19 yr old mother found dead wraped up in a vacant apartment's closet

[John Quinn]

By Kemberly RichardsonMANHATTAN (WABC) -- Police have made an arrest in connection with a body found wrapped in plastic in the closet of an empty apartment in upper Manhattan.
Authorities say 19-year-old Glendalis Pagan's badly decomposed remains were found inside a sixth-floor apartment of a building on West 204th Street in Inwood on Monday.
An autopsy is being performed to determine her cause of death.
"I can't believe she's gone," Pagan's cousin, Elizabeth Martinez, said. "It still doesn't go through, she was so young."
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Pagan was head over heels for her son, Andy, a child who now cries for his mother, not knowing she will never return.
Police have arrested 23-year-old Andre Velez, Pagan's former boyfriend. He is charged with murder.
Relatives say the last time they saw her alive was Wednesday around 9 p.m., inside a building on Dyckman Street where she lived with her mother and baby.
"She was with her ex-boyfriend," Martinez said.
Velez is also Andy's father, who just finished serving a year in jail for assaulting Pagan.
"They had their differences between each other," friend Gigi Figueroa said. "Two years ago, he hit her in the head with a hammer. She ended up in the hospital."
He also lives in the building, just a few doors down from where her body was discovered.
"She told him she didn't want to be with him, and that's why he got mad," Martinez said. "He got really jealous, obsessed. He would follow her everywhere."
But his mother insists Pagan wasn't afraid of her son, pointing out that ever since he got out of jail in March, she would bring Andy over to see him.
"He made a mistake and did his time, paid for his crime," she said. "He's moving on for a better tomorrow, but I don't think he has the heart or capability to do what they say was done to her."
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WEB PRODUCED BY: Bill King


NEW YORK AND TRI-STATE AREA NEWS

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[Amy Matthews]

So young so tragic. This is why we have to get word out to these young girls as young as possible about early warning signs and to know to get out at the first sign before it gets to this point and how to protect themselves in the event of breaking up. How many times do we here of this happening after a women says those deadly words, i don't want to be with you any more? How can we get the word out so more women and girls see it and understand it?

This story just keeps going on just with new names. Will it ever stop? I pray everyday for all those vulnerable women and children out there in similar situations.

Susan Murphy- Milano is doing her best but she can't do it alone.
My heart goes out to this young women's family and to her now motherless child.