BOSTON -- New York city police continue to investigate a bouncer who works at the bar where a Boston graduate student was last seen before she was found slain Feb. 25.

NewsCenter 5's Gail Huff reported that the bouncer is being held by police on a parole violation and questioned in connection with the death of Imette St. Guillen, 24, whose strangled and suffocated body was found nude in a deserted Brooklyn field.

Parole officials said they did not even know the bouncer, who has not been charged, was working at The Falls bar in Manhattan, where St. Guillen was last seen. He was not supposed to be out after his 9 p.m. curfew as that was a violation of his parole.

In Boston's Mission Hill neighborhood, where St. Guillen grew up, her family is hopeful there will soon be a break in the case.

"I am hopeful that they do catch the person so that this does not happen to anyone else. That's what I'm hopeful about," St. Guillen's mother Maureen St. Guillen said.

Police said Darryl Littlejohn, 41, of Queens, N.Y., left The Falls bar about 4 a.m. Feb. 25, saying he was escorting St. Guillen to a taxi. But Littlejohn never returned to the bar.

Littlejohn's Jamaica, Queens home was searched Monday night and Chinese food and soda he consumed at the club was being analyzed for DNA to see if matches DNA found on the victim's body. Packing tape found upstairs at his home was being compared to tape that was used to cover St. Guillen's nose and mouth. Investigators were removing bags of items from the home and were meticulously going over a van owned by Littlejohn's mother.

Some of his neighbors watched the exhaustive police search.

"They should get to the bottom and find out who did it so that our neighborhood, our area, our houses, lives and our children can go back to normal," neighbor Bernard Hall said.

Littlejohn has a criminal record that spans two decades and includes violent crimes such as armed robbery. He served four years of a 10-year prison sentence. He has two children. His relatives said they believe he is innocent. His aunt said such a crime would be "out of character" for Littlejohn.

"Police has to do their job and not just implicate anyone because it's a black male and the person has a previous record," Littlejohn's aunt Addie Harris said.

St. Guillen's mother said she is confident authorities will find the right person.

"They're doing a terrific job. I trust them completely and it's totally in their hands," Maureen St. Guillen said.

New York police are also awaiting toxicology reports that may indicate whether Imette St. Guillen had been drugged.