo struggled with addiction to prescription drugs, including Percocet and Xanax, which were prescribed after the near-fatal attack.
She and her now-adult children – Paul, 46, and Jessica, 42 – have used 2026 to reflect on how far they've come as a family.
Back in 2022, Mary Jo told the Daily Mail that the emotional fallout from her auto bodyshop-owner husband's betrayal and the intense public scrutiny forced her to leave the East Coast altogether.
'These days when I'm recognized it's a positive thing. But back then it was me at the grocery store being stared at, yelled at, ''What's wrong with you? Why are ya staying with that idiot?'' and worse.
'I'm a housewife, not a movie star, I wasn't used to it. I had two young children still in school, I had to think about them.'
The family relocated to Agoura Hills, California, in 1996.
'Moving here was not because I wanted to. I left my family, my friends, my support group, my doctors. Life had become impossible. My husband was a lunatic and had lost his job. I was out of it.
The family's home in Massapequa, New York where their lives were turned upside down in 1992 - they relocated four years later to the West Coast, moving close to 20 times
Mary Jo now lives with her daughter Jessica, 42, and says that instead of reliving the horrific day she nearly died, the family has renamed May 19 'Survivor's Day,' marking it with a celebratory dinner
Mary Jo stuck by Joey's side through it all before calling it quits in 2003
'I was on Percocet and Xanax on a daily basis since '92, and I wasn't in my right mind. I couldn't have found Agoura Hills on a map. What brought us out here in 1996 was the school system.'
She estimates she has moved nearly 20 times since then, living throughout Southern California and beyond, including Las Vegas.
'I've lived all over the valley in a big circle, West Hills, Woodland Hills, Oak Park, I've lived in downtown Newport/Laguna beach area, and in Las Vegas.
'I just sort of trudged along, sick, defeated. I just thought no one will recognize me here and that's what I wanted. Back then I didn't have my own voice like I do now.'
It wasn't until 2003 that she finally divorced Joey Buttafuoco, her high school sweetheart, after they had moved together to California.
Now sober for more than two decades, Mary Jo lives just minutes from her son and shares a home with her daughter.
As the anniversary of her attempted murder approaches each year, the family has found a way to reclaim the date.
'It used to be we would all dread that anniversary rolling around on May 19. It was also like four days after my birthday on the 15th. It was something dark and that would hang heavy,' Mary Jo said.
'Then one day I had just had it. I told my kids, 'Hey, I'm here, I'm alive. I made it. We should celebrate that day.'
They renamed that once dreaded day of May 19 'Survivor Day.'
'So now we go out to dinner, just the three of us, to Morton's or Ruth Chris, somewhere nice and we celebrate the fact that I lived.'
Joey, now 69, served six months prison time for the statutory rape of Fisher. He remarried in 2005.
Fisher, now 51, was originally charged with the attempted murder of Mary Jo, but it was bargained down to assault with a deadly weapon. She served seven years in prison before being paroled in 1999. She later worked as a porn actress and stripper for a while.