The body of a decapitated and dismembered technical CEO was found inside a Lower East Side apartment Tuesday afternoon, sorted in plastic bags right next to an electric saw, sources told the Post.
Police arrived at the creepy scene shortly after 3:30 p.m., after a cousin of the dead man requested a wellness checkup at the E. Houston Street building and called police, sources said.
An electric saw was found near the body, which was described as a 33-year-old man. The victim’s arms and legs were removed below the knees, and body parts were found in plastic bags found in the apartment, the sources said.
Police sources believe the victim is Fahim Saleh, a venture capitalist and the CEO of Nigeria-based motorcycle startup Gokada.
Saleh is listed as the owner of the apartment, which he bought last year for $ 2.25 million, according to records.
“This is ugly,” said a policeman at the scene.
The sources described the murder as an apparent targeted murder.
The victim was last seen in surveillance footage Monday afternoon around 1:40 p.m., when he entered the elevator of his building, which opens directly to his seventh-floor apartment, sources said.
Images of the apartment building appear to show the alleged killer carrying a bag, waiting to enter the elevator with the victim, the sources said.
The victim gives the suspect a puzzled look during an exchange as they climb together. As soon as the victim leaves his apartment, the suspect can be seen attacking him, according to sources.
A police source said the crime scene looked like a “professional” murder because there was almost no blood left and the department was not looted.
While another source added that it seemed that the murderer had been “interrupted”.
“It didn’t seem like the killer was finished,” said the source.
Investigators believe the victim is Saleh, but are waiting for the medical examiner to confirm his identity.
Later, police were seen questioning a sobbing woman, which according to sources identified as the victim’s cousin, in the building’s lobby.
The victim’s cousin found his exposed torso in the living room next to the construction bags and saw when he went to see him on Tuesday after hearing from him, sources said.
“I was really upset. Crying. Shivering, ”said local resident Danny Faust. “She was sitting there, but you can see that her legs were shaking. She is nervous. I was crying like, you know, drying my eyes.
“He was screaming when he fell the first time,” said Faust, 40.
He said he went to the building after seeing police converge on the scene.
“Corpse? Okay,” he said. “But when you hear chopped and dismembered? That’s it. It’s a sick type of mind that someone does that.”
Saleh was an American from Bangladesh who founded and invested in several transportation-related startups, according to his LinkedIn page.
In 2015, he co-founded Pathao, a transport company in his parents’ home country of Bangladesh.
About two years later, in December 2017, he co-founded Gokada, an on-demand motorcycle transport company in Lagos, Nigeria, and took over as CEO in April of last year. He recently oversaw the company’s transition to delivery service during the coronavirus pandemic.
He also launched venture capital firm Adventure Capital in New York in 2018.
“We used to call him Elon Musk from the developing world. It was like the Energizer Bunny, ”a lifelong friend told The Post.
“His best friend in Dubai called me sobbing on the phone, ‘they took my son; They took my son! He played the ukulele … he was so full of ideas, “added the friend.
Residents said the crime was particularly troubling because it occurred in what is generally a quiet neighborhood.
“It is shocking. It’s awful, ”resident Jason Rivera, 45, told The Post. What could go through someone’s mind to behead him? Pure evil.
No further details are available immediately.
Additional reporting by Tina Moore
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