NEW YORK CITY -- A young woman from Providence was the victim of a gruesome murder in Harlem, New York City.
The body of 19-year-old Francis Alfonso Pellerano was found in a 55-gallon drum inside a Harlem apartment over the weekend.
"I always knew that something was going to happen to her. I wasn't sleeping at night," the victim's father, Manuel Alfonso, told NBC 10 News through a translator.
Pellerano was Deaf and could not speak. She was a student at the Rhode Island School for the Deaf on and off for about five years, until she left the school late last year.
Family members said she went to New York with a young man she met on Facebook. He is also Deaf.
Media outlets in New York reported that Pellerano may have been planning to leave the boyfriend. Pellerano's body was found in the barrel by the boyfriend's grandmother, who smelled a foul odor.
There have been no arrests. The boyfriend is under psychiatric care in a New York hospital.
"I want justice because I know he's not crazy. He cleaned all the blood after he killed her," Alfonso said.
The Rhode Island School for the Deaf is planning a memorial for Pellerano.
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