Arrest in Elderly Woman's Stabbing Death in Jersey City: Prosecutors

A man has been arrested in the death of an elderly grandmother fatally stabbed in Jersey City last month, prosecutors say.

Jeffery Harley, 50, is charged with murder in connection with the death of 81-year-old Lucila Cardenas-Viejo, who was found with multiple stab wounds on Feb. 7 in her Lexington Avenue home, said Hudson County Prosecutor Esther Suarez on Saturday.

Authorities had released surveillance video of a man knocking on her doors hours before she was found dead.

On Friday, NBC 4 New York exclusively captured police executing a search warrant at a home across from where Cardenas-Viejo lived. Earlier in the evening, neighbors said detectives arrested Harley, who lives there -- but police have not said if he is the man seen in the video.

Neighbors were skeptical.

"It's hard to believe. I can't believe that's the guy. The picture I saw in the video doesn't look like the person they arrested," said neighbor Benny Ortiz.

"I guess we see what happens when the evidence comes up, but I can't see that right now, I really can't," said Joseph Brown, another neighbor.

Harley was charged on Friday with murder and several counts of robbery, burglary and possession of a weapon. He was being held in lieu of $2 million bail.
 

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