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Columbia Triple Murder Suspect Watched TV Reports About Killing, Cops Say

By Jess Wisloski | June 24, 2012 1:01pm | Updated on June 24, 2012 3:28pm

MORNINGSIDE HEIGHTS — The suspect who was on the lam for nearly a month after allegedly shooting three men at point-blank range inside a BMW near Columbia University earlier this month told cops he recognized himself in the video surveillance from the murder scene, according to his criminal complaint.

"I saw myself on TV," Roberto Nunez, 30, of the Bronx, told officers after being collared at his brother's Bronx home Saturday, according to the criminal complaint released after Nunez' arraignment at Manhattan Criminal Court Sunday.

Nunez was arraigned on one count of first-degree murder, and one count of second-degree murder in the June 7 shooting that left Amaury Rodriguez, 30, Heriberto Suazo, 26 and Luis Catalan, 25, dead inside a parked BMW at West 122nd Street near Claremont Avenue, the NYPD said.

Police originally thought the attack was a revenge killing over a drug ripoff, but sources said Saturday that the motive appeared to have been a robbery.

Video surveillance showed Nunez calmly leaving the vehicle, closing the door behind him, and discarding a bloody shirt in a trash can, which police later recovered and matched the DNA to Nunez, according to the criminal complaint. Cops nabbed Nunez Saturday morning at his brother's home in the Bronx, officials said.

Nunez did not offer a plea before Judge Arthur F. Engoron at the arraignment Sunday, and reappears in court to face a grand jury on Thursday, June 27.

Police Commissioner Raymond W. Kelly praised the work of the NYPD on Saturday.

"Detectives assigned to this case did a masterful job, relentlessly working it to apprehend a suspect who initially appeared so calm, collected, and out of reach," Kelly said.

In Nunez's Concourse Village neighborhood, residents were surprised to learn of his alleged connection to the brutal crime.

Milton Dixon, 62, the superintendent in Nunez's building, said Nunez had been nicer to him than many of his neighbors at 928 College Ave.

"He was a composed person, he never seemed to be aggressive," said Dixon. "He didn't have that type of behavior. When I worked for him in his apartment I never had a problem, unlike some of the other tenants."

Nobody answered the door at Nunez's apartment, and a man at the rental building where police arrested Nunez, just two blocks away, said he didn't know anything about the crime or arrest.