NEW YORK (AFP) - An elderly New York woman was killed Saturday when a masked man dressed in an exterminator suit doused her with a flammable liquid and set her ablaze inside a building elevator, local media reported.

The New York Daily News identified the woman as Delores Gillespie, saying she was about to step out of the elevator at her home in Prospect Heights, Brooklyn, when she was met by a man with a barbecue lighter, a bottle and a jug of combustible fluid.

A surveillance camera has captured the attacker spraying Gillespie with the fuel, then lighting a Molotov cocktail and setting her on fire, the report said.

Gillespie, who was in her 60s or 70s, was pronounced dead at the scene, and police are now hunting for her killer, the paper noted.

The Daily News quoted neighbors as saying that Gillespie had been living in the building for years and appeared to be mentally ill.

She often complained that upstairs tenants were stealing from her, the report said.

In recent months, her son, who neighbors said was also mentally ill, was staying with her, the paper added.