Queens landlord 'stabbed two tenants and girlfriend to death for refusing to pay rent since COVID' - as neighbor says suspect once looked at him like he was 'ready to kill'

A New York landlord reportedly killed two of his tenants - as well as his girlfriend - in a dispute over back rent.

David Daniel, 54  is now facing murder charges as a result - after turning himself over to police moments after the murders.

The triple stabbing happened in the St. Albans section of Queens sometime before 7am, and left two women, ages 51 and 55, and one 57-year-old man dead.

Two of the victims, the man and the 55-year-old woman, were tenants at the single-family home where the killings occurred - which is owned by Daniel and had been rented out for the past several years.

Cops found the tenants in a basement bedroom, and the suspect's girlfriend in a bed upstairs. Daniel later turned himself in to confess, and law enforcement sources said he may have been motivated by a rent dispute that dates back to the pandemic.

The triple murder happened just before 7am, and a David turned himself to the 113th Precinct minutes later to own up to slayings. There, he told officers he was 'having issues with his tenants'.

NYPD Assistant Chief Kevin Williams told reporters in a statement hours later outside the home, which was overrun with cops Tuesday morning: 'The officer inquired further, and the male stated that "he did something bad,"

'He came in as calm as we thought he could he could be when he engaged the officers,' the top cop added. 

Footage from Tuesday morning, meanwhile, showed the department's stark response - with dozens of lawmen gathered in the home's backyard less than an hour after they received word of the murders.

They remained over the course of the morning, as cops at the precinct roughly a mile away questioned the suspect.

There, he gave cops the address of his home and told them 'he left the backdoor open,' NYPD Chief of Detectives Joseph Kenny said later Tuesday, as he recounted how the landlord 'said that he killed three people' before providing the information.

Police proceeded to descend on the single-family, three bedroom home around 7:16am, where they found the bodies and pronounced all dead.

During Daniel's alleged confession - which saw him charged with first- and second-degree murder later in the day - he  told cops 'that he had [been having] problems with his girlfriend and that the two [people] in the basement had not been paying their rent,' Det. Kenny said.