Same man may have strangled two women

They held off labeling him a serial killer, but police on Tuesday said DNA evidence links the same person to the strangulations of two women this month in the city's Kensington section.

"The DNA from both crime scenes is connected, so we have been able to link both these murders to the same individual," Homicide Capt. James Clark said at a news conference.

The body of Elaine Goldberg, a 21-year-old nursing student at Gwynedd-Mercy College, was found Nov. 3 in a lot on the 2800 block of Ruth Street.

The body of Nicole Piacentini, 35, was discovered Nov. 13 less than a mile away, behind a building on the 1900 block of East Cumberland Street.

Both bodies were found partially clothed. Clark said the women had been sexually assaulted and strangled.

In the wake of the slayings, two additional women have come forward to tell police they were sexually assaulted in separate October incidents by a man who choked them to unconsciousness.

One woman told police the assault took place in the same lot where Piacentini's body was found.

One of the women provided a description that was used for a police sketch of a suspect, but Clark cautioned that "we're not 100 percent sure if that attacker is our killer."

Clark said investigators have submitted DNA evidence from the nonfatal attacks to the police laboratory and are awaiting the results to see if there is any connection. The DNA samples also are being run through a national database.

Clark said detectives have interviewed many people and are receiving "a lot of cooperation."

They still lack a solid lead.

"As of yet, nothing's panned out," Clark said, but he added: "This is big. We do now know definitively that both these [cases] are connected."

When asked if the man they're looking for is a serial killer, Clark said, "Potentially," but "right now we're not calling it serial murder. We're trying to get this individual off the street before it would come to [that]."

Detectives are looking back several years for other unsolved attacks in Kensington and similar crimes in other parts of the city, Clark said. The department is also reaching out to federal authorities to see if there are connections outside the city.

The attacks happened in a section of Kensington known as a high-traffic area for drug dealing and prostitution. Since the attacks began, police have asked people to stay out of the area unless they live or have "legitimate business" there.

The attacker in the police sketch is described by one of the surviving victims as a slender, light-skinned African American or Latino man in his late 20s.

He stands between 5-foot-6 and 5-foot-10 and has a mark on his cheek and a goatee. At one point, he was described as wearing a blue hooded sweatshirt and blue denim cargo pants.

Anyone with information is asked to call homicide at 215-685-3334 or -3335.

"Give us whatever information you have," Clark said, "and let us do our thing."