A 38-year-old mother of two was found dead in her bed this week with injuries to her face and neck and blood all over her Bronx apartment, police said Thursday.
Authorities said Lissette Gomez’s body was located inside her apartment on Cauldwell Avenue near Westchester Avenue in the Woodstock neighbourhood around 12:45 p.m. Wednesday.
The NYPD stated that Gomez’s death was “suspicious,” while the specific circumstances were unknown.
Police said a 33-year-old male was being questioned, but the nature of his relationship with Gomez or whether he played any role in her death was unknown.
Police arrived at Gomez’s residence after someone called 911 and discovered her dead in bed, with major cuts to her face and neck, according to cops. EMS pronounced her deceased. The city Medical Examiner’s Office will issue an official determination.
On Thursday, a makeshift memorial with images of Gomez, candles, and words from her loved ones and neighbours was built up at the building’s entrance. “Goodbye lovely angel, we love you,” wrote her 44-year-old sister Carmen Torres in a note.
NYC woman, 38, found dead in bed inside bloody apartment: cops https://t.co/gqqpNuOziW pic.twitter.com/6Zu5UMWkd0
— New York Post (@nypost) March 23, 2023
“I’m feeling destroyed,” Torres, of The Bronx, said outside the building to The Post. “My heart is heavy right now, but I’m trying to be tough since I’m the only one out here for her.” My folks are in Florida because they cannot afford to travel.” Torres called her sister, a mother of two small children, “beautiful” and “kind.”
“She had a large heart,” the woman in mourning stated. “She would give you whatever she has.” She was a lovely lady.”
The last time the two sisters saw each other, Gomez “had bruises on her face, legs, arms, everywhere,” Torres said, adding that her sister had been in a relationship with a “bad” guy she had warned her against.
According to neighbours, Gomez had been trying to rebuild her life after years of battling drug addiction but had recently fallen into an abusive relationship.
“She was straightening her life up, she was doing everything right,” Nini Rodriguez, 59, said of Gomez, whom she had known for about ten years.
“She was simply in a poor circumstance, a domestic violence relationship,” Rodriguez stated. “He was quite abusive. He used to beat her up in front of everyone. She always had a bruised face, black and blue, and she told everyone he was abusive.”