A 23-year-old woman in Queens, New York, spotted the Ecuadorean immigrant who was accused of sexually assaulting a 13-year-old girl in a local park after seeing him on a New York City Police Department wanted poster.
On Tuesday, Angela Sauretti recognized the alleged child rapist Christian Geovanny Inga-Landi in front of her and her unnamed friend outside the deli at the 108th Street Grocery, which is a few blocks from the park where the alleged assault happened.
“I’m like, ‘Yo, that’s him?’ [The friend] said, ‘Yes, that’s him.’ That’s what confirmed it. And everything just spiraled from there,” she reportedly said.
Sauretti said she grabbed him and put him in a headlock as he attempted to get away from her.
She recounted saying to him as she attempted to do a citizen’s arrest, “You did that to a woman, and a woman got back and did this to you.”
She added, “He said, ‘Let me explain!’ I’m like, ‘There’s nothing to explain. You’re a rapist.’”
In addition to her, at least 10 other people also spotted him and joined in on smacking him around and helped detain him by using a belt to tie his legs. Another woman, Isabel Caizado, reportedly kicked him and hit him with a shoe.
“After that, I ain’t gonna lie, everybody just started beating on him,” Jeffrey Flores, another Queens resident, reportedly said about the group that had grabbed the suspect.
Sauretti called 911 and when police arrived, she was heard on tape yelling, “He’s the rapist! He don’t care. … He’s right there! We beat his ass!”
“He kept saying, ‘Help, help, help,’ and then I would say — I told him to shut up. That’s what the girls was yelling when he was — … one less guy on the street that is, you know, messing up the world,” Flores said.
Inga-Landi attempted to get away from the crowd by hiding underneath a car, but the NYPD dragged him out from under the car.
The 25-year-old suspect appeared in court on Wednesday and is facing multiple charges, including rape, sex abuse, robbery, menacing, unlawful imprisonment, kidnapping, endangering the welfare of a child, and possession of a weapon. If convicted, he could face 25 years to life in prison.
Queens District Attorney Melinda Katz spoke after Inga-Landi’s arraignment and thanked the Queens community for its help in catching him.
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“I am thankful that the community responded. We got the arrest within a day or two. I want to thank the NYPD. They got the word and the picture out. They got a very detailed description of the tattoo,” Katz said.
She added thanking the brave 13-year-old children involved by saying, “It is amazing then from what they went through, their identification, their you know, their memory of the tattoo, the braces, all which was right on point, which is a remarkable thing for two 13-year-olds to remember. And then the manhunt that ensued after that in this city. I do want to thank the individuals who made phone calls, who gave tips, who made sure we found Christian Inga in a timely fashion.”
