A New York City nightclub bouncer went on trial today, charged with raping and strangling grad student Imette St. Guillen after a night of drinking at a SoHo bar where he worked.
The 44-year-old bouncer has pleaded not guilty and says he had nothing to do with her death in 2006.
Prosecutor Kenneth Taub told jurors in a Brooklyn courtroom that Littlejohn is linked to the 24-year-old John Jay student’s death by DNA and other evidence.
St. Guillen, 24, was last seen alive on Feb. 25, 2006, walking out of The Falls bar in SoHo at closing time with Littlejohn. The next day, her body was found wrapped in a bed cover and dumped near the Belt Parkway in a desolate area of East New York.
Autopsy results revealed she had been raped, strangled and smothered. Her hands and legs were bound and a sock was stuffed in her mouth.
Littlejohn's DNA was on the tie binding St. Guillen's wrist, and DNA from his mother and brother were on the cover, as were fibers matching coats and a carpet in the Littlejohn property, prosecutors said.
Investigators also traced Littlejohn’s cell phone to the East New York location where St. Guillen’s body was discovered, prosecutors said.
Defense lawyers argued that the cops framed Littlejohn, possibly to protect the bar’s well-connected owner Danny Dorrian.
The trial is expected to last 3 to 4 weeks.
Littlejohn is already serving a 25-year prison sentence for kidnapping and trying to rape a Queens woman in 2005, an attack that prosecutors called a precursor to the St. Guillen slaying.
