The body of 65-year-old Edwin Echevarria was recovered floating in a suitcase in the East River last Wednesday afternoon.
Christian Millet, 23, was brought in for questioning after the victim was identified.
He allegedly made statements linking himself to the crime, apparently describing it as the result of an ongoing dispute.
Authorities say Millet knocked his victim to the ground during a verbal dispute over food that turned physical. While on the ground, he allegedly stomped on Echevarria's head, stabbed him about 12 to 13 times and dismembered him in a bathtub.
When the suitcase was discovered, it contained a torso, zipped into a sleeping bag that was stuffed into the suitcase.
The news of the arrest came after missing person posters with Echevarria's name and face started showing up around this Lower East Side neighborhood.
Some neighbors say they saw Millet in the building and Echevarria would call him his grandson.
"It's just a shocker how you can have somebody stay at your home and they just blatantly just take your life as if it's nothing," a neighbor said. "And then you sit there and tell the f***ing cops like, oh, I don't know where he's at."
Family members told Eyewitness News that Millet is the son of Echevarria's longtime partner, and he had been staying at Echevarria's home.
Echevarria's nephew says his uncle was a kind man and a hard worker who just retired from his job as a postal worker.
He says it was in his nature to help others, but in this case it ultimately led to his death.
"That's how Edwin was, kind hearted, you know what I mean? If you needed something, he was able to help you," said nephew Eric Maldonado.
Millet was arraigned Thursday, and charged with murder in the second degree and concealment of a human corpse.
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