Trupti Patel, 36 and described as of Southwest Asian descent, was found murdered in the basement of her East Hartford apartment building off Nutmeg Lane in the early morning hours of July 10, 2004. Her husband had reported her missing the night before after returning from an overnight shift and finding her car in the complex parking lot. She had been shot multiple times.

The case went cold for years until a DNA sample from the scene was matched to Kelvin Daye after he was compelled to provide DNA following a conviction in an unrelated drug case. Daye was arrested in May 2011 and tried in Hartford. Prosecutors said the attack was sexually motivated and presented DNA evidence linking Daye and Trupti to a condom found at the scene; Daye was acquitted of first-degree sexual assault but convicted in March 2013 of capital felony, murder, felony murder, and first-degree kidnapping. He was later sentenced to life in prison without the possibility of release.