Man held in murder case
Suspect in death of New Scotland man arrested in Virginia
A physician assistant who is a suspect in the killing of a 35year-old New Scotland man was arrested by police and federal agents Friday evening as he drove across the Virginia border from Tennessee, police said.
Jacob L. Klein, 40, had emerged as a person of interest in the slaying of Philip L. Rabadi, who was a physician assistant at St. Peter’s Hospital. The victim was bound, slashed and mutilated in his Miller Road residence several miles south of Albany.
Police have not disclosed a motive for the homicide, but Albany County Sheriff Craig Apple said Klein was stalking Rabadi’s wife — who had once been Klein’s girlfriend — for three days before the murder. She was unaware of the surveillance, Apple said.
While she knew Klein, her husband did not, the sheriff said. Apple said investigators believe they know why Klein was stalking Rabadi’s wife, 29-year-old Elana Z. Radin, but said, “I can’t go into detail on that.”
Klein spent much of his childhood in Cobleskill. A former schoolmate of Klein’s at The Albany Academy, who asked not to be identified, said that growing up Klein was known as “Larry” or “Lawrence,” his middle name. The former schoolmate said Klein commuted from Schoharie County to the private school in Albany for several years and graduated in 1999.
Federal agents assisted in the surveillance and arrest of Klein, who is being held in custody without bond on a federal warrant charging him with unlawful flight from prosecution. Under federal statutes, a person who allegedly commits a felony and
crosses state lines for the purposes of fleeing can be arrested by federal agents.
Klein also faces a charge of second-degree murder on the basis of an arrest warrant issued in Albany County Court, Apple said.
Klein could remain in federal custody for more than a week and will initially appear before a U.S. magistrate before being returned to Albany, where he will be turned over to state authorities and is expected to face additional charges in connection with the homicide, Apple said.
Using data and video from license plate readers, doorbell video cameras and other electronic devices, Apple said investigators were able to put together a timeline of Klein’s activity before and after the murder.
Law enforcement sources said phone data also was critical in tracking Klein’s movement over a three-day period before his arrest. Klein at one point took an Uber in Albany and video from the ride was seized by police.
The electronic data indicated Klein had visited the couple’s residence prior to the homicide.
Initially, investigators suspected Klein had flown to Albany and boarded a
return flight at 10:30 a.m. Wednesday following the homicide. They now believe he drove his vehicle from Franklin County, Virginia, where he has a residence, to Albany. He obtained a vehicle at a car-rental business on Central Avenue and used the vehicle to surveil Rabadi’s home and to visit St. Peter’s Hospital, where
both Rabadi and his wife worked.
Apple said Klein drove to Albany three days before the murder. After covertly stalking Rabadi’s wife, he waited until she left for work at St. Peter’s Hospital early Wednesday and went to the couple’s residence, Apple said. Ring and Nest cameras of neighbors captured footage of part of the confrontation when Rabadi opened the front door at about 7:30 a.m., he said.
Radin had left home to go to work around 6 a.m.
A source briefed on the investigation said as Klein confronted Rabadi, the resident appeared to react as if a weapon was brandished before he retreated into the house with Klein behind him. Police recovered a handgun from the glove box in Klein’s vehicle when he was arrested just after 6 p.m. Friday.
Rabadi did not show up for his shift at the hospital that morning and when he couldn’t be reached, his wife, also employed as a physician assistant at St. Peter’s, called 911, Apple said. She and Rabadi’s father arrived at the house about the same time as a sheriff ’s deputy, and they were right behind the deputy when she found Rabadi’s body in the garage, he said. Rabadi was bound and dead at the time they found his body, with injuries that included stab wounds to his upper body and head.
Klein allegedly drove away from the house and returned the rental vehicle that morning just before 10 at an Enterprise business at 900 Central Ave. On Thursday, license-plate readers in Virginia showed him traveling in that state in his vehicle. He returned home and federal agents kept watch on him overnight Thursday, according to a person briefed on the investigation.
On Friday, investigators continued undercover surveillance of Klein, largely based on tracking his phone, and initially thought he was fleeing as he drove into Tennessee. But later that day, Klein, who had stopped in Memphis, began driving back toward his Virginia home.
As he approached the state line of Virginia, a fleet of state troopers from both states, with a helicopter overhead, stopped Klein along a highway less than a half mile into Virginia. A law enforcement source said he remained in his vehicle for several minutes and would not immediately follow orders to get out with his hands up. At one point, the source said, Klein appeared to reach toward his glove box but then stopped and sat for several more minutes.
He eventually left the vehicle and surrendered without incident.
Apple said they had no record that Klein was currently working at any Virginia medical facilities.
Radin has ties to the Syracuse area and she attended the SUNY College of Medicine in Brooklyn, graduating in 2016 — a year after Klein graduated from the same school. They had a personal relationship for several years, but it’s unclear if they met while attending medical school or became acquainted in their medical careers.
Rabadi, a surgical physician assistant who began working at St. Peter’s Hospital in 2019, is from Albany and graduated from the University at Albany and Albany Medical College, where he had been an honors student.
Klein is a military veteran with no prior criminal record. He had been a physician assistant in California and upstate New York, including at Columbia Memorial Hospital in Hudson. He has ties to the Cobleskill area and central New York, and also lived in southern California, according to public records.
The Times Union first reported Friday that police sources said evidence placed Klein in the Albany area on the morning that Rabadi was killed, including at the New Scotland residence.
Rabadi and Radin were married in September in West Sand Lake and bought their house off New Scotland Road about two months before, county records show.