The rise in gun violence in New York City continued full-force this weekend, with at least 12 shooting events leaving three dead since Friday night.
What We Know:
- In the past four weeks, shooting incidents in the city are up approximately triple in comparison to the same period last year, which seems to be a pattern since early June, as the city’s coronavirus lockdown began to lessen.
- The NYPD recently changed its anti-crime tactics by disbanding the department, apparently due to brute force and police brutality. Since then, officers of that department have been assigned to other assignments. Such change, along with the lessening of the coronavirus lockdown, could have triggered such a rise in violence.
- The first fatality happened at 4 p.m. on Aug. 14th in front of 395 Ocean Ave., near Crooke Avenue, in the Prospect Lefferts Gardens area of Brooklyn. 28-year-old DeShawn Reid, who resided at the location, was shot in the chest by an unknown individual. Arrests have not been made in this instance and officers did not describe the gunman.
- The second fatality happened on Aug. 15th at the corner of East 128th Street and Lenox Avenue in Harlem at 12:30 a.m., where a 30-year-old man had been shot in the chest. 32nd Precinct Officers discovered the victim following a 911 call of a man shot. Paramedics hurried the victim to Harlem Hospital, where he died. Arrests have not been made in this instance.
- The third fatality happened at 3:05 a.m. in front of a home on Ridgedale Street between Grayson and Defoe Streets in Springfield Gardens, Queens. A 28-year-old man was found shot in the chest and head. 113th Precinct officers say they have no suspects or arrests in this case.
- Mayor Bill de Blasio and NYPD Commissioner Dermot Shea have blamed the spike in shootings on a wide variety of factors, including what they see as slowdowns in the court system, gang activity, and restrained rage after months in a pandemic lockdown.
Anybody with information regarding these shootings is asked to call the NYPD’s Crime Stoppers Hotline at 1-800-577-TIPS (8477) or for Spanish, 1-888-57-PISTA (74782). You can also send tips online at nypdcrimestoppers.com or on Twitter @NYPDTips. All calls and messages are kept confidential.
