Boston police tonight arrested Philip Markoff, a 22-year-old Boston University medical student, in the murder of 26-year-old Julissa Brisman at the Copley Marriott last week and an attack on a second woman at a Back Bay hotel.
Markoff, who allegedly contacted the women through Craigslist ads, had been the target of a national manhunt since police last week released hotel security footage of a fair-haired young man believed to be responsible for Brisman's murder.
The murder was soon connected to an April 10 attack at the nearby Westin Copley, where a prostitute who advertised on Craigslist was robbed at gunpoint.
The suspect allegedly tied up and robbed a prostitute at gunpoint at the Westin Copley in the Back Bay on April 10. Two days after Brisman's murder, a third attack occurred at the Warwick Holiday Inn Express & Suites, when another prostitute reported she had been assaulted by a man with a similar description. It is unclear whether Markoff has been charged in connection with the Warwick attack.
Earlier today, Warwick police released four black-and-white surveillance photographs of the suspect in that case.
The man, who is wearing a baseball cap and a jacket over an untucked shirt in the hotel surveillance photographs, bears a resemblance to the suspect depicted in pictures taken at the two hotels where the other attacks occurred.
But the series of photographs from the Holiday Inn Express Hotel & Suites in Warwick were blurry, making it hard to say for sure whether it is the same man, even though Boston police investigators believe it is.[To see surveillance photographs from the fatal attack in Boston, click here.]
"I don't think the stills are as good as Boston's,'' said Warwick Police Chief Stephen M. McCartney. "We don't have him ever taking off the hat.''
From the times stamped on the photographs, it appears they were taken about 25 minutes before police responded to the hotel after getting a call about the attack around 11:15 p.m. The man is walking past two elevators in the lobby and into a stairwell on the west side of the hotel.
The woman, whom police described as a 26-year-old prostitute from Las Vegas, told investigators that a clean-cut, blond man tied her up with plastic cord. The man demanded cash and spotted a laptop computer he wanted, McCartney said. But as he began rummaging through the woman's items, her husband came into the room, and the attacker pointed a gun at him and backed out the door before fleeing.
In the first reported attack in Boston at the Westin, a woman was bound with what a witness told the Globe last week were plastic zip ties. The woman was robbed of a debit card, $800 in cash, and $250 in American Express gift cards.
On April 14, 26-year-old Julissa Brisman was shot to death at the door of her room on the 20th floor of the Marriott Copley. Brisman had also advertised massages on Craigslist, and the assailant had tried to bind her hands with plastic ties.
Warwick police released the photographs to news media after withholding them over the weekend, at the urging of Boston police, for what McCartney described as strategic reasons. He declined to elaborate.
