Authorities have arrested a Bronx man in connection with the death of a burnt body missing hands and teeth, found in a shopping cart under the Yonkers Bridge last month.
The New York Police Department announced an arrest Friday in the death of a body found under the Oak Street Bridge near the Yonkers-Mount Vernon border on Aug. 5. Firefighters had responded to a report of a fire under the bridge, but discovered the body soon after putting out the blaze.
An investigation revealed that the victim may have been murdered in a Bronx home, where additional dismembered body parts linked to the crime were discovered.
Yonkers police said their investigation determined the body was burned in their jurisdiction but the murder happened somewhere else, and they have turned the case over to the NYPD.
According to law enforcement sources, officers executing a search warrant at a home in Rogers Place in the Bronx in connection with the case found human bones in the kitchen, a human hand in a pot and a human foot in the freezer, as well as firearms and drug paraphernalia in a bedroom.
“Whoever did this wanted to do everything in their power to prevent the victim from being identified,” former New York Police Chief Terry Monahan said. “When you remove teeth and limbs from people, it’s to prevent identification. If you take the hands away, you can’t get fingerprints. If you take the teeth away, you can’t identify them through dental records.”
It’s not clear exactly why investigators went to that particular location.
A senior NYPD official previously told NBC New York that police have video of a man rolling a shopping cart onto a Metro-North train at the Bronx’s 44th Precinct, and that the cart appears to be the same one later found on fire.
Muhammad Aadil, 40, was arrested on suspicion of murder, manslaughter and concealment of a body. His lawyer details are not available at this time.
