A renter charged with strangling his Queens landlady last year is a migrant from Colombia who was allowed into the US as an unaccompanied minor, sources said — as the victim’s outraged sister claimed authorities kept it quiet until it was too late.
Davi Vidal, 20, crossed the border illegally in San Luis, Arizona, in June 2022 when he was 17, and was allowed to remain in the country as an unescorted minor — standard practice for lone underage migrants who are freed into the country for “humanitarian reasons,” federal law enforcement sources said.
Sources said Vidal’s “US sponsor” was an aunt in Wisconsin. He was cut loose with a date for an immigration court hearing, though it was unclear when that hearing was scheduled for, according to the sources and records.
But on Dec. 7, 2023, Vidal was still free when he allegedly got into a rent dispute with his landlord, Zoraida Leo, 55, and attacked her, leaving her to die inside her building on 96th Street near Northern Boulevard in East Elmhurst, police said.