July weekends are turning out to be deadly periods for the city, as four people were murdered in the course of a few predawn hours on Sunday. Just after midnight, Nazario Bleu was shot in the torso near the Pelham Parkway Houses in the Bronx. A second man was shot as well, though he managed to reach a nearby building to call 911, and remains in stable condition. Bleu was declared dead at the scene. Unfortunately, this was just the first of the night's shootings.
About an hour later, police were called to Kosciuszko Street and Tompkins Avenue in Bed-Stuy, where they found Jamel Johnson, 23, fatally shot in the head after a block party nearby. Two other men were found shot in the leg, and are now in stable condition. Around 2:45 a.m., the third murder occurred at East 172nd Street in The Bronx, when Rafael Otero, 27, was headed home from a party with his girlfriend and her daughter. His girlfriend told the Daily News that the party had been for "Spanish only," and a fight broke out when a group of black people showed up. Cops showed up and told Otero to leave, but then "[The perps] chased after him and shot him." His girlfriend said, "I try to help him, but there is so much blood rushing from his neck and I already see his eyes rolled back in his head."
The fourth murder occurred around 6:30 a.m. on 135th Street and Liberty Avenue in Queens. Barri Jahoor, 35, was pronounced dead at the scene when police arrived and found him shot several times in the torso. Neighbors say the killing happened outside a party at a barbershop, and detectives suspect it may have been a robbery gone wrong. Shortly after Jahoor's murder, a man checked himself into Jamaica Hospital with a gunshot wound to the stomach. Police are investigating whether the two incidents may be related. One local told NY1, "I'm scared cause it's not safe. You can't even walk in the daytime and when it's nighttime this happens -- people robbing and shooting all over."
This comes after three killings on Friday: A man was killed near the Walt Whitman Houses in Brooklyn; a man was killed after a fight in a East Harlem pool; and a man was found shot dead in the Bronx in the evening. According to the latest NYPD statistics (through June 27), murder is up 11.1% from last year, with 221 murders so far this year, compared to 199 last year. Overall crime is down 1.32%.
