Arrest made in killing of Michigan Avenue Chicago doctor

chicagotribune.com
Arrest made in killing of Michigan Avenue doctor

By Angela Rozas

Tribune staff reporter

3:08 PM CDT, August 14, 2007

A man suspected in the slaying of a Michigan Avenue dermatologist has been arrested on the Caribbean island of St. Martin, Chicago police said this afternoon.

The suspect surrendered after a federal provisional warrant was obtained in the killing of Dr. David Cornbleet, police said. Authorities will try to extradite the man to the United States.

The warrant was issued June 8, after police learned that the man had fled to St. Martin, the French side of the Caribbean island, and police had been working for months to secure his arrest, authorities said.

The suspect eventually turned himself in to French authorities, Interim Police Supt. Dana Starks said at a news conference at Chicago police headquarters this afternoon.

The dermatologist was found bound, gagged and stabbed to death in his Michigan Avenue office on Oct. 24.

Harrison Area Cmdr. Steve Peterson said DNA evidence from the suspect's former apartment in New York as well as surveillance video from the doctor's office and a parking garage led them to the suspect.

Police also credited a MySpace page started by the doctor's family with generating leads.

Jon Cornbleet, the doctor's son, said the family received a substantial number of tips from the Internet.

He said he was pleased a suspect was in custody but is concerned about the extradition process.

The French government does not have the death penalty and typically has not extradited individuals wanted in capital cases.

"I knew I would get him," Cornbleet said at the news conference. "I had all the confidence in the world the police would get him."

A police source said the suspect has confessed to the murder. The suspect allegedly told authorities he killed Cornbleet after the doctor prescribed him a drug for skin problems that left him impotent, the source said. The man also knew details about the crime that others did not, the source said.

The man was an Internet gambler and lived off winnings, the source said.

A video obtained from the scene and distributed widely showed a man entering through a revolving door into the lobby of 30 N. Michigan, across from Millennium Park, wearing a red baseball cap and a gray jacket. The video did not offer a clear view of the man's face.

About an hour later, the man emerges from an elevator in the building wearing a black stocking cap and holding a jacket?-turned out to expose its white lining?-over his face and torso.

A video from a nearby parking garage on Monroe Street also helped lead police to the suspect, Peterson said.

Chicaog Trib. 8/14/07