The girl shot in the neck on a Brooklyn street on Friday night remains at Columbia University hospital, where she is recovering from surgery. And her family says that she is paralyzed. A prosecutor said at the suspected shooter's arraignment, "When the defendant was told he was being arrested for shooting a child, his response was laughter... Her spine is severed and she will be paralyzed for life."
Tayloni Mazyck was outside of 600 Gates Avenue with her mother just before 8:30 p.m. when a 17-year-old apparently opened fire on two men standing outside of 590 Gates. Police arrested Kane Cooper, charging him with attempted murder, assault, criminial use of a firearm and reckless endangerment. WABC 7 reports, "Police say Cooper was out on bail in a separate gun-related incident when the shooting occurred. Police say he was trying to settle some kind of argument with two other men at Gates Avenue and Throop Avenue in Bedford Stuyvesant and opened fire." It's suspected that Cooper was aiming at a Bloods member.
Tayloni, known as "Tutu," is unable to move "anything," according to her father. Robert Mazyck sai said, "She just has tingles in both her arms. “When you touch her arms, both arms hurt. Nothing else is working. Her time to walk around is gone. Even with surgery, there is no guarantee.” The Daily News reports:
The bullet, believed to be a 9-mm. slug, would have killed 200-pound Tayloni were it not for one thing: her girth.
“It was the fatty tissue that saved her,” Mazyck told the Daily News outside New York-Presbyterian Hospital Columbia. “The doctor said if she was thinner, she’d be dead.”
He added, "I am just so tired of this. You can’t stand in front of your own building? Not only was [Tayloni] standing here, my 7-month-old granddaughter was out here too. What’s the matter with people?"
