Cristian Lemus-Estrada allegedly killed Carlos Tinizhanay-Arias in April.
Cristian Lemus-Estrada. EAST WINDSOR — An East Windsor man has been indicted on murder charges for an April homicide that was the township’s first in three years, the prosecutor’s office said today.
Cristian Lemus-Estrada, 19, allegedly stabbed a neighbor in the torso with a kitchen knife during a fight in the Windsor Castle Apartments on Devonshire Drive.
The neighbor, 28-year-old Carlos Tinizhanay-Arias, was taken to Robert Wood Johnson University Hospital Hamilton and was pronounced dead soon after, police said.
A few hours after police arrived at the scene they tracked down Lemus-Estrada in another Windsor Castle apartment and arrested him. The stabbing took place inside the apartment of a mutual friend of the two men, police said.
At a previous bail hearing Lemus-Estrada’s attorney Nicole Carlo said her client had acted in self defense. The two men got into a fight, Carlo said, and Tinizhanay-Arias was choking Lemus-Estrada.
Tinizhanay-Arias was highly intoxicated and repeatedly lunged at Lemus-Estrada, Carlo said.
A prosecutor said Lemus-Estrada left the mutual friend’s apartment and returned with the knife about five minutes later. Lemus-Estrada hid the knife behind his back as he entered and then stabbed Tinizhanay-Arias, Assistant Prosecutor Brian McCauley said.
In addition to murder, a Mercer County grand jury indicted Lemus-Estrada last Wednesday on charges of possession of a weapon for an unlawful purpose and unlawful possession of a weapon, the Mercer County Prosecutor’s Office said in a news release.
He remains in the Mercer County Correction Center in lieu of $500,000 bail.
Lemus-Estrada is a native of Guatemala who has been living in the country illegally for about one year, prosecutors said. The U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement has been notified of the charges, and he could be deported after they are resolved, McCauley said at the earlier hearing.
Lemus-Estrada has no known criminal record in the U.S. but may be a person of interest in a homicide investigation in Guatemala, McCauley said.
Contact Brendan McGrath at (609) 989-5731 or bmcgrath@njtimes.com.
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