Suspect In NYC Gruesome Double-Homicide taken into custody after a brief scuffle when cops showed up at his girlfriend’s Bronx home.
Suspect In NYC Gruesome Double-Homicide scuffled With Cops Showed Up At His Girlfriend’s Bronx Home (PHOTO: BBC)
Suspect In NYC Gruesome Double-Homicide
Accused killer Jahmel Sanders, 30 years old was knocked on the door said NYPD Chief of Detectives James Essig, Wednesday. Sanders faced an array of charges from killing to kidnapping and arson in the May 16, 2022 executions of Nikki Huang and her friend Jesse Parrilla. The two victims were gunned in the head, with their charred corpses found inside a burned-out car in the Bronx.
He was arrested Tuesday, ending a 10-month manhunt, and authorities are still looking for fellow suspect Steven Santiago, 34. Both were associates of the “Down the Hill” gang on the Lower East Side, and Essig said the fugitive Santiago had ties to New Jersey. Police previously sought the suspect in New Jersey and Queens, according to the chief. His girlfriend was not charged with any crimes, he added.
Sanders had been staying at an assisted care facility for mentally ill and formerly homeless people, where he bragged about having killed someone after moving in about two years back, according to a neighbor. During a brief Wednesday court appearance in the Bronx, Sanders winked as he left a three-minute hearing attended by the victims’ family members. He was due back in court for arraignment on Thursday.
The Killer Said Nothing
The alleged killer said nothing on Tuesday as he was walked in handcuffs from the 45th Precinct stationhouse in the Bronx, and he made no comments when taken into custody, according to Essig. A fast-escalating conflict between the gang and its rival “Up The Hill” crew wound up with three people dead and three more injured across eight hours of violence on the Lower East Side, Queens, and the Bronx.
The lethal circumstances were set in action when Huang, 23, was robbed on the road of her expensive Louis Vuitton handbag, with the victim getting out to the “Up The Hill” friends to start the wheels in movement. The 22-year-old Parrilla, a skilled basketball player, was killed only because of his ties to Huang, authorities said.
According to Essig, the suspects carried the two victims to the Bronx, where they were shot before the car was set burning. He added that an additional two vehicles were set flaming during the violent night, one in the Bronx and the other in Manhattan, as the suspects used additional cars to move around.
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