Oscar Winner's Son Charged With Strangling Girlfiend in New York City Hotel Room!

[Brian Damage]

NEW YORK -- The son of an Oscar-winning songwriter was arrested Friday on charges of choking his Peruvian-born girlfriend, a fashion designer found dead and half-clothed in a bathtub overflowing with water in a posh hotel, police said.

Nicholas Brooks, 24, was arrested on charges of attempted murder and strangulation in the death of Sylvie Cachay, who was discovered around 3 a.m. Thursday at the Soho House hotel. He has been at a police precinct more than a day and was cooperating with investigators, who obtained a search warrant to take swabs from under his fingernails.

Police said the death was ruled a homicide, but the medical examiner's office has not determined a cause of death pending toxicology test results after an autopsy was inconclusive. The results could take days.

Brooks, the son of "You Light Up My Life" writer Joseph Brooks, has an attorney, but police didn't know the lawyer's name. His father, who is in unrelated legal trouble, has not commented on the case and doesn't know who is representing his son, according to the elder Brooks' attorney.

The 33-year-old Cachay, wearing a black top and underwear, was found submerged in the oval tub, face up, after hotel staff noticed the ceiling below her room was leaking. She had red marks around her neck and a bite mark on her hand, investigators said.

http://www.foxnews.com/us/2010/12/10...ent+-+Mixed%29