Haitian migrant fatally stabs his 2 roommates inside NY apartment before deportation hearing: report
A Haitian migrant allegedly murdered his two roommates in an apartment complex in the Hudson Valley as he was awaiting a federal deportation hearing.
Kenol Baptiste, 30, is accused of stabbing the two men in and around an apartment complex he was staying at in Middletown, NY, on Monday.
Police arrived at the Ruth Court apartments after receiving a call about a stabbing.
Officers discovered one man dead inside a unit while a second man was discovered lying outside on a sidewalk suffering from serious injuries, according to the Times-Herald Record.
The second victim was transported to the nearby Garnet Health Medical Center, where he later succumbed to his injuries during surgery.
A police K-9 team captured Baptiste in a wooded area near the apartment shortly after the stabbings.
Baptiste has been charged with second-degree murder and first-degree manslaughter, both felonies, and also handed a misdemeanor criminal possession of a weapon charge.
No motive behind the killings was immediately released.
The alleged killer and his two victims, who were also from Haiti and spoke Creole, were reportedly acquaintances and had been living together in the apartment for less than a year.
“In follow-up with members of the community, we are learning that this group of individuals moved in there about a year ago,” Middletown Police Chief John Ewanciw told Mid Hudson News.
The victims’ names weren’t being released pending family notification.
Local officials are asking how Baptiste got into the country in the first place.
Ewanciw said Baptiste entered the US about eight months ago and police are “still trying to track back how, where, when.”
Orange County Executive Steven Neuhaus said Baptiste was awaiting federal immigration proceedings at the time of the stabbings.
Neuhaus also blamed the Biden administration for the brutal deaths.
“This is a failure on all levels of the federal government,” Neuhaus told News12 Hudson Valley. “It was one of the most brutal murders that some law enforcement is reporting to us that they’ve seen.”
Baptiste is being held in Orange County Jail and is scheduled to appear in court on Friday.
Last spring, Neuhaus filed several lawsuits against NYC Mayor Eric Adams after several buses of migrants were transported from the city up to hotels in Orange County.
The county exec claimed Adams had sent 82 migrants — all single men — to nearby Newburgh hotels in May 2023 to alleviate the stress of the migrant crisis in the city.
As the men were moved up from Manhattan, the hotels, Crossroads Hotel and Ramada by Wyndham, reportedly kicked out US veterans who had been living there.
The Hudson Valley area had also received migrants from secret midnight flights to Stewart International Airport in New Windsor after the Biden administration previously sent them to Westchester County Airport, The Post reported.
