Murray Hill Murderer Sentenced To Prison For Killing 87-Year-Old

MURRAY HILL, NY — A man who bludgeoned his 87-year-old boss to death with a lamp was sentenced to serve 20 years-to-life in state prison on Monday, prosecutors said.

Miguel Abarentos, a 30-year-old who nearly got away after killing his employer inside his Murray Hill home, will serve at least 20 years in prison before he is eligible for parole, the Manhattan district attorney's office said in a statement.

Abarentos pleaded guilty last year to the 2012 murder of Thawerdas Sadhwani, his 87-year-old former boss. Prosecutors said that Sadhwani had hired Abarentos in October 2012 to work for his business to and to complete errands and household tasks at his apartment on East 36th Street.

On Dec. 15, 2012, Abarentos went inside his boss's apartment and beat him to death using a metal chair and a ceramic lamp, which shattered to pieces during the assault. Prosecutors said Sadhwani's neck was crushed and his nose broken during the attack.

That same day, Abarentos left the Murray Hill murder scene and went to an internet cafe in Queens, where he messaged a friend saying that he had just killed someone and needed to leave the country, prosecutors said. The next, Abarentos boarded a flight to the Philippines, where he remained at large for nearly 3-and-a-half years before he was arrested in 2016 and extradited to the U.S.

"In this shocking crime, Miguel Abarentos wrought havoc in the home of his elderly employer, beating the man with such deadly force that even one of the murder weapons — a ceramic lamp — was shattered by the impact of his blows," Manhattan district attorney Cy Vance said in a statement. "That he fled to the Philippines the following day to avoid detection only underscores the cowardice of this murder of an 87-year-old man."

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