Yesterday, the trial began for the Chinatown resident who prosecutors say killed a date and then kept her body in his bed while he searched online for ways to dispose of her body. Prosecutor Joan Illuzi-Orbon said that Michael Chin Lenahan bragged to a neighbor about the "girl" in his bed, but Lorna Santiago was dead: "As she lay next to him in the bed, he accessed web sites on how to preserve a dead body ... and visited sadomasochistic web sites."
The Post also reports that Lenahan, "an out-of-work, coke-addicted artist," allegedly "visit[ed] strip clubs and pool halls, and us[ed] his victim's credit card to buy booze." Lenahan is accused of strangling Santiago in 2007 after a Saturday-night date during which they had dinner at a restaurant on Third Avenue and then went to a strip club, Rick's Cabaret, where he bought her $50 in lap dances. Afterwards, they went to his apartment—which he shared with his grandmother—at 20 Confucius Plaza.
They got into a fight, where Lenahan ended up throwing her against a wall and choking her. He later confessed to his brother that he made a mistake; Lenahan's mother ended up finding the body in his bed under garbage.
Lenahan's lawyer claims the killing was an accident and that his client's sleeper hold lasted too long. DNAinfo adds, "The lawyer said the incident was similar to a hit-and-run involving a pedestrian. A driver can panic and leave the scene irrationally, Sosinsky said. He said his client's cocaine use contributed to his bad decisions after the alleged accident."
