By Shayna Jacobs
DNAinfo Reporter/Producer
MANHATTAN SUPREME COURT — A man on trial for allegedly murdering his girlfriend in her Chelsea apartment was so desperate for cash he tried to hawk "anything he could get his hands on" several times a week, a local jeweler testified Friday.
"Sometimes he would find a piece of glass in the street and come to me and try for an hour to convince me to buy it," said Jason Farahan, owner of Jason's Jewelry on 14th Street.
Robert Camarano, 62, is a career criminal with a history of heroin use was living in his girlfriend's apartment when she was found stabbed and strangled to death on June 8, 2008.
Despite the bloody murder scene, Carmarano claimed that she had overdosed on pills in his opening statement earlier this week.
Prosecutors believe that Camarano killed Michele Hyams, 60, during a fight over his selling her jewelry. They portrayed him as a drug-addicted lifetime parolee who had no job and was desperate for money.
The jeweler said Camarano would sometimes be waiting outside before the store even opened, eager to try to pawn off items for as low as $5 to $15.
"I just remember that, you know, most of the time you would just come and harass me," Farahan told Camarano on cross-examination.
"I asked you many times to please leave my store and not come back and you kept coming back," he added.
Prosecutors played a security tape from the jewelry store that showed Hyams, on the day she was murdered, approaching the counter to ask about a piece of jewelry she owned that should not have been sold to them, an employee testified.
On Thursday jurors heard the 911 call from Camarano reporting that Hyams had been stabbed to death, though prosecutors say it was an act designed to cover up his crime.
Testimony will continue Friday afternoon with closing statements likely to be heard early next week.
