As NYPD detectives sought the black-clad monster who beheaded and dismembered 33-year-old tech entrepreneur Fahim Saleh in his $2.2 million Manhattan apartment, his family issued a plea for justice.
‘No words or actions to provide any of us comfort except the capture of the person who exhibited nothing short of evil upon our loved one,’ the family statement said.
‘We need and urge the NYPD and other members of law enforcement to work diligently to get to the bottom of this horrific crime and bring justice for Fahim.’
The family described the brutality of the killing as beyond comprehension.
‘The headlines talk about a crime we still cannot fathom,’ the statement said, going on to say that the loss was more enormous than anyone but those who really knew Saleh could understand.
‘Fahim is more than what you are reading. He is so much more. His brilliant and innovative mind took everyone who was a part of his world on a journey and he made sure never to leave anyone behind.’
Saleh was the chief executive and co-founder of Gokada, a motorcycle ride-sharing service that operated in Nigeria—one of his latest ventures in an entrepreneurial career that began when he was in his teens.
His body was discovered on Tuesday afternoon in a Lower East Side luxury condo complex. His head and limbs had been removed, and the parts were in contractor bags; an electric saw was nearby.
Detectives who reviewed building security footage saw that a day earlier, at 1:40 p.m., Saleh had been followed into the elevator by a man all in black, including a mask and hood.
Saleh used a key fob needed to bring the elevator up to his apartment, which occupied the entire seventh floor. He appeared to grow uneasy when the person in black fumbled in the absence of ordinary elevator buttons. The two appear to exchange words but the camera in the elevator has no audio and detectives were not immediately able to discern what might have been said.
By that point, the elevator doors had closed, and the elevator was on its way up to the apartment, where Saleh would be trapped. When the doors opened, Saleh stepped off and turned right. The suspect came up right behind him and raised his hand, and Saleh crumpled to the floor. Detectives theorized he may have been incapacitated with a Taser.
The elevator doors closed, so what happened next was not captured on video. But an autopsy determined that Saleh was repeatedly and fatally stabbed in the torso before he was butchered.
The killer seems to have waited overnight, allowing Saleh’s blood to coagulate, before setting to work with an electric saw. Despite its gruesomeness, ‘it was not a messy crime scene,’ a detective noted.
Investigators believe the killer was interrupted—possibly by a relative concerned they had not heard from Saleh—in the midst of a plan to carry the body away and leave no trace of the killing.
‘Like it never happened,’ a detective said.
The detectives suspect that the killing may have been the result of a financial dispute with someone who either hired an assassin or did the murder themselves.
It’s not clear if there is an international component to the crime. A senior police source in the Lagos State Police Command told The Daily Beast that Nigerian authorities are not investigating but are ready to help if there are leads that point to their country. ❑
