New York City ? A 39-year-old man with a history of mental problems was arrested Saturday in the vicious slaying of a psychologist attacked in her office with a meat cleaver, police said.

David Tarloff, of Queens, was taken into custody in the morning after investigators matched him with three palm prints found at the bloody crime scene, said Police Commissioner Raymond Kelly.

Tarloff made statements incriminating himself during a 25-minute interrogation, Kelly said. The questioning stopped when he asked for a lawyer, and it wasn’t clear later Saturday whether he had an attorney. Murder and attempted murder charges are pending, Kelly said.

Therapist Kathryn Faughey was slashed 15 times with the cleaver and a 9-inch knife in her Manhattan office Tuesday evening.

A psychiatrist who worked in the building, Dr. Kent Shinbach, went to Faughey’s aid and was badly injured.

Kelly couldn’t confirm whether Tarloff was ever Shinbach’s patient, or whether he had met Faughey. It remained unclear why Tarloff would have attacked Faughey, police said.