Pace Student Found Strangled in Apartment

The Pace University community is reeling after news that a student was found strangled in his Chelsea apartment. According to the Daily News, 19-year-old Kevin Pravia was found by his roommate yesterday afternoon. Police arrived at 239 West 15th Street around 6 p.m., and Pravia was "strangled with an electrical cord that was still wrapped around his neck" and his "mouth was stuffed with plastic."

A neighbor told NY1, "I was at home last night and I heard somebody screaming in the hallway and I opened up my door and his roommate was yelling, 'he's dead, he's dead.'" The neighbor also said Pravia and the roommate had moved into the apartment several weeks ago and that the police suggested Pravia could have died on Friday. There were no signs of a break-in, and police are not calling it a murder yet. Pravia had been on the honor roll and Dean's List at Pace, which issued a statement of sympathy to his family and friends.

Other residents were shocked: One told the News, "Me and my girlfriend only moved in yesterday and this is not what we expected. We were told this is a really nice neighborhood. I can't believe this," while an NYU student said, "I can't let my folks know about this. The reason they let me live here is because it's supposed to be so safe."

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By Jen Chung in News on September 1, 2008 10:06 AM

Comments [rss]

wineNroses

I think everyone should have the right to comment, I just wanted you to know who you were talking about. If it were a friend of YOURS, you would feel the same. His funeral was lovely, except for the press who stuck a camera in his mother's face. We asked them to leave, but they just went across the street. He always wanted to be famous...

da90027

SO WHAT IF he was gay or straight. It makes no difference. I love the way people make rude, insensitive and unsympathetic remarks HIDING behind a computer. If you said stuff like this to anyone in person you'd get punched or worse. It really shows what a lousy job your parents did in raising you. Karma is a bitch so be very careful what you say about others and how you treat people. No one deserves to die this way. Last I checked suicide victims don't strangle themselves. Opinions are like a holes, everyone has one and they usually stink !!!

JusticeGuy216

The truth is something everyone will have to handle. I was mainly referring to comments like #4.

NannyState

#13, When the truth comes out about this, will you and wineNroses be able to handle it?

jessiegolightly

You're asking 8 million new yorkers not to comment on something that happened in their backyard.

JusticeGuy216

Why post a comment about a (possible) murder victim who you don't even know? As wineNroses said his family and friends don't need to read your theories on what happened to Kevin. It's a sensitive subject and I think some of you should think of his family and friends before commenting.

Even as someone who went to school with Kevin I don't feel that it's my place to share my speculations. I'd really appreciate it if those who didn't know Kevin at all do the same.

NannyState

This is how mobsters rub out guys behind on their vig, not a 19 yr. old college kid. This is beyond disturbing and sick. terrible.

eager2

Just because commenting is an option doesn't mean you have to do it all the time. Your uninformed musings and opinions are of very little value to this story. A young man who happened to live in Chelsea is dead. If you want to speculate as to why, do it to yourself, or to people who, by virtue of being your family, friends, or coworkers, are unfortunately obligated to listen to you. Spare the rest of us. Please.

MikeAM

Unfortunate about his death and that some people think everybody who lives in Chelsea is gay. He lived on safe block - some other parts of Chelsea, particularly OuCh (Outer Chelsea) by Club Row is kind of sketchy. Hate to say it, but it looks more like a suicide rather than a homicide whenever any type of strangling happens. It doesn't make as much sense as to why there was plastic in his mouth, unless it was an attempt to mask his screaming as he was strangled.

wineNroses

He was a friend from high school, what sickens me is that people treat this like a joke until it happens to someone standing right next to you in a yearbook photo. You people need to grow up and show some respect. He wasn't even twenty. His family loved him.

ides_of_march

"The reason they let me live here is because it's supposed to be so safe."

It must be a rule in journalism that whenever a gruesome murder happens, find at least one clueless dummy to interview who thought their neighborhood was somehow magically immune from such crimes.

Kojak

"And how do you know he was gay?"

He lives in Chelsea.

zingbot

Let's not blame the victim before more facts are released. It could've been a homicide.

And how do you know he was gay?

Wza

yep ^

dooWOP

Sounds like rough gay sex gone awry...

jessiegolightly

and the mouth stuffed with plastic leads you to believe he did it himself?

moocowtoo

They are not calling it a murder yet? Hmm, self-asphyxiation maybe?

maevro

I have lived in Chelsea for 6 years and I have always felt very safe. You have murders everywhere, so not telling your parents or flipping out is unwarranted.