A man has been arrested after authorities found the charred body of a woman in a house fire on Long Island Monday.
Forty-nine-year-old Loventino Cassadean of Freeport was arrested and charged with second-degree murder. He's expected to be arraigned in First District Court in Hempstead Tuesday.
Cassadean was taken into custody after he flagged down a police officer responding to the house fire early Monday. Police charged him after questioning.
It wasn't clear if Cassadean has an attorney.
Fire responders arrived to the home at 117 Craig Avenue at around 6 a.m. They found the woman near the front area of the house after the blaze was extinguished.
The body was so severely charred police have not been able to confirm the identity. Police brought in a K-9 dog trained to sniff out accelerants.
A friend at the scene said she was counseling a 21-year-old woman who lived at the home. The young woman was married to a man twice her age, and the two had a rocky relationship, according to Elaine McArthur.
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"From the conversations we had, he did threaten her once or twice," said McArthur.
Witnesses said a family with two children live in the house, but neighbors believe the children were staying with their grandmother in Guyana.
"It's horrible, it's terrible," said one witness, who did not know the family. "This is really a big surprise to the neighborhood and it's really a true tragedy."
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