Veron Primus: Suspect in Chanel Petro-Nixon cold case escapes Caribbean prison for 2nd time

By Mary Murphy, WPIX

KINGSTOWN, St. Vincent (WPIX) -- Veron Primus, a man indicted in absentia 10 years after the 2006 cold-case murder of Brooklyn high-school student Chanel Petro-Nixon, has escaped for a second time from prison on the Caribbean island of St. Vincent and the Grenadines.

A police bulletin was issued for Primus, 33, and convicted killer, Ulric Hanson, who were inmates at Her Majesty's Prison in Kingstown. "Both men are considered armed and very dangerous," the bulletin said.

TRUE CRIME DAILY: Veron Primus case coverage - TCD

Primus, who was born in St. Vincent, was awaiting trial on the island for the 2015 murder of real estate agent Sharleen Greaves and was serving time for his first prison escape in early October 2019. After the first escape, he turned himself in to authorities within 12 hours.

Primus grew up in Brooklyn and met Chanel Petro-Nixon at church. On Father’s Day in 2006, Petro-Nixon, then 16, told her parents she was going to submit a job application at Applebee’s on Fulton Street, near their Bedford-Stuyvesant home.

TRUE CRIME DAILY: Could a New York City cold case be solved by a kidnapping 3000 miles away? - TCD

She said Primus, then 19 and living in Crown Heights, was supposed to meet her at Applebee’s. She never came home. Her body was discovered four days later, folded over in a garbage bag on a Kingston Avenue sidewalk, about a mile from her home. She had been strangled.

Primus later served time in a New York State prison for violating an Order of Protection secured by a girlfriend, and then he was deported to St. Vincent in 2015.

MORE:

• Man indicted in 2006 strangulation of Brooklyn girl escapes Caribbean prison 2nd time - WPIX

• Police launch manhunt for two “dangerous” escaped prisoners - St. Vincent & Grenadines Searchlight