A New Year’s Day welfare check at a Copley hotel ended in tragedy when a 24-year-old woman from Erie, Pennsylvania, was found dead inside a room she had been sharing with a 29-year-old man, according to police. Days later, investigators say the same man was discovered in Akron with another 24-year-old woman who had allegedly been held and brutalized for days.
The suspect, identified by investigators as Marcus Dangelo Price, is charged with murder, rape, felonious assault, and kidnapping in connection with the Erie woman’s death. He is currently being held in the Summit County Jail on unrelated warrants while detectives continue piecing together what happened in the days leading up to the killing and the second alleged assault.
Copley police formally filed the felony charges against Price, according to News 5 Cleveland. Investigators say Price and the Erie woman had been staying in the same hotel room around the time she died. Prosecutors have not yet publicly addressed a possible motive and are waiting on additional evidence and forensic results.
Medical Examiner Rules Death a Homicide
The Summit County Medical Examiner’s Office determined that 24-year-old Shawnna Elizabeth Pasquale died “as a result of a physical assault” after she was found in a hotel room on Rothrock Loop on Jan. 1, officials said. WOIO/Cleveland 19 reported that Pasquale had moved to the Copley area about a month earlier, hoping for a fresh start, and that her family has been pressing authorities for answers. Early on, police said they did not believe the attack was random.
Second Woman Rescued in Akron
Not long after Pasquale’s death, detectives were alerted that another 24-year-old woman was missing. She was later found with Price in Akron’s Kenmore neighborhood on Jan. 9, according to News 5 Cleveland. The United States Marshals Service’s Northern Ohio Violent Fugitive Task Force and the Akron Police Department joined the search and assisted in locating and rescuing her…