Serial Killer: Harvey Marcelin

In 1963, Harvey Marcelin got into an argument with his girlfriend, Jacqueline Bonds, in the hallway of their Manhattan apartment. He pulled out a .32 caliber revolver and shot her. Bonds ran into the bedroom, but Marcelin shot her twice more; she staggered into the living room and died of her injuries. Marcelin was arrested shortly afterward and taken to Bellevue Hospital for a psychiatric evaluation. Examining psychiatrists found he suffered from a personality disorder with sociopathic traits but was legally sane and competent to stand trial. A jury convicted him of murder, and he was sentenced to life in prison with the possibility of parole after the jury could not agree on the death penalty. He was released on parole in 1984.

Approximately one year after his release, in 1985, Marcelin stabbed another woman he was in a relationship with, Ana-Laura Sierra, to death and dumped her body in Central Park. He pleaded guilty to first-degree manslaughter in 1986 and was sentenced to six to twelve years in prison. He was released on parole again in 2019.

Around the time of his 2019 release, Marcelin met Susan Leyden while both were staying at a homeless shelter in the Bronx. Surveillance footage later showed Leyden entering Marcelin's East New York apartment building on February 27, 2022. On March 1, Marcelin and an unidentified woman were recorded at a Home Depot in Manhattan purchasing a reciprocating saw, trash bags, and cleaning fluid. Investigators allege that Marcelin killed Leyden inside his apartment and used the saw to dismember her body.

On March 2, Marcelin was seen leaving a shopping cart at the intersection of Pennsylvania and Atlantic Avenues in East New York. Approximately six hours later, a passerby called 911 to report the cart; inside, police found Leyden's headless, limbless torso in a garbage bag. Separate surveillance footage from a nearby dollar store showed Marcelin riding a motorized scooter with what investigators identified as one of Leyden's severed legs, wrapped in plastic, on the seat.

Marcelin was arrested on March 4, 2022, and initially charged with concealment of a human corpse. A search of his apartment recovered additional remains, including Leyden's head. A grand jury indicted him on murder, evidence tampering, and concealment charges, and he was formally rearrested on the upgraded charges on March 14, 2022.