PROVIDENCE, R.I. – Rhode Island authorities have found evidence linking a medical student accused of killing a masseuse in Boston to a hotel near Providence where a third crime occurred, a law enforcement official said Friday.
The law enforcement official told The Associated Press that fingerprints belonging to Philip Markoff were found on a wall of the Holiday Inn Express in Warwick, where a stripper has said she was assaulted by a man she met through Craigslist. The official spoke on condition of anonymity because he was not authorized to discuss the case.
The official also said that Markoff sent text messages from the hotel but did not have information about what Markoff said or to whom he wrote.
Markoff has pleaded not guilty, and his lawyer, John Salsberg, has said he is innocent of the charges.
Markoff, a Boston University medical student, is charged in the April 14 killing of Julissa Brisman, a 25-year-old masseuse he met through Craigslist. He is also charged in a robbery of another masseuse that police say he met through the online classifieds site.
He has not been charged in Rhode Island, but police and prosecutors here have been investigating links to the Boston cases.
A Las Vegas woman who worked as a stripper and was offering lap dances through Craigslist told police that she was bound with cord and held at gunpoint late on April 16 at the Warwick hotel. The assailant fled when the victim's husband returned to the room.
Suffolk County prosecutors in Massachusetts have placed an ad on Craigslist in an attempt to find other women who may have been victimized by Markoff.
Markoff, who was arrested during a traffic stop Monday as he drove to Foxwoods Casino in Connecticut, was placed on suicide watch at the Boston jail where he was being held after authorities reportedly found shoelace marks on his neck.
His attorney and parents visited him Friday, and his fiancee said earlier in the week that she supported Markoff and didn't think he was capable of hurting anyone.
Meanwhile, Brisman's mother, Carmen Guzman, said in a statement Friday that losing her daughter to such a violent death will "haunt me for the rest of my life." She said she was "relieved that the man who did this is in custody."
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Associated Press Writer Denise Lavoie contributed to this story.
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