My Therapist Was Murdered Last Night.

Dr. Kathryn Faughey was my therapist for 13 years.

She was a wonderful, wonderful person and my friend.

She helped me get my diagnosis when I was becoming disabled. And stood by me during the disability process.

She helped me through my infertility treatments and the birth of my children.

She helped me get through the deaths of both my parents.

She kept me from harm and helped me through severe PTSD of 4 years ago.

She was a deeply spiritual woman, a class act and the sort of therapist I wish everyone had.

I am in shock.

Please pray for her boundless spirit and her husband.

She was a one of a kind doctor, friend and human being.


Patient hacks therapist to death

BY ALISON GENDAR, KERRY BURKE and ETHAN ROUEN
DAILY NEWS STAFF WRITERS

A cleaver-wielding patient hacked his psychologist to death in her upper East Side office Tuesday night, viciously slashed a colleague who came to her aid and then fled into the night, cops said.

The psycho apparently attacked Kathryn Faughey, 57, during a therapy session about 9p.m., repeatedly chopping at her body with a meat cleaver, police said.

"Lots of anger," a police source said. "This was clearly personal."

A psychiatrist from the same practice in the E.79th St. building, Kent Shinbach, attempted to help her, but the maniac slashed him numerous times in the face and neck, cops said.

The force of the blows was so severe that the killer bent two knives - the cleaver and a 9-inch blade with a camouflage handle - during the assault, police sources said.

"The place was trashed," another police source said. "There was some violent struggle. Her blood was all over her office."

The blood-spattered assailant left the weapons in the office and fled through a basement exit into an alley, the source said. His escape was filmed on numerous surveillance tapes, and police say they know who they are looking for.

"I saw emergency crews rolling out a body covered in blood with a sheet over it," said Alexandra Pike, 20, who lives across the street. "Through my windows I can see papers messed around, and the office in disarray."

An employee of the building where Faughey had her office said of the suspect, "He looked like a psycho to me. I saw him go in. ...He went out through the basement. I'd never seen him before."

Faughey's injured colleague was taken to New York-Presbyterian Hospital Weill Cornell in serious but stable condition.

He was identified as Shinbach by the practice's office manager, Darlene Yeats, 52, of the Bronx.

Faughey, a Ph.D. and graduate of Yeshiva University who lived with her husband across the street from her office, specialized in relationship issues, coping with stress and changing life conditions.

"I practice cognitive psychotherapy effectively - in a warm, clear and lively manner," she wrote on her Web site. "As our inner and outer worlds change, learning new emotional strategies is essential for growth."

"She was terrific. She had a very big heart," said a neighbor in her apartment building who identified himself only as Steve. "She did her job very well. She did a lot of reading. She was always keeping up with medical developments.

"It's just terrible."

SOURCE