NORTH BRADDOCK, Pa. — A man is charged with criminal homicide after a woman was stabbed to death at a North Braddock senior apartment community.
Allegheny County police say they were called to Shady Park Place on Lobinger Avenue at 10 a.m. on Saturday.
Police found a woman dead from multiple stab wounds when they arrived.
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Victor Ramon Estrella Cordero, 28, of Braddock, was charged in connection with her death on Sunday.
Family members tell Channel 11 the victim was 65-year-old Faith Henley, a mother of 10 children.
“She just had a heart of gold,” her sister Camillia Henley said. “For somebody to do that to her, that’s crazy. It’s sickening.”
Cordero is being held at the Allegheny County Jail.
Shady Park Place shared a statement on the situation, saying: “Currently, our priority is the well-being and support of our residents and staff. We recognize that following an experience such as this, it is natural for individuals to have questions, emotions, or a need to speak with someone. Professionals have been on-site to provide counseling services and mental health referrals to residents. Our prayers are with the family during this difficult time.”
According to a criminal complaint, Henley was found with stab wounds to the back of her head, back of her neck and a cut on her forehead. She also had leashes tied to her wrists and ankles. Officers said she had broken gold-plated metal in various places around her and on her.
Her apartment unit was set at 44 degrees and the room temperature was at 68 degrees when police arrived. An officer noted that a candle burning in the room contained liquid and solid wax, indicating it had not been burning for long.
An empty bottle of rubbing alcohol, Comet cleanser and a black handle steak knife were all found in the living room, along with her body.
Officers said they found a blanket rolled into a ball in a bedroom closet. When they unrolled the blanket, a gray Nike zip-up hoodie with blood stains on both sleeves and on the torso was found inside.
Police noted that Estrella Cordero was the 911 caller. They said he reported the incident as an overdose or medical emergency in the initial call. Police said it took him a minute to answer the door after they knocked eight times. He originally told police his name was “Matis Hernandez,” but said he later provided them with documentation from the Dominican Republic that identified him under the name Victor Ramon Estrella Cordero. Immigration and Customs Enforcement confirmed this identification.
Estrella Cordero told police he came to the apartment unit, which has only one entrance and exit, between 9 a.m. and 9:30 a.m. to collect $400, he said Henley owed him, police say. He said he found Henley lying on the ground and saw blood upon his arrival, so he called 911.
Police reviewed surveillance video that shows Henley coming and going multiple times throughout the night, multiple times through the night of Oct. 10 and the early morning of Oct. 11.
Henley is seen leaving the apartment at 7:02 p.m. on Oct. 10. While she is gone, footage shows an unanswered knock at her door at 8:17 p.m. At 8:19 p.m., a person with a hood up opens the apartment door and looks out into the hallway. Henley comes back to the apartment with a man and enters it at 8:26 p.m.
Police said multiple people were seen on camera coming and going from the apartment, all of whom they were able to account for, except for the person who was seen opening the door in a hoodie at 8:19 p.m. on Friday.
Henley is last seen alive returning to the apartment at 5:41 a.m. on Saturday. At that time, police say the man in the hoodie had still not left the apartment, surveillance cameras show.
A different man comes to the door on Oct. 11 at 6:34 a.m., 6:56 a.m. and 7:43 a.m. All of his knocks go unanswered.
Another man is seen coming to the door at 9:24 a.m. His knocks go unanswered. At 9:36 a.m., a man with a dog comes to the door. His knocks, also, go unanswered.
Police say Estrella Cordero called 911 at 9:58 a.m.
To account for the man in the hoodie, officers began reviewing more surveillance video from Oct. 9 and Oct. 10.
This video shows a man entering the unit at 8:15 p.m. on Oct. 9 wearing a red Philadelphia Phillies hat with a white emblem, a black mask, a black t-shirt, black Ecko sweatpants and red Nike shoes with a white sole. He is carrying a black garbage bag.
Surveillance video from Oct. 10 shows a man wearing similar red Nike shoes and a Nike hoodie who matches the appearance of the man in the Phillies hat leaving the apartment.
Police say that the same man was spotted again wearing a combination of clothing, but now with different sweatpants, entering the apartment again on Oct. 10 at 5:49 p.m. and was never seen leaving it again.
Officers noted that when Victor Ramon Estrella Cordero arrived at police headquarters to be interviewed on Oct. 11, he was wearing the same Philadelphia Phillies hat and black Ecko sweatpants seen in the surveillance video.
Upon their review, police said they filed the criminal homicide charge against Estrella Cordero because the video did not support his claim that he arrived at the apartment between 9 a.m. and 9:30 a.m. on Oct 11, but instead appears to show that he was the only person in the apartment when Henley was last seen alive. He was also seen wearing a hoodie that matched what was found hidden in the closet and bloodied on the day of the murder.
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