A New York man was scheduled to appear in court Monday after being accused of murdering a friend and helping to store his dismembered body in a refrigerator for nearly two years.
Nicholas McGee, 45, has pleaded not guilty to all charges, which include murder, robbery, tampering with evidence and concealing a corpse. He was scheduled to appear in court for a hearing on Monday, according to court records.
McGee’s pleas came in Kings Supreme Criminal Court in Brooklyn on Friday, when a judge ordered him held without bail, the records state.
His wife, Heather Stines, 45, was also charged in connection with the case. She is charged with concealing a corpse, hindering prosecution, and tampering with evidence and was also being held with out bail.
Lawyers for both defendants did not immediately respond to a request for comment Saturday night.
The office of Brooklyn District Attorney Eric Gonzalez alleges that McGee stabbed the victim, 39-year-old Kawsheen Gelzer, as he slept on a sofa in McGee’s apartment in the Flatbush neighborhood of Brooklyn in March 2022.
The victim awoke and fought back, but he succumbed to stab wounds as well as wounds from a hammer that McGee grabbed as the two struggled, the office said in a statement.
Afterward, McGee allegedly took drugs out of Gelzer’s pocket, the office said, and then used a saw and a hammer to dismember the victim’s body before putting the head and torso in a refrigerator, it said.
Arms and legs were stored in the freezer, the office said. It wasn’t until almost two years later, in late January, that the remains were found, the DA’s office said.
Someone told the organization Crime Stoppers that Stines was allegedly storing the body parts in her refrigerator, according to prosecutors.
She was taken into custody upon the discovery, and McGee was arrested in Chesapeake, Virginia, and returned to Brooklyn on Friday, the DA’s office said. McGee had been imprisoned in Virginia on an unrelated crime, NBC New York reported.
“This was a gruesome and horrific murder that we allege began with an attack on the victim as he slept,” Gonzalez said in the statement from his office. “We will now seek to hold the defendant accountable for this senseless crime.”
This article was originally published on NBCNews.com