A former celebrity photographer from New York who made a career shooting the rich and famous through his lens has been charged with the murder of a 37-year-old Bronx woman.
Benjamin Lozovsky, 41, is now in Rikers Island awaiting a January court hearing over the killing of Jacklyn Timinski, who was found clinging to life after suffering severe head injuries in her Bronx home.
Police allege how Lozovsky struck her in the head with a kettlebell during a drug-fueled confrontation, leaving her bloody and unconscious – while Lozovsky was found naked and bloodied outside the Bronx home.
The alleged attack happened in early September after the pair met outside a pet store on Manhattan’s Upper West Side.
The couple are said to have returned to Timinski’s dilapidated home in Throgs Neck, New York but the night descended into violence leading to her receiving fatal head injuries.
Timinski was seen being loaded into the back of an ambulance with blood streaming across her face.
Meanwhile, Lozovsky was found spattered in blood on the lawn outside her home.
He was arrested at the scene and a week later was charged with Timinski’s murder after she died later in the hospital at Jacobi Medical Center.
Lozovsky’s mother insists her son acted in self-defense.
‘Benjamin was a photographer who was in unbelievable demand,’ Sabina Lozovsky told the Daily News. ‘All the designers. All the singers. He knew all of them.
‘She’s a good-looking and nice girl. She invites him to her house in the Bronx and he goes with her. He doesn’t do drugs,’ Sabina insisted.
Friends of Timinski say she was on the verge of turning things around, preparing to enter rehab and rebuild her life following the devastating loss of her teenage daughter, 18-year-old Olivia Rios, to suicide earlier this year.
Timinski was known for her personality, love music and dancing but struggled with her own personal demons.
They believed her encounter with Lozovsky was simply a chance meeting gone tragically wrong.
Before the pandemic Lozovsky was a fixture in the elite circles of fashion and entertainment.
His work graced publications and campaigns placing him in the company of figures such as Iggy Pop, Nicki Minaj, Benedict Cumberbatch and Greta Thunberg.
But following a violent assault by several men in 2020, Lozovsky was left physically and emotionally scarred after he severed median nerve in his left arm. It left him unable to hold his camera and ruining his career.
It sent him into a downward spiral marred with arrests and increasingly erratic behavior.
Lozovsky has four prior arrests on charges including assault, aggravated harassment and criminal mischief, including the breaking of two cellphones in his Upper West Side apartment building, which his mother says was unintentional.
For Lozovsky, the murder charge represents a steep fall for a man whose photos captured the glamor, beauty and power of celebrity.
‘Prior to COVID he was a very accomplished photographer and that’s really all I can talk about at this point,’ Lozovsky’s lawyer, Jodi Morales told the Daily News.
‘I always emphasize that people are innocent until proven guilty and it’s very early in the case. Of course, I know that people will hear the story and make their decision. But there’s a lot that needs to be revealed and so I always hope that people will have an open mind,’ Morales said.