Metro

Man arrested after stabbing HIV-shelter manager to death: cops

A deranged man was arrested today after he stabbed an Upper West Side shelter manager to death yesterday afternoon, cops said.

Bernardo Paulino, 34, allegedly slashed John Baisley, 56, several times about 12:30 p.m. at the Camden Residence Hotel on 95th Street, between Broadway and Amsterdam, authorities said.

Baisley, the front-desk manager of the facility that provides emergency housing to people living with HIV, went to Paulino’s third-floor room to evict him for destroying property, police sources said.

Paulino became enraged and chased him out of the room with a hammer, sources said. “He was out of his damn mind,” said Herlene Lawton, 61, who also lives on the third-floor. “I heard screaming and fighting outside my door. I didn’t dare go out there.”

Paulino then allegedly got a kitchen knife, and began stabbing him, sources said. When police arrived at the scene, Paulino refused to drop the blade, and cops had to taser him to take him into custody, sources added.

“I went up to see the police were already struggling with Bernardo. They yelled at him, drop the knife! But he refused. He kept yelling, ‘No! No!’ “said Linda, 42, a resident who declined to give her last name. “They had no choice and they had to tase him. I saw the knife- it could have been eight inches long.”

EMS rushed Baisley to St. Luke’s Hospital, where he died, authorities said.

His wife, who declined to give her name, came to the scene and began weeping today. “I don’t want to feel like he’s dead,” she sobbed. “I just want to honor him.”

Lawton said Paulino seemed psychotic before the attack. “I saw him acting crazy in the middle of the night, sitting on the floor talking to himself in the hallway,” she said. “I knew that man was crazy, but didn’t know he was gonna do something like this.”

Resident John Flemings, 71, who also lives on the third-floor said Paulino had been kicked out in the past for psychotic behavior, but that Baisley helped him come back to shelter.

“That’s what he gets for trying to help someone out. And now Bernardo stabbed John to death over nothing. ” said Flemings. “I came outside right after the fight…. He said, ‘He cut me bad! I’m bleeding.’ I saw him just covered and dripping with blood. It was a horrible fight.”

Sources said Baisley had a long rap sheet up until 2005, but hadn’t been in trouble with the law since then. He had at least fifteen drug possession and trespassing related arrests on his record that date back to 1991, sources added. He lived nearby at the Douglas II housing development on Columbus Avenue, near 104th Street.

Paulino was taken to Metropolitan Hospital for a psychiatric evaluation, and then transferred to Bellevue Hospital, where he was charged with second-degree murder, cops said.