The jealous handyman accused of murdering his on-off lover Orsolya Gaal has said he killed her after discovering she had been texting another man, according to a police source.
An unnamed senior NYPD supervisor told The Daily Beast that David Bonola said he had been having an affair with the married mother-of-two on and off for the past two years.
Mr Bonola, 44, claimed he had seen text messages between Ms Gaal and another man and so he went to her home in Forest Hills in the early hours of Saturday morning to confront her when she returned home from an event.
Mr Bonola and Ms Gaal, 51, got into an argument and the 44-year-old allegedly slashed his lover’s throat and stabbed her more than 50 times.
He then stuffed her body into her son’s hockey duffle bag, dragged it to the nearby Forest Park and dumped it there, police said.
Police confirmed that Mr Bonola had worked as a handyman for Ms Gaal’s family and that the pair had been in an “intimate relationship” over the last two years.
The relationship had recently come to an end, police said, though it is not clear who ended it.
The existence of the text messages to another man has not been confirmed nor is it clear how Mr Bonola would have accessed them on Ms Gaal’s cellphone.
Police said Mr Bonola willingly accompanied officers to the 112th precinct on Wednesday where he reportedly confessed to the savage attack that has rocked a quiet neighbourhood in Queens.
He was arrested and charged with Ms Gaal’s murder on Thursday.
On Thursday night, he was arraigned in Queens Supreme Court on charges of murder in the second degree, tampering with physical evidence and criminal possession of a weapon in the fourth degree.
Prosecutors revealed new details of Ms Gaal’s final moments in the courtroom, detailing how she willingly let her alleged killer into her home in Forest Hills in the early hours of Saturday morning before they got into an argument in the basement and she repeatedly told him to leave.
At that point, Mr Bonola allegedly flew into a rage, slashing her throat with a kitchen knife and stabbing her more than 50 times .
Ms Gaal’s 13-year-old son was upstairs in the family home at the time of the attack. Her husband and other son were out of town at the time.
Ms Gaal’s body was found inside the duffle bag in Forest Park by a dog walker the next morning.
Police followed a trail of blood back to her home.
“Two boys are left without a mother and a young teenager faces the added trauma of being home when this heinous murder took place,” Queens District Attorney Melinda Katz said in a statement on Thursday night.
“As alleged, the defendant stabbed the victim over 50 times and then attempted to dispose of the body by stuffing it into a duffel bag and dragging it across a quiet residential neighborhood – leaving a trail of blood and a terrified community.
“The defendant is now in custody and will be held to account for this horrific crime.”
A judge ordered Mr Bonola to be held without bond after confessing to the brutal crime.
He is next scheduled to appear in court on 26 April.
