Queens landlord accused of stabbing 3 tenants to death says he ‘just snapped’ after partner mocked him over rent

A Queens landlord accused of stabbing his girlfriend and two tenants to death told cops he “just snapped” after his partner mocked him about back rent and refused to pay her share, prosecutors said Wednesday.

In a statement to cops shortly after turning himself in, David Daniel blamed “stress” for Tuesday morning’s deadly outburst, an excuse he backed up a day later when he told reporters outside a Queens precinct that he had been under “a lot of pressure.”

Daniel showed up Tuesday at the 113th Precinct stationhouse and confessed that he “did something bad” inside his Millburn St. home in St. Albans, cops said.

Officers rushed to his home to find Colleen Caesar Fields, 51, dead in an upstairs bedroom. Two other victims, a man and a woman, were found dead in a basement apartment.

Investigators believe Daniel killed all three as part of an ongoing landlord-tenant dispute. The couple downstairs had not paid their rent since the start of the COVID pandemic, a police source said.

“I’m having trouble with my tenants, they haven’t paid rent in a long time,” Daniel said in a statement to cops, according to prosecutors. “I did a horrible thing, real bad.”

Officers at the precinct asked him if he had killed someone. Daniel replied, “Yes.”

“I just need some time, I was trying to see if I can get the bodies out because they didn’t want to come out,” he told the officers on Tuesday. “This morning it happened, everyone is there now,

“Tenants and the person I live with — everyone is dead, honestly,” he said. “The tenants are downstairs in the basement, one male, one female The backdoor leads upstairs to the bedroom.”

Then Daniel described the confrontation that led to the carnage.

“My partner began to mock me because I wasn’t doing anything about the payment,” he said. “She locked me out of the room and I told her we don’t have to share a room, but she has to pay $1,500 dollars in rent. She refused to do that and I just snapped. I was just so angry from all the stress.”

Daniel, 54, dressed in a white Tyvek suit, listened at his Queens Criminal Court arraignment as his lawyer, Daria Aumand, said she wants him to undergo a psychiatric evaluation.

“It may be an extreme emotional distress issue or another psychiatric issue where it’s best for a doctor to evaluate,” the attorney said.

Prosecutors, who charged Daniel with first- and second-degree murder and criminal possession of a weapon, want him jailed for life without the possibility of parole.

“The bloody crime scene was the result of extraordinary brutality,” Queens District Attorney Melinda Katz said in a statement. “In court, what we will show is that the defendant viciously stabbed his defenseless victims to death.”

Cops executed a search warrant and found scissors and a knife in the car Daniel used to drive himself to the precinct, according to proseuctors.

As Daniel was being prepared for his court appearance, his slain girlfriend, Caesar Fields, was remembered Wednesday as a loving mom who was “full of life.”

“This is a big blow,” Steve Fields, the victim’s ex-husband, told the Daily News. “It comes as a surprise. She was a nice person, a very energetic person, full of life.”

Also killed were Evette Sweeney, 55, and Thomas Wayne, 57.

After the arraignment, Daniel was held custody, with his case adjourned until Friday.

The landlord’s brother previously told The News that Daniel didn’t have a history of violence and comes from a close-knit family with roots in the island country of Jamaica.

“My brother is not a violent person,” the sibling said. “He doesn’t really go out here and look for trouble, you know? So this is, like, shocking to the entire family right now.”