Authorities on Friday reportedly apprehended two fugitive squatters in Pennslyvania wanted in the death of a woman found in a duffel bag in a New York City apartment.
New York City police believe Halley Tejada, 19, and Kensly Alston, 18, beat and killed Nadia Vitel, 52, when she encountered them squatting in her late mother’s 19th-floor luxury apartment on East 31st Street on March 15, the New York Post reported. U.S. Marshals in York, west of Philadelphia, located Tejada and Alston on Friday shortly after they crashed Vitel’s car, the outlet reported. The pair had also been using her credit card, according to the outlet (RELATED: TikToker Goes Viral For Telling Illegal Immigrants How To Use Squatters’ Rights To Steal Americans’ Homes)
NEW: Two squatters murder 52-year-old New York City woman and stuff her body in a duffel bag in her late-mom’s apartment.
Thanks, progressives!
Nadia Vitel was found beaten to death on East 31st Street in a 19th-floor apartment.
Vitel had just arrived at the apartment from… pic.twitter.com/DuXyXOqYdT
— Collin Rugg (@CollinRugg) March 22, 2024
After not hearing from his mother for two days, Vitel’s son searched the apartment with the building superintendent March 15, ABC 7 reported. The pair called the fire department when they found a duffel bag they believed contained a body, according to the outlet. (RELATED: Homeowner Detained For Allegedly Kicking Squatters Out Of Own Home: REPORT)
Vitel appears to have been severely beaten, suffering blunt force trauma to the head, several facial fractures, a brain bleed and two broken ribs, the New York Post reported. Vitel also appeared to have been thrown against a sheetrock wall, according to ABC 6.
NYPD Chief of Detectives Joseph Kenny announced that the case was expanded to include the suspects’ crashing Vitel’s Lexus in Lower Paxton Township, outside Harrisburg, Pennsylvania, according to NBC New York. The crash scene allowed law enforcement to gather essential leads that led to the suspects’ arrests, the outlet reported.