Vet stabbed to death in Bronx deli

An unhinged woman described by those who know her as a neighborhood troublemaker was charged Friday with the knife slaying of an elderly veteran inside a Bronx grocery store.

Madelyn Tamarez, 31, knifed the man at the Sam Aden grocery store on Westchester Ave. near Commonwealth Ave. in Parkchester, police said.

Tamarez — a “problem to everybody,” said store coowner Abdo Kaid — got into an argument with the victim in the store shortly after noon.

“(The victim) was in the store buying coffee. He comes in a lot,” said Kaid.

“She comes in and says, ‘You racist. You blah blah blah.’ So he spits … twice in her face. But I yell at her, ‘Get out of the store. Leave.’”

Tamarez walked out — and returned moments later with knife, Kaid said.

She stabbed the man, 70, three or four times and ran off, said cops and witnesses.

Medics rushed the victim to Jacobi Medical Center, where he was declared dead. Cops arrested Tamarez a short time after the slaying.

“Everybody knows her. … And she always has the knife,” said Kaid, 29.

“The blood is all over. The blood is there (on the pavement) and inside everywhere,” he said.

The dead man lived two blocks away at the New Era Veterans Home. His name was not released.

People in the neighborhood said Tamarez is unbalanced and often threatens people.

“She’s always around,” said a man who works in a local tax-preparing business and wished to remain anonymous. “She always has that knife.”

Cops have busted Tamarez roughly a dozen times in the last decade for assault, aggravated harassment and theft, among other offenses.

The nature of the dispute in her alleged deadly attack Friday is still under investigation, police sources said.

Tamarez is charged with murder, manslaughter and criminal possession of a weapon, cops said.