NEW YORK — The New York Police Department on Tuesday offered a $3,500 reward for information on the killing of Queens mom Orsolya Gaal, as detectives continue to try to figure out who stabbed her more than 50 times before stuffing her body in a duffel bag.
Police on Tuesday morning put up reward posters on the tree-lined streets around Gaal’s Forest Hills home.
Gaal, a 51-year-old mother of two, was found dead inside the duffel bag on Metropolitan Avenue just outside Forest Park about 8 a.m. Saturday. Her neck and upper body were riddled with stab wounds, police said. She also had cuts on her hands indicating that she put up a fight.
Cops quickly identified her by following the trail of blood from Forest Park back to her home on Juno Street.
As of Tuesday morning, police had not identified the person caught on surveillance camera rolling the duffel bag away from Gaal’s home.
“She was a wonderful person. When I heard this, I couldn’t believe it,” teary-eyed neighbor Ina Cohen told the New York Daily News Tuesday as she placed a bouquet of flowers outside Gaal’s home. Cohen works at Church and the Gardens Nursery School, where Gaal’s children attended as tots.
Recalling the happy family, Cohen couldn’t fathom why Gaal had been killed.
“There’s nothing bad to say,” she said. “She always had a smile on her face. She was always proud of her children. It’s such a tragedy.”
“I just hope they find whoever did this,” she added. “Because what they did to her, horrible.”
As detectives continue to search for clues they are also trying to determine if Gaal’s death has anything to do with an incident on May 29, 2020, when she mysteriously disappeared for more than seven hours, cops said.
At 7:21 a.m. that morning, her husband, Howard Klein, called police and said she had left their home at 12:30 a.m. to go for a walk and never returned. He managed to track her phone to Jamaica, Queens, but couldn’t get her on the phone.
About 30 minutes after calling cops, Klein called police back to say his wife was safe and sound, police said.
In the hours before her death, Gaal went out with friends Friday to a show and wound up near Lincoln Center in Manhattan. She then hit a bar near her home about 11 p.m., a high-ranking police source said. Detectives aren’t sure if she planned to meet someone there but she stayed about 30 or 40 minutes, then returned home alone, the source said.
At 4:30 a.m. Saturday, a man was seen on surveillance video rolling the duffel bag down Juno Street, sources said.
Investigators believe she was killed by someone she knew. It’s also believed the suspect entered the home through a rear door.
Gaal was murdered while her 13-year-old son slept upstairs, police said. Klein and their 17-year-old son were away in Oregon at the time, looking at colleges.
The younger son was questioned by police and released to the custody of an adult Saturday morning, police said.
After the murder, Klein reported getting a threatening text from his wife’s phone and has told police he is worried for his and his family’s safety.
An autopsy on Monday revealed that Gaal had been stabbed more than 50 times before she was placed in the duffel bag, the city Medical Examiner’s office said.
Anyone with information is asked to call Crime Stoppers at (800) 577-TIPS. All calls will be kept confidential.
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