Murder Charge Formally Filed Against Former Enfield Man In Delaware

WILMINGTON, DE — A former Enfield resident who was taken into custody at the Elm Street Burger King on an out-of-state warrant earlier this month has been formally charged with murder by police in Wilmington.

Timothy Olschafskie, 30, who according to Wilmington police now resides in Ansonia, was arrested by Enfield police Nov. 2 as a fugitive from justice, and was held on $1 million bond pending extradition to Delaware.

The extradition took place Tuesday, and Olschafskie was arraigned on a charge of first-degree murder by abuse or neglect. He was committed to the Howard R. Young Correctional Institution on $2 million cash-only bail, according to Wilmington police.

On the morning of March 11, police responded to a home upon a report of a child suffering from a medical emergency. The child, a 21-month-old girl, was taken to a hospital and later died of her injuries, police said.

A death investigation conducted by the Delaware Division of Forensic Sciences determined the child’s cause of death was homicide. Following collaboration between a detective from the Criminal Investigations Division and the Delaware Department of Justice, warrants were obtained for Olschafskie's arrest, police said.

"We will not be releasing any further details about this incident out of respect for the victim’s family," Wilmington police spokesman David Karas said.

Olschafskie, who attended Enfield High School through 2011 according to yearbook photos, is a convicted felon in Connecticut, having pleaded guilty in 2015 to five felony counts of maliciously killing an animal. According to the Associated Press, he was charged in the deaths of seven cats two years earlier, and admitted killing five. Police said the cats suffered blunt force trauma, bone fractures, lacerations to internal organs and skin torn from their bodies.

Authorities said the killings happened when Olschafskie was staying at the Windsor Locks home of his fiancee’s family, which had taken in the felines from an animal rescue program, the Associated Press reported.

When convicted, he received a five-year prison sentence, suspended after two years, plus five years' probation, according to judicial records.