{"id":315155,"date":"2026-08-06T12:54:10","date_gmt":"2026-08-06T12:54:10","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/315155\/"},"modified":"2026-08-06T12:54:10","modified_gmt":"2026-08-06T12:54:10","slug":"naked-man-on-roof-of-luxury-queens-hi-rise-arrested-for-murder-of-man-he-was-visiting","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/315155\/","title":{"rendered":"Naked man on roof of luxury Queens hi-rise arrested for murder of man he was visiting"},"content":{"rendered":"

A naked man found on a rooftop trying to destroy security cameras with a fire extinguisher has been arrested for murder for the brutal stabbing death of the man he was visiting<\/a> in the luxury Queens high-rise, police said Thursday.<\/p>\n

Bretford Brewer, 36, was charged Wednesday with murder for allegedly killing Carlos Penzo, also 36, in the victim\u2019s Long Island City apartment, police<\/a> said.<\/p>\n

Penzo was found dead sitting up in his bathtub Saturday afternoon in the Hayden luxury building on Hunter St. near Jackson Ave. in Long Island City. He had a knife and Taser in his lap.<\/p>\n

He had deep stab wounds and slashes to his face and head and had also been stabbed in the chest, sources said. There was blood in his bedroom and on his kitchen floor and a broken knife was found in the sink, sources said.<\/p>\n

\u201cFor this to happen to him in the comfort of his own home is unbelievable,\u201d Christine Piantini, the victim\u2019s sister, told the Daily News earlier this week as she fought back tears. \u201cMy brother was not an aggressive person. He was a sweetheart.\u201d<\/p>\n

\"TheThe Hayden apartment building on Hunter St. in Long Island City, Queens. (Rebecca White \/ New York Daily News)<\/p>\n

Police were called to Penzo\u2019s home about three hours before he was found dead after receiving a 911 call from the victim\u2019s cell phone but were unable to get into his apartment.<\/p>\n

Then at 12:35 p.m. an alarm went off and building security found the suspect on the roof of the 51-story building spraying a fire extinguisher at security cameras in an apparent attempt to destroy them, police sources said.<\/p>\n

Building security alerted cops, with NYPD officers nabbing the suspect, who by then had moved from the roof to a fourth-floor hallway, where he was trying to break into the victim\u2019s apartment, sources said.<\/p>\n

Cops were then able to gain access to Penzo\u2019s unit and discovered him dead amidst the bloody crime scene inside.<\/p>\n

\"TheThe Hayden apartment building on Hunter St. in Long Island City, Queens. (Rebecca White\/New York Daily News)<\/p>\n

\u201cHe comes from a very good family and was loved by everybody,\u201d Penzo\u2019s distraught sister said.<\/p>\n

Brewer was hospitalized for psychiatric observation before being charged Wednesday, cops said.<\/p>\n

The suspect lives in Crown Heights, Brooklyn, according to cops, and has no prior arrests in the city. His arraignment was pending in Queens Criminal Court Thursday.<\/p>\n

At least one other man had been in the apartment around the time the murder happened, but it was not immediately clear if others could be charged.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"A naked man found on a rooftop trying to destroy security cameras with a fire extinguisher has been…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":315156,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[37],"tags":[262,263,266,85,267,9,24,264,10,12,63,261,122,124,123,265],"class_list":["post-315155","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-queens","tag-city","tag-county","tag-crime-and-public-safety","tag-latest-headlines","tag-local-news","tag-new-york","tag-new-york-city","tag-new-york-county","tag-new-york-news","tag-news","tag-nyc","tag-nyc-crime","tag-queens","tag-queens-headlines","tag-queens-news","tag-sub-county-region"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/315155","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=315155"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/315155\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/315156"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=315155"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=315155"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=315155"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}