NYC landlord kills tenant, then self with machete

(CBS) NEW YORK - A rent dispute turned deadly Tuesday, when a New York City landlord butchered his tenant with a machete before fatally stabbing himself.

Police say 62-year-old Eulith "Sonny" Reid killed his 48-year-old tenant Hettie Patterson, a mother of four, by hacking her in the head with the machete, reports NY1. Police reportedly found Reid in his first floor apartment having slit his own throat and wrists. Both were pronounced dead in Jamaica Hospital.

According to NY1, neighbors said Reid told them Patterson, a home-health aid who lived in the basement, owed several months' back rent. One neighbor said the landlord just wanted his tenants out and refused to take Reid's rent.

According to Patterson's boyfriend, 50-year-old George Frankson, Reid was attempting to force Patterson out of the Queens apartment because he wanted to move his children there instead, the New York Post reports. Frankson said Patterson was ready to move but had not yet found an affordable place.

Frankson says Patterson called him Tuesday night, shortly before her death, the Post reports.

"She called me and said 'I see Sonny behind the house, hiding.' I said 'Go inside the house and when you get inside, let me know,' so she did," Frankson said.

Tuesday morning, another tenant reportedly  found Patterson's dead body in the backyard.

"I'm not glad he died. He should suffer. He died too easy," the victim's boyfriend said, according to the Post .