A cleaning lady murdered and left to decompose in an air shaft in her Rector Street workplace in 2009 will have the final word against the maintenance man who suffocated her, prosecutors promised in dramatic opening statements yesterday.

“In her last, bold but futile attempts to fend him off, she scratched him, and in doing so she identified him to all of you,” Assistant District Attorney Christine Keenan told jurors, speaking of slain mother of three Eridania Rodriguez, 46.

“Under her fingernails was the DNA of that man sitting there at that table,” Keenan said, pointing to accused murderer Joseph Pabon, 27.

Defense lawyer Mario Gallucci told jurors in his own opening statements that Pabon could not have done everything he is accused of within the 45-minute time frame when he was unaccounted for in the building. Testimony continues tomorrow.