Woman Set On Fire And Torched To Death In NYC Elevator

Why in the world would this man light a 60-year-old woman on fire while carrying groceries on an elevator?

Police say they are questioning a man in connection to the death of a New York City woman set on fire in the elevator of her apartment building. New York Police Department spokesman Paul Browne said Sunday that the 47-year-old man went into a police precinct a couple of miles from where the attack happened in Brooklyn and said he had started a fire. Authorities say the man has made statements implicating himself and came in overnight reeking of gasoline. He hasn’t been charged.

The unidentified man was waiting for the woman, who was in her 60s, when the elevator doors opened to her floor of the Crown Heights building. The man sprayed her with an accelerant and set her on fire, New York City police spokesman Paul Browne said. “It was apparent he knew she was on the elevator,” he said. The brutal attack lasted about a minute and was recorded by two video cameras, including one inside the small elevator. The assailant began to enter the elevator and sprayed the woman as the doors opened to the fifth floor where she lived, Browne said.

The woman, who had grocery bags in her arms, turned about 180 degrees and then crouched in an attempted to protect herself, he said. But the man sprayed her directly in the face and continued to spray her “sort of methodically” over her head and parts of her body as the bags draped off her arms. She turned around and retreated to the back of the elevator.

At some point, Browne said, the suspect then pulled out a barbeque-style lighter, used it to ignite a rag in a bottle and then waited for a few seconds – before using the flames to set her afire, causing the elevator to fill with smoke. The man backed out as the woman fell to the floor of the elevator, Browne said, and seemed to pause before tossing the bottle inside the elevator onto the woman. Browne would not comment on the motive in the killing, but said the suspect knew his victim.

So sad. R.I.P. to the woman in the elevator