What to Know
- Karina Vetrano's strangulation death shocked the city; her body was found by her father and police hours after she went missing
- Her alma mater, Archbishop Molloy High School, held a fundraiser to establish a scholarship in her name
- Chanel Lewis, 20, of East New York, is charged with murder and sexual abuse in her strangulation death
The family of a woman found dead after she vanished while jogging watched in tears as lawyers played a taped confession of the man accused of killing her.
Chanel Lewis has been charged with murder in the 2016 death of Karina Vetrano. He has pleaded not guilty, and his attorneys say his confession was wrongly obtained and should not be admissible in his upcoming trial.
The video was played in court Monday. Lewis says he grabbed the 30-year-old who ran past him in on a secluded section of a marshland park in Queens. He says he beat and strangled her, but he did not molest her.
The body had been found with her clothing in disarray leading investigators to suspect she'd also been sexually assaulted.
A judge will decide whether the footage can be used.
