NEW YORK– Two men were arrested Friday on manslaughter charges in the death of a homeless man who was accosted as he slept in the parking lot of a Brooklyn supermarket, police said.
The suspects were awaiting arraignment and it was not clear if they had attorneys who could comment on the charges.
Police said Cos Jervis Jonas Ajpuac, 38, and another man were attacked with metal pipes and a baseball bat around 7 p.m. on September 18, police said. Ajpuac succumbed to his injuries on October 2. The other man, a 42-year-old, survived.
The attackers “simply attacked them while they were sleeping,” said store security officer Stephen DeGrasse told the Daily Newsand said he had seen security footage of the assault.
He said the victims and suspects all visited the same ShopRite supermarket to redeem the five-cent deposit on the bottles and cans they collected.
They were friends, he said, and drank beer together after cashing in on the bottles.
There was no immediate information from police about what led to the attack.