Brooklyn Man Sought In Hotel Deaths Charged With Murder

NEW YORK (CBSNewYork) -- A 36-year-old Brooklyn man has been charged with murder, following the deaths of two women at local hotels.

As CBS2's Jessica Schneider reported, Joseph Danclair was finally nabbed by police Friday after a manhunt. His foot was in a cast for a fracture he allegedly suffered while trying to get away from investigators hot on his trail.

Police believe the tattooed suspect killed two women this past summer – one at the Manhattan Broadway Hotel on West 38th Street last Tuesday, the other at a Brooklyn hotel in July. He has also been linked to two violent sexual assaults, authorities said.

"There's a certain pattern with the way that he went about doing these crimes, and it was consistent through all four," said NYPD Chief of Manhattan Detectives William Aubry, "and I'm just glad that we got him off the street and that we prevented possibly another rape victim or another homicide."

Antoinette Marin, 43, was found dead in the Manhattan Broadway Hotel on Tuesday. Chrissy Bevelaqua, 35, of Staten Island, was discovered inside a room at the Bushwick Hotel in Brooklyn, police said.

Both women appeared to have been strangled, according to police sources.

"I'm happy my sister and this other woman got justice," Belevaqua's sister, Joely Bevelaqua, told CBS2. "I hope he stays behind bars because she was a mother of four."

Police said Danclair befriended both women before killing them.

"These women were good women," Aubry said. "There was no prostitution involved. There was no other type of intent."

Danclair has 28 prior arrests for drugs, robbery and kidnapping, and police said he will be charged in the rapes of two women. One that happened in 2010, the other just a few weeks ago, police said.

Both sexual assault victims identified Danclair by his tattoos, police said

"If you look at the two sex crimes, and particularly one of the women, she's real lucky to be alive," Aubry said.

Danclair as of Friday night had only been officially charged with Marin's murder, but he was expected to be charged with Bevelaqua's slaying and the sexual assaults in the days to come.