One of the year’s strangest news stories just got stranger, as the man known on the Internet as “Kai the hatchet-wielding hitchhiker” has just been charged with murder.
Prosecutors in Union County, N.J. arrested and charged the 24-year-old Kai – whose real name is Caleb Lawrence McGillvery – with murder for the bludgeoning death of 71-year-old attorney Joseph Galfy.
Galfy was found in his New Jersey bedroom on Monday, beaten to death and wearing only his socks and underwear.
During a press conference Wednesday, Union County Prosecutor Theodore Romankow was able to pick out McGillvery from video captured on a surveillance camera in Times Square. Romankow also added that McGillvery cut his “Carrot Top“-like hair in an attempt to disguise himself.
Law enforcement officials noted that McGillvery commented on the incident on his Facebook page:
Police captured McGillvery at the Greyhound bus station in Philadelphia last week. His bail was set at $3 million.
“I believe that everyone is a little safer with this person off the streets,” Romankow said.
Kai is best known for saving two women and a Pacific Gas & Electric employee in California from a seemingly deranged man by striking the man in the head with a hatchet. His bravery was captured on video and published on YouTube, where it has received more than 260,000 hits.
