By Christina Santucci and Jeremy Walsh
A transgender woman was found murdered inside her Ridgewood home last week and police were still searching for the culprit Tuesday, authorities said.
Police responded to 69-30 62nd St. March 30 after a 911 caller reported a male not breathing. Officers found 29-year-old Edelbuerto Gonzalez-Andujar, who published reports said used the name Amanda, unconscious and unresponsive, police said.
Gonzalez-Andujar was pronounced dead at the scene. The city medical examiner ruled she died from strangulation. The mother of the woman who found Gonzalez-Andujar’s body said the apartment looked like a struggle had taken place.
Milagros Ramirez of Bushwick visited the site March 31 and said her daughter, Barbara Vega, had found the victim more than three days after Gonzalez-Andujar had last been seen alive.
“She was dead I think three days,” Ramirez said, noting police said a tall man in a hooded sweatshirt was caught on video tape leaving the apartment March 27. “He locked the door and took her keys.”
She said she did not know anyone who would hurt Gonzalez-Andujar, but noted police had told her a laptop computer was missing from the apartment.
“I don’t know if it was someone who came to rob her,” she said. “I don’t know.”
The victim had not been working recently because of back problems, Ramirez said.
Gonzalez-Andujar was the first person murdered in the 104th Precinct in 2010. A total of two people were slain in the precinct in all of 2009.
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