Police officers summoned to Room 15 at the Kamway Lodge in Queens last week were met at the door by the odor of a dead body and burning incense. Inside the room, they found Andrea Zamperoni, a missing chef, wrapped in bed linens and stuffed in a trash can with one foot protruding, according to federal investigators.
A woman who answered the door, Angelina Barini, was charged on Monday in connection with the death of Mr. Zamperoni, a chef for the high-end restaurant chain Cipriani, and two other men found dead from drug overdoses in other Queens motels.
On Monday afternoon, a federal magistrate judge ordered Ms. Barini be held without bail on charges of conspiracy to distribute and possession with intent to distribute one or more substances containing fentanyl.
The powerful opioid has helped drive overdose deaths to record levels in New York City and across the United States. Barini, 41, told investigators she was a prostitute and had given Mr. Zamperoni liquid ecstasy after he paid her for sex, according to a criminal complaint and affidavit.
Though toxicology tests had not been completed on Mr. Zamperoni, the charging document said the two other men had died after taking drugs Ms. Barini had given them that were laced with fentanyl, a powerful narcotic. The criminal complaint against her mentions two co-conspirators who investigators said were Ms. Barini and occasionally stole their property once they were drugged and incapacitated. At her initial court appearance, Ms. Barini appeared dressed in a baggy gray sweatshirt, sweatpants and sneakers.
