The mother of a man who cops believed tortured and killed his 21-year-old girlfriend – leaving her to die on a Bronx staircase – has been arrested after investigators determined she helped clean up the gruesome crime scene, officials said.
Naida Jorge, 54, was charged Thursday evening with murder, manslaughter, hindering prosecution, concealment of a human corpse and tampering with physical evidence over the tragic slaying of Princesa Encarnacion-Soto.
“She did attempt to clean up the crime scene,” NYPD Chief of Detectives Joseph Kenny told reporters.
Police were still looking for Robert Strother, 27, the dead woman’s boyfriend, in connection to the murder, cops said.
The victim, who was barely breathing when officers found her bruised up body Tuesday, had been tied up and subjected to sadistic torture inside a Fordham Heights apartment before being dumped on the stairs.
“There was no blood on her while she laid on the staircase, and she was in fresh clothing that had no blood on her. So [there is a] possibility that someone cleaned the body, put fresh clothes on her and threw it on her by the staircase,” Kenny said Thursday.
Cops responding to a 911 call, who discovered Encarnacion-Soto, followed a trail of blood that led into the Grand Concourse apartment where Strother is believed to have allegedly tormented the young woman.
“The wounds themselves were inflicted for pain, not to kill,” Kenny said.
Encarnacion-Soto was tied up, stabbed from head to toe, and possibly beaten with a hammer before she was dumped in the stairwell, police and law enforcement sources said.
“We believe that she was tied down to the bed based on the blood that was on the bed,” Kenny told reporters. “There were slice marks on her thighs, slice marks on her upper arms, and shoulders. The ones on her legs were fresh. The ones on her upper torso seemed like they were in the process of healing.”
Encarnacion-Soto, who later succumbed to her injuries, had returned to the Bronx earlier this month after leaving Strother and traveling to Rhode Island.
She was living with him and his mother when she returned, police said.
A photo obtained by The Post from inside the horror home showed layers of grime and debris.
Strother was spotted leaving the Bronx building on security cameras and remained on the loose Friday, sources said.
In a cruel twist, Kenny said police were called in May by Strother, who claimed that Encarnacion-Soto had been raped by a group of men on the roof of the building.
Cops determined the report was bogus — and now believe the call was an attempt to hide the abuse that Encarnacion-Soto had been suffering in the apartment.
“The mom and son fabricated the rape story because our victim here was injured to the point she needed medical attention,” Kenny said.
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