A shocked Brooklyn tenant fatally stabbed a violent ex-con burglar with the intruder’s own knife as he struggled to disarm the stranger who had invaded his apartment, according to sources and a report.
The 45-year-old tenant appeared to have acted in self-defense when he allegedly knifed 34-year-old Dan Costume in the leg and back during a Friday night scuffle inside his third-floor apartment on Avenue D near East 31st Street in Flatbush, law enforcement sources said.
Costume — who has been on parole since 2024 after serving prison time for attempted burglary, according to public records — had first stabbed the tenant in the neck, cops said.
The tenant, speaking in Spanish, told The Daily News he’d just come home from playing soccer, and his wife had left the door unlocked when she went to run an errand.
When the renter stepped out of the bathroom, he came face-to-face with Costume carrying a haul that included two cellphones and a laptop.
“He was in shock that there was a random person in his house,” one of the tenant’s relatives said in English, translating the man’s frightening ordeal.
The tenant grabbed Costume from behind, but he wouldn’t drop the items — so the two strangers began “battling between each other,” according to the relative.
The intruder bit the resident’s hands and cheek before knifing him, the family member told the paper.
After stabbing Costume twice during the battle, the battered resident booted him into the hallway, before the bloodied burglar collapsed on the stairwell and dropped his loot, the outlet reported.
Both men were taken to the Kings County Hospital Center, where Costume died of his injuries.
The resident was listed in stable condition and has since been released.
“He was acting in self-defense,” the relative told The Daily News. “Everything happened so fast.”
The stunned tenant was initially taken into custody, but his arrest has since been voided, the sources said.
Blood stains were still visible on the staircase walls Monday.
“I saw the blood, but I don’t know what happened,” one resident said.
