NEW YORK (1010 WINS/WCBS 880) — A 74-year-old man was stabbed to death in the Harlem apartment where he lived on Friday, and police have charged his nephew, who shared the residence, in his killing, the NYPD said.
Simon Beverly, of 560 West 151st Street, near Broadway, was pronounced dead in his sixth-floor apartment after officers responded to the residence at around 6 a.m. on Friday morning. Cops found him unresponsive with a stab wound to the torso, police said.
Nehemiah Terry-Peterson, 23, was charged on Friday night with murder and criminal possession of a weapon, authorities said.
Police confirmed that Terry-Peterson is the victim's nephew, and that the two lived at the same address.
Vernon Terry, Beverly's brother-in-law and the leaseholder of the apartment, said that the 74-year-old had been squatting in the apartment for nine years without contributing to household expenses or cleaning up after himself, a report by the New York Daily News said.
"I've been trying to get him out for years," Terry told the Daily News.
Sources told the New York Post and amNY that Terry-Peterson allegedly stabbed his uncle during an argument, and a weapon was recovered at the scene.
According to a report by the Gothamist, Elizabeth Fischer, an attorney with the Neighborhood Defender Service of Harlem, is representing Terry-Peterson and claims the stabbing was an act of self-defense that can be proven with surveillance footage. Fischer called for Manhattan District Attorney Alvin Bragg to throw the case out.
"Mr. Terry-Peterson and his family have been living in terror of his great uncle, going so far as to install security cameras in Mr. Terry-Peterson's own bedroom," Fischer told the Gothamist. "The camera footage is clear — what happened here was not a crime committed by Mr. Terry-Peterson."
The Neighborhood Defender Service of Harlem did not immediately respond to 1010 WINS/WCBS 880's request for comment.
