Syracuse, N.Y. — An arrest has been made in the slaying of a 93-year-old woman found dead last week in Skyline Apartments in Syracuse.
Victoria Afet, 23, of Syracuse has been charged with murdering Connie Tuori. The Syracuse Police Department announced the arrest of Afet — who has been in jail for weeks on unrelated charges — during a news conference Thursday.
Afet has been charged with first-degree murder and first-degree burglary, both felonies. If she’s convicted of first-degree murder, she could face life in prison without parole.
Syracuse police officers found Tuori, a retired teacher and world traveler, dead in her 12th-floor apartment on St. Patrick’s Day.
Afet has a history with law enforcement that includes being accused of robbing a 74-year-old woman at Skyline, stealing $38 and biting her hand on Feb. 18, police said in a felony complaint filed in Syracuse City Court. She was released by a judge the next day — only to be returned to jail just over a week later on a new charge.
Before her murder arrest, Afet had five ongoing felony cases, a short, failed stint on probation and a misdemeanor larceny conviction, public records show. She’d been jailed seven separate times in the past three years, according to records provided by Onondaga County Sheriff’s Office spokesman Sgt. Jon Seeber.
Her prior ongoing allegations included, in separate cases from 2020: slamming a woman’s head against a tree, flashing a serrated knife while threatening someone’s life and injuring someone with a knife outside a store.
Skyline Apartments, once a luxury apartment complex, is now plagued by crime and notorious for its squalor. Since Sept. 1, police have been called to the building more than 527 times — averaging almost three calls a day.
Connie Tuori
After college, Tuori taught school in Syracuse and in California, along the Mexican border. And then she taught in Italy for several years before she moved to Istanbul, Turkey, to teach English for a year and a half.
She, however, loved to travel. In the end, she visited all seven of the world’s continents.
This is a breaking news story. Check back for updates.
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Staff writer Samantha House covers breaking news, crime and public safety. Have a tip, a story idea, a question or a comment? Reach her at shouse@syracuse.com.