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Manchester Suspect Accused of Fatal Beating Held On $2 Million Bail

MANCHESTER — After DNA linked a local man to a gruesome killing, police say a friend of Steven Durdek Jr. filled in details that matched the crime scene, including the victim's response to finding an intruder in her home.

Durdek, 21, is accused of raping and fatally beating Sarah J. Kelloway, then torching her body. He was ordered held on bail of $2 million Tuesday after his arraignment in Mancheser Superior Court. According to an arrest warrant affidavit released Tuesday, Durdek denied ever being at Kelloway's apartment, but did not say more.

Police say they believe Durdek was roaming the area near his Chestnut Street home early on Jan. 18, trying to break into cars. The arrest warrant shows the information came from a friend whom Durdek, a convicted burglar, had met at a New Haven halfway house.

Durdek and John Paul Torres, 22, were Facebook friends, which is how police first connected the two. Torres agreed to meet police on Feb. 12. When he approached Manchester detectives, Torres was "visibly shaken and began to well up in tears," Det. Dave Miele wrote in the warrant.

[...]
Durdek had told him, Torres said, that he was out early on the morning of the killing "car shopping," which Torres explained meant breaking into cars, police said. The apartment house at 52 Park St. was a four-minute walk from Durdek's home, and he had targeted the place for a burglary, the warrant says. Using a fire escape, Durdek climbed onto a roof, where he crouched outside a third-floor window and waited for Kelloway's son to leave, according to the warrant.

When Kelloway's son left, Torres said Durdek told him he entered the apartment through a window, police said.

"Torres said Durdek started looking around and the old lady came out at him and tried to swing at him or something," the warrant says. "Torres said Durdek told him that he grabbed her up and started beating on her.

"Torres said Durdek said he couldn't stop, that he threw her on the bed and lit her on fire," the warrant says.

The details that Torres provided could only be known by the perpetrator, police said. Police say there was no sign of forced entry. Kelloway's son said he had locked the apartment door when he left, yet the door was found unlocked, with Durdek's DNA on the inside knob, police said. Durdek's DNA also was found inside Kelloway's body, police said.

Also, a broken clay statue found at the scene matched Torres' description of Kelloway, 56, swinging at Durdek when she first saw him, police said. Durdek's description of the beating meshed with a broken ashtray found at the scene and Kelloway's position when found, face up on her bed, police said. Pieces of the ashtray had hair stuck to the edges and other pieces were embedded in Kelloway's body, police said. The medical examiner found that she died of blunt force trauma to her head before she was lit on fire.

Torres said Durdek had described finding lighter fluid in the home and dousing Kelloway's body with it, then igniting the body, police said. Kelloway's son said he had left a container of lighter fluid in the apartment, and police said they found the melted container.

[...]
Facebook postings figured prominently in the investigation. Besides linking Torres and Durdek, police found images that Durdek had posted on the social media site after Jan. 18. Two photos posted on Feb. 2 showed naked women with their legs bent, police said. In one image, a bottle of whiskey, an empty glass and a lighter were positioned between the woman's legs, police said.

The posts, Miele wrote, "share a strong resemblance to the crime scene,,,"

In an interview with detectives on Feb. 4, Durdek said he had never been to Kelloway's apartment and did not know her, the warrant says.

[...]
Durdek has two violation-of-probation cases pending, connected to a burglary in Stamford and a larceny in Manchester, according to court officials. At the time of his arrest in the Kelloway case, he was a client of Manchester Alternative in the Community, a program run by Community Partners in Action — http://www.cpa-ct.org/alternative.

A judge had referred Durdek to the program on Jan. 30 on issues unrelated to Kelloway's death, agency executive Director Maureen Price-Boreland said Tuesday. Durdek attended an initial session with a program staffer and returned on Feb. 4 for an assessment of whether he was complying with conditions related to substance abuse, Price-Boreland said.
[...]
http://www.courant.com/community/ma...der-arrest-folo-0218-20140217,0,3237307.story
 
Try to lie your way out of that, you vile piece of old lady murdering shit!:laser:
For sure. He's lower than low. He had her targeted out and he was waiting for a chance. Sounds pretty damn premeditated to me.
The apartment house at 52 Park St. was a four-minute walk from Durdek's home, and he had targeted the place for a burglary, the warrant says.
 
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