A New Jersey man has been arrested in connection with the sexual assault and murder of a woman found dead in a park lake last month, prosecutors said.
Jorge Rios faces charges of felony murder, kidnapping and aggravated assault for the death of Carolina Cano, 45.
Cano's body was found shortly after 7:30 a.m. on March 24 in a lake at Lincoln Park in Jersey City, New Jersey. Her cause of death was strangulation and drowning and was ruled a homicide, the Hudson County Prosecutor's Office said in a press release.
Her roommate told NBC New York that Cano left their Jersey City home around 5:30 a.m. to go jogging and never returned.
"She was like family because I've known her since she was a little girl," the roommate, who was not identified, said.
Cano's family lives in Peru, according to the roommate. Cano came to the United States alone and worked as a nanny.
"She was a working woman, a good woman," her roommate said. "She didn’t bother anyone. She was a woman that was always with God, that’s how she lived. She was really a beautiful woman. She had a very beautiful heart."
Rios, 33, was arrested Sunday by the Hudson County Prosecutor's Office Homicide Task Force and is being held at the Hudson County Correctional Facility in Kearny, New Jersey.
Meanwhile, jurors in the New York City borough of Queens are expected to begin deliberations Monday in the retrial of Chanel Lewis, 22, who was charged with the 2016 rape and murder of jogger Karina Vetrano.
Vetrano, 30, was found dead Aug. 2, 2016, near a running trail in Howard Beach. Lewis' first trial ended in a mistrial in November 2018.