Police on Tuesday arrested a man in the killing of a Brooklyn philanthropist known as the “Santa Claus” of his block last week, officials said.
Dondre Richardson, 33, who lives in a homeless shelter on Wards Island, was arrested for Antonio Litman’s grisly slaying last Monday in his Fort Greene brownstone, authorities said.
He was hit with murder and arson charges for the killing, cops said.
Litman’s lifeless body was discovered inside the lobby of the brownstone on Adelphi Street with dozens puncture wounds to his neck and chest after firefighters put out a blaze there early Monday, cops said.
The 55-year-old founder of Virginia’s House of Hope — a nonprofit that says it has distributed food, clothing and school supplies to more than 10,000 families — was apparently dead before the 3:30 a.m. fire started, law enforcement sources have said.
Richardson was being held at Woodhull hospital after being taken into custody by officers in Brooklyn’s 88th Precinct.