Suspect in Jewelry Heist Slayings Is Captured

A man suspected of killing three jewelers during a robbery spree in New York and Connecticut was captured Friday, found with his girlfriend in a motel room on the casino strip a block from police headquarters.

Christopher DiMeo, 23, surrendered peacefully after officers surrounded the Ascot Motel, where he and his girlfriend had checked in Thursday.

Police evacuated the motel before a police negotiator reached DiMeo by phone. After about an hour of talks, an unarmed DiMeo surrendered, according to Maj. John Hunt of the New Jersey State Police.

Authorities believe DiMeo chatted up store employees for as long as 45 minutes before the robberies, saying he was looking for an engagement ring, then pulled out a gun and took merchandise worth hundreds of thousands of dollars. Police said victims had described him as talkative and engaging, with piercing blue eyes.

He was jailed on a parole violation from New York state, but is suspected in four robberies and three killings, including the deaths of a couple Wednesday in Fairfield, Conn., Hunt said.

The motel is one block from the city’s Public Safety Building, where the state attorney general was meeting with school officials and local and state police about violence in the city.

“Talk about bad timing on his part,” Atty. Gen. Peter Harvey said later.

DiMeo was expected to be arraigned Monday.

His girlfriend, identified by motel workers as Nicole Pearce, was being held Friday on a fugitive warrant from California, authorities said.