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Man Who Murdered Girlfriend and Her 2 Daughters is Arrested: NYPD

By  Katie Honan and Nicholas Rizzi | February 13, 2016 7:45pm | Updated on February 14, 2016 12:36pm

 Michael Sykes killed his girlfriend in the Ramada Inn on Staten Island, police said. He was captured Saturday in Queens.
Michael Sykes killed his girlfriend in the Ramada Inn on Staten Island, police said. He was captured Saturday in Queens.
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NYPD

QUEENS — The man accused of fatally stabbing his girlfriend, their baby and another child at a Staten Island hotel used as a homeless shelter was arrested and charged with their murder on Saturday, police said.

Michael Sykes, 25, was apprehended at around 3:30 p.m. in Queens, according to a police spokesman. 

That spokesman could not confirm where in the borough Sykes was, but multiple reports said he was picked up at the Woodside Houses on 31st Avenue.

He pleaded not guilty to first-degree murder, attempted murder, assault, robbery, endangering the welfare of a child and criminal possession of a weapon charges at his Sunday arraignment, the Staten Island District Attorney's office said.

"The heinous and violent nature of this tragic crime make it a top priority for my office," Staten Island District Attorney Michael McMahon said in a statement.

"The public should be assured that my staff intends to vigorously prosecute the case against this murderer."

Sykes is accused of stabbing his 26-year-old girlfriend, Rebecca Cutler, and her three young daughters with a kitchen knife inside her room at the Ramada Inn at 535 Gannon Ave. N. on Staten Island Wednesday morning, police said.

She and her two youngest daughters — 1-year-old Ziana Cutler and 4-month-old Maiyah Sykes — died at nearby hospitals. The 2-year-old girl was listed in critical condition after surgery Wednesday, officials said.

Cutler and her daughters moved into the hotel, which is being used by the Department of Homeless Services to shelter residents, on Dec. 6, but Sykes did not live with them, according to police.

All four visited a deli on Victory Boulevard early Wednesday morning and returned to the hotel at 8 a.m., police said. Surveillance video showed Sykes going into the room with Cutler and the three girls, police said.

Officials believe the stabbing happened just before 9 a.m. A maid found the victims at around 10 a.m., and police found the bloody kitchen knife near the scene.

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Sykes was spotted on a bus headed towards the Staten Island Ferry later that morning, according to the NYPD.

The NYPD said he called his mother at 10:30 a.m. to confess to the killings and said he wanted to kill himself. He had no criminal history, police said.

“Thanks goes to the hard-working officers of the NYPD for bringing Mr. Sykes into custody," Mayor Bill de Blasio said in a statement. "The judicial process can now begin to run its course. I hope the family members of the young mother and her small children can find some amount of closure in knowing he has been apprehended.”

On Thursday, city administrators said there wasn't anything they could have done to protect Cutler because she never reported any abuse to shelter officials.

Human Resources Administration Commissioner Steven Banks wrote in a letter to the state, who requested the city discontinue the hotel's use as a shelter and increase security at sites around the city, that HRA and DHS weren't even aware that Cutler had filed a complaint Tuesday against her boyfriend after he pushed her and took her cell phone during a fight. 

The New York State Office of Temporary and Disability Assistance recommended the city shut the Ramada Inn as a homeless shelter, move the residents and add more security at the other centers around the city.

The city said it was already in the process of relocating families from the hotel and didn't plan to move families there again.

Sykes was remanded at Rikers Island and is due back in court on Tuesday, the DA said.