KINGSTON, Jamaica – A 42-year-old Brooklyn woman was Thursday charged with killing, dismembering and scattering the body parts of a Guyanese woman around Long Island in the United States.
Investigators believe that the victim, 27-year-old Chinelle Latoya Thompson Browne threatened to expose that the accused, Leah Cuevas, fraudulently acquired the apartment where Browne lived.
The police say that Cuevas was not the landlord for the property but had forged the deed for the property naming her owner when the real one died.
The criminal complaint alleges Cuevas decapitated Browne while she was still alive.
The victim’s dismembered torso was found in a Bay Shore parking lot on July 8 and the severed arms were found in the yards of two other homes in Hempstead a day apart, authorities said.
The severed head was found on July 17 in front of a row of bushes outside another home in Hempstead, the prosecutor said.
Police and federal authorities said DNA and tattoos matched Browne to the remains found.
Suffolk County Homicide detectives nabbed Cuevas with the help of the US Marshals’ New York/New Jersey Regional Fugitive Task Force.