Man arrested at Fla. site where woman's body found

Authorities arrested a man Thursday at the location where a young woman’s body was found inside an abandoned car near Florida’s Space Coast on Tuesday, WKMG reported.

Officers from the Palm Bay Police Department were interviewing neighbors in the area after the body was found, when they took the man into custody. There was no immediate word on charges against the man, or his connection to the ongoing investigation.

On Tuesday, the battered body of Jillian Christine Kusznir, 22, was found in the trunk of the abandoned vehicle, just off Interstate 95. A business owner alerted authorities about a suspicious car parked in a lot around 7 a.m.

Police later found the car’s trunk ajar with Kusznir’s body inside. Kusznir’s mother owned the vehicle, police said.

Authorities told the station Kusznir had suffered noticeable trauma before her body was discovered. Her last known address was not far away from the site of the discovery.

“Our detectives have been working this case nonstop. We will not stop until we give Jillian and her family the justice that she deserves,” Palm Bay Police Commander John Resh told the station.

Surveillance footage showed a man walking away from the vehicle Monday evening. No information was immediately available to determine whether the man taken into custody Thursday resembled the man in the video.

Kusznir was a witness to the shooting deaths of two of her friends inside another man’s home in 2013, MyFoxOrlando reported. She told detectives at the time she had purchased marijuana from the homeowner, Stephen Wright, who got involved in an argument with her friends. Wright later shot and killed both men. The incident was ruled a justifiable homicide, and no charges were filed. Kusznir also had previous charges relating to theft.