Just hours after a Queens couple rang in the New Year, the wife became the city’s first murder victim of 2018 — and her abusive husband hanged himself from a tree in a city park.
Authorities were investigating the deaths as a murder-suicide after the bodies were discovered about three hours apart on New Year’s Day, police sources said.
Stacy Singh, the 26-year-old mother of two small children, was stabbed repeatedly in the back and left face-down in the couple’s Richmond Hill home on 103rd Ave. near 113th St., according to the sources.
A knife was found near her body when police arrived around 2 p.m.
Her hard-partying husband Vinny Loknath, 46, committed suicide just after 11 a.m. in Forest Park, about 1 1/2 miles from the murder scene, sources said. He was found hanging from a tree in the park.
Loknath “was very abusive to her,” said the dead woman’s brother-in-law Romain Shaw. “She stayed with him no matter what because they had two kids together. She was hoping for him to change, but he never did.
He’s such a coward.”
According to Shaw, Loknath was drinking heavily and using cocaine when family members gathered on New Year’s Eve at a Queens restaurant.
“He was so drunk, so very drunk,” said Shaw. “He always beat her up when he went home high.”
A neighbor said the couple fought constantly, recalling one incident that ended with the battered wife leaving their home in an ambulance.
“The cops are always there,” the neighbor said. “They were always having big fights. But she still came back to him.”
The couple had a 5-year-old son and a 1-year-old daughter now left parentless.
Stacy “was a very sweet person,” said Shaw. “She was a very generous, caring person. She loved her children very much, spent every penny on them. They were her world.”
The victim’s family came to the house Monday evening, with the woman’s sister collapsing upon arrival.
The neighbor described Loknath as a construction worker often seen sitting on the front stoop of the house, smoking cigarettes and drinking beer.
The killing marked the second consecutive year that the city’s first murder occurred in the Queens precinct.
On Jan. 1, 2017, 31-year-old Ricky Kalisaran was shot dead during an attempted robbery on 124th St. near Liberty Ave.
Woman fatally stabbed, abusive husband found hanging from tree in suspected murder-suicide
Authorities were investigating the deaths as a murder-suicide after the bodies were discovered about three hours apart on New Year’s Day, police sources said.
Stacy Singh, the 26-year-old mother of two small children, was stabbed repeatedly in the back and left face-down in the couple’s Richmond Hill home on 103rd Ave. near 113th St., according to the sources.
A knife was found near her body when police arrived around 2 p.m.
Her hard-partying husband Vinny Loknath, 46, committed suicide just after 11 a.m. in Forest Park, about 1 1/2 miles from the murder scene, sources said. He was found hanging from a tree in the park.
Loknath “was very abusive to her,” said the dead woman’s brother-in-law Romain Shaw. “She stayed with him no matter what because they had two kids together. She was hoping for him to change, but he never did.
He’s such a coward.”
According to Shaw, Loknath was drinking heavily and using cocaine when family members gathered on New Year’s Eve at a Queens restaurant.
“He was so drunk, so very drunk,” said Shaw. “He always beat her up when he went home high.”
A neighbor said the couple fought constantly, recalling one incident that ended with the battered wife leaving their home in an ambulance.
“The cops are always there,” the neighbor said. “They were always having big fights. But she still came back to him.”
The couple had a 5-year-old son and a 1-year-old daughter now left parentless.
Stacy “was a very sweet person,” said Shaw. “She was a very generous, caring person. She loved her children very much, spent every penny on them. They were her world.”
The victim’s family came to the house Monday evening, with the woman’s sister collapsing upon arrival.
The neighbor described Loknath as a construction worker often seen sitting on the front stoop of the house, smoking cigarettes and drinking beer.
The killing marked the second consecutive year that the city’s first murder occurred in the Queens precinct.
On Jan. 1, 2017, 31-year-old Ricky Kalisaran was shot dead during an attempted robbery on 124th St. near Liberty Ave.
Woman fatally stabbed, abusive husband found hanging from tree in suspected murder-suicide
