Nadia Vitels, 52, who was found stuffed in duffel bag in her Manhattan apartment was ‘killed by two SQUATTERS who beat her to death’ as cops hunt male and female suspects

The police have announced that the mother found murdered and taken to her in a duffel bag New York City apartment were some squatters who beat the woman to death.

Nadia Vitels, 52, was found dead in the East 31st Street apartment in Manhattan’s Kips Bay on March 14, after her family called the building’s superintendent to conduct a welfare check.

The coroner ruled her death a homicide Friday after an autopsy showed she died of multiple facial fractures, a brain hemorrhage, two broken ribs and blunt force trauma to the head.

Now the head of the NYPD says that the suspects – believed to be a black man and a black woman in their twenties – were in Vitels’ apartment.

“We believe some squatters took over the apartment and this woman came home … and walked into the squatters who were there,” Kenny said.

The two suspects were seen driving away in Vitel’s Lexus SUV around the time they thought she died and were even caught on surveillance footage that has not yet been made public.

Kenny added that the unique design of the “luxury apartment” may have allowed them to hide from Vitels for a while.

‘The apartment itself is very unique because there is no front door to the apartment. You take a lift up and then you key in. The elevator is basically your front door,” Kenny told the newspaper New York Post.

Michael Medvedev, Vitels’ son, made the gruesome discovery of his mother’s corpse when he returned with the building’s superintendent, Jean Pompee, who had lived there for 22 years, after Vitels had not been seen for 48 hours.

“As they are getting ready to leave, the son opens the closet door at the front door and discovers the duffel bag with one foot sticking out,” Kenny said.

While the suspects – one of whom has previously been arrested – are still on the run after stealing Vitels’ car on Thursday evening, the police believe they are on the right track.

“Right now we have probable cause, we have two subjects, we have the Regional Fugitive Task Force actively hunting right now,” Kenny said.

The couple reportedly drove over the George Washington Bridge into New Jersey before crashing Vitels’ SUV in Pennsylvania’s Lower Paxton Township.

NYPD officials did not receive the car’s license plate numbers until the next day, but they know the squatters immediately tried to spend $1,000 on a replacement vehicle.

Medvedev remembered his mother Monday at her funeral at Gutterman’s Funeral Home in Woodbury as a smart, beautiful and adventurous woman.

“I remember her showing me a gold medal she had earned in high school in Russia, a student medal of honor for being the best in her class. That medal has always stuck with me for some reason. I felt proud to be her son and I wanted to earn my gold medals to live up to her,” Medvedev said.

He said his mother moved to the United States from Russia to study and play tennis in Oklahoma, then moved to Miami for college.

According to her LinkedIn profile, Vitels was a marketing professional who worked at Canon, Nokia and tennis star Maria Sharapova’s candy line, Sugarpova.

New York City Police Department officers were seen dragging several bags of the victim’s belongings, including three suitcases and bags containing her clothes, from the building last week.

Her family told Medvedev that they had not heard from her in a few days, so he went to her apartment to check on her and saw signs that something was wrong.

Medvedev said his mother loved her dog and that she adopted the puppy while she was going through a difficult time in her life and caring for her sick parents.

“He became her next obsession, her best friend, her husband. He was the only man she needed,” the son said at her funeral.

“This little puppy gave her the love she needed to get through the hardest time of her life.”

Pompee discovered that her dog was urinating all over the floor because he was unsupervised, which was very unusual.

“They found a bag in the closet and said, ‘I think there’s a body in here.’ “I kind of felt something was wrong, it looked suspicious,” Pompee said.

He added that he saw signs of a struggle in the apartment when the circuit breaker panel, which he believes is electrical, remained damaged.

Vitels’ concerned family members then called the fire brigade, who quickly arrived on the scene.

“The fire department opened the bag and discovered her body,” Pompee added. ‘I didn’t look at the body myself, they just said there was a body inside and called the police. It was in the closet near the entrance to the door.

‘It was in a small kind of bag that you zipped shut, a kind of soft bag. I felt bad, you never want to hear about someone being killed or killed.”

The chief inspector confirmed that there was a different name on the lease for the apartment where Vitels was located and said he had only met that person once and had forgotten what he looked like.

‘Apparently she (Vitels) was sublet. “I didn’t know she was coming to live here,” he added.

Vitels reportedly moved into the apartment just days before her death, and Medvedev said his mother was looking forward to starting this next chapter in her life.

‘Preparing to move to New York City, where she would conquer the world. “She was so excited to move to the city,” he said.