A 29-year-old Brooklyn woman lay dead inside her apartment, as her 7-year-old daughter slept in a nearby room, police said.
Investigators believe Daniel Elias, 28, strangled his girlfriend Cynthia Lopez during a heated argument early Monday and then left their Sunset Park apartment. The victim was found about 6 a.m., police said. The couple's daughter, Destiny, wasn't hurt.
Elias returned to the apartment soon after the murder and was arrested. He was still being questioned hours later.
"He's a great man and a great dad," his mom, Elizabeth Morales, told the Daily News.
Elias' family said he killed his girlfriend of 10 years by accident, defending himself when she charged at him with a knife during an argument over her seeing two other men.
At one point during the fight, Lopez called her brother to report what was happening, Police Commissioner Raymond Kelly said.
The argument continued and she was killed, police sources said.
During his brief absence from the crime scene, Elias went to his aunt's home just four blocks away. He told the aunt, Marisol Lopez - no relation to the victim - that his girlfriend had been cheating. Then they started arguing.
"He said she charged at him with a knife and he choked her," the 44-year-old aunt recalled Elias saying.
"I gotta go," he told her. "I know I'm going to jail. I love you."
Then he ran out the door.
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