Tuesday, February 12, 2008, Psychologist Kathryn Faughey was butchered in her place of business brutally slashed 15 times with a meat cleaver and a 9-inch knife. The police are still trying to find the killer.
According to Kunsman the police had every reason to want to talk to him, saying "The reasons they had for questioning me were valid. I've been in more contact with Kathryn lately. I've been speaking to her a lot lately on the phone and by e-mail. I guess that's what led them here."
He is correct, that is what led them to him because according to a friend, Don Hurley, that had been in contact with the victim via email, that night, Faughey mentioned him in her last message, sent only about a half-hour before she was killed.
Kunsman met Faughey, at a guitar camp several years ago, according to a law enforcement official who spoke on condition of anonymity because the investigation is ongoing.
Kunsman was found through Faughey's recent e-mail records, which contained messages about his personal problems, the law enforcement official said.
Kunsman is married with six children and admits to speaking to Faughey on Tuesday afternoon, on the phone, declining to go into details of the conversation, "That's personal. She was just being a friend," he said. He had been e-mailing and calling Faughey regularly in the days leading up to her death to discuss his worsening personal problems.
The police are also questioning other acquaintances.
According the original AP article the police were having trouble determining whether the killer was a patient of Faughey's or her partner, Dr. Kent Shinbach, but have been unable to access medical records because of federal privacy laws.
This is denied by the authorities in another article, which states that policed scoffed at that report, stating "There is a great deal of patient information already in the hands of law enforcement. We already have several people we know we need to talk to."
According to that report, Police Commissioner Raymond Kelly released a new information about Tuesday's meat-cleaver murder of the upper East Side therapist - revealing that another woman was alone with the madman for at least half an hour.
Only she survived.
The female patient - whom police Kelly did not identify - had an appointment with Faughey's partner, Dr. Kent Shinbach, and was in Suite 1-C when the killer walked in about 8 p.m.
After Faughey was murdered and Shinbach, 70, was badly hurt trying to save her, the killer tried to shove the woman - described by sources as tall, buxom and blonde - into a closet.
It goes on to say that after the woman gave him a "well placed kick", the suspect ran off, leaving behind a bag filled with knives, a rope, women's clothing and slippers - and a package of adult diapers.
One other reason police spent so much time questioning Kunsman was because the partner, Shinbach, had picked him out of an informal lineup although the woman who spent time with Faughey's killer in the waiting room did not identify him from an array of photos.
Police doubt that Kunsman is their killer because he had no injuries and they believe the killer would have suffered wounds from the struggle.
Somewhere in New York, the meat cleaver butcher roams free.
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