E. SIDE PARTY SLAY
A suspect was being questioned at a Manhattan station house Wednesday evening in connection with the murder of a Connecticut man who was killed at a posh apartment paid for by a jeweler to the stars, sources said.
James Rackover was in police custody, but had not been charged in the gruesome slaying of 26-year-old Joseph Comunale, whose body was found days after he went missing.
Rackover lives in the apartment on East 59th Street near First Avenue where Comunale had been partying on Saturday night.
The luxury pad, near Sutton Place, was being paid for by jeweler Jeffrey Rackover, who adorns A-listers and helped Donald Trump pick out an engagement ring for his wife, Melania, sources said.
Jeffrey lives in another apartment in the same building, but it’s unclear how the pair are related.
Police discovered Comunale’s body in a shallow grave in Oceanport, NJ, on Wednesday morning, according to sources.
The Stamford man — a Hofstra University grad who worked as a sales associate at Tri-Ed Ltd. — had been stabbed nine times, and had a broken pelvis.
He had also been set on fire in a possible effort to cover up the crime, and may have been thrown from a fourth-floor window, the sources said.
Comunale had been hanging out at The Gilded Lily in Chelsea on Saturday, and followed a group of people to the party at James Rackover’s apartment.
Sources said the group was using cocaine and police suspect steroids were also involved.
“We believe something apparently went south in the apartment after partying all night,” a police source said.
Cops found blood inside the apartment, and on the clothes of Rackover and one of his friends, sources said.
Rackover was taken into custody on Wednesday after officers arrested him for allegedly driving without a license.
Comunale was last seen in building surveillance video with-James Rackover.
James lawyered up when he was taken into custody and has not been cooperating, according to law-enforcement sources.
Cops found Comunale’s body after the suspect’s friend turned himself in, telling cops they drove to New Jersey to dump the body, police said.
Comunale’s devastated father, Pat, told reporters outside his Stamford home on Wednesday evening that his son was a “great kid” and “one of a kind.”
Jeffrey Rackover declined to comment.