Neighbors and a family friend of the Sunset Park woman who was beaten to death with a hammer say she regularly fought with her accused killer, who rented a room in her home.
The carnage unfolded around 2 p.m. on Wednesday, when police were called to a building on 52nd Street and Fifth Avenue. They arrived to find a 5-year-old boy and a 3-year-old girl with severe head trauma. Their mother, identified by police as Zhao Zhao, 43, also had severe head trauma and was pronounced dead at the scene.
Cops said they took 47-year-old Liyong Ye into custody down the block after he had tried to flee the building. Police recovered a bloody hammer at the scene.
Ray Huang, a friend of Zhao’s family, confirmed that Ye and Zhao frequently bickered over everything from differing sleep schedules to use of WiFi.
“They’re living together with different schedules,” Huang said. “It’s a problem. They should understand each other, but they don’t … Every day they have a little problem, and put together they have a big problem.”
Jason Zheng, 16, who lives on the same floor as Zhao and knew the family, said he often heard raised voices coming from the apartment where Ye rented a room from Zhao with his 9-year-old son.
On Wednesday, police said their argument turned deadly.
Video viewed by Gothamist of the aftermath of the attack shows police officers holding the kids, who are covered in blood. One officer can be heard saying he doesn’t think they should wait for the elevators, and the cops dart down the stairs with the children in their arms.
Neighbor Kokila Frank came out of her home across the street when she heard a commotion of honking and ambulances.
“Around maybe 2 o’clock, I heard a lot of sirens … So I just came out to see what was going on,” she said. “And then at the same time, I saw two police officers clutching babies, one was… holding the baby like this, with all blood all over. And the second one also, same thing. The police, they were running, and they…
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