TITUSVILLE, Fla. -- A man convicted of a murder in New York is awaiting extradition after police arrested him at a hotel in Titusville. It's how he was caught that's extremely unusual.

Guests and managers at the Budget Inn on US-1 thought something was fishy when one of the guests wanted to change rooms every night. They contacted the fugitive unit of the sheriff's office and, sure enough, he was an escaped murderer.

"He moved in, paid up front and was a good tenant," said motel manager Ross Lambert.

Lambert said everything seemed normal in the beginning as Daniel Pagan got to know fellow guests at the Budget Inn on US-1.

"He seemed like a nice guy. He was always going out of his way to help me and other people around here," Lambert said.

Pagan appeared before a judge Friday afternoon and said little. A day before, he'd hidden away in a bathroom inside a stranger's room as deputies set up surveillance on him.

"Sure enough, he started acting strangely, going to different rooms trying to conceal himself. And they observed him going to one room, it didn't seem like it was his room, made contact with the actual renter and he said, 'Yeah, there's a guy hiding in the bathroom,'" explained Lt. Mike Demorat, Brevard County Sheriff's Office.

Motel management said Pagan even found a new girlfriend at the motel who didn't know he'd escaped from a rehabilitation program in New York where he was serving 25 years to life for a convenience store robbery and murder in the Bronx. It was a fellow guest who called the sheriff's office after noticing that Pagan moved from room to room and acted suspiciously.

"He didn't cause a problem. He was just hiding in the bathroom and just basically gave up," Demorat said.

Pagan is being held without bond in the Brevard County jail as he awaits extradition to New York.