Shot praying for pal, may not walk again
SHE STOOD UP for a fallen classmate — and now she may never stand again.
A 16-year-old girl attending a prayer vigil for a slain classmate was shot in the lower back on Monday — and now the victim’s heartbroken family fears the errant round may have left the teen paralyzed.
Princess Lindow, a student at Urban Dove High School, marked the 17th birthday of murder victim Tyquan Holmes at a prayer vigil at the Marcy Houses about 7:50 p.m. Monday.
She was standing with about 30 friends and classmates when someone walked up and opened fire into the crowd.
“We were holding hands in a circle praying,” Princess, still groggy from two surgeries, said Wednesday from her hospital bed at Woodhull Medical Center’s intensive care unit.
“There were shots. I knew I was shot because my legs went numb and I couldn’t walk,” she said. “My leg went dead and I fell to the floor. I couldn’t breathe. Everything was changing colors.”
“I wish I never went over there,” she said.
The bullet pierced her thigh, ripped through her lower back and went through her other leg, relatives said.
“We don’t know if she is going to walk again,” Princess’ mother, Roxanne Sharpe, said, fighting back tears. “She just gotten off assisted breathing. We don’t know all the damage.”
Police said the gunman, described as a rail-thin teen in a black hoodie, fired three shots from a .22-caliber handgun. He remained at large Wednesday.
“What was he doing there with a gun?” Sharpe asked. “Some people don’t have respect for anything. There were kids and families there. There were babies in strollers. How could they do something like this? We have to do something about the guns.”
Investigators believe it was a gang-related shooting. Holmes, who was fatally shot in the Marcy Houses on June 1, was a member of violent street gang known as the Young Hittas Crew, police sources said.
Princess was not the only teen wounded by gunfire Monday night.
In a hours separate incident before Princess 41/2 was wounded, a former classmate, 16-year-old Rahim Adekanbi, was shot in the thigh as he played basketball with friends at Washington Hall Park in Clinton Hill .
The Benjamin Banneker High School student got caught in the crossfire as an argument broke out between two groups of young men or teens, police and relatives said. No arrests have been made.
“He wasn’t even there for the dispute,” his mother, Abiola Oladiro said. “He always stops to play basketball in the park with his friends. Someone just started shooting. And my son was hit.”
“I’m in shock,” she said. “My son is a good boy. He’s never had any trouble with law or with anybody.”
Despite the intense pain she was feeling — and her grim prognosis — Princess’ heart went out to Rahim.
“He’s my friend,” she said. “We went to summer school together at Benjamin Banneker. I only heard he was shot while I was at the Marcy Houses.”
“I didn’t get to text before I got shot,” she said. “I just hope he gets through it. I’ll be praying for him.” PARTIALLY paralyzed since birth, a 21-year-old man could not dodge a stray bullet fired in a Bronx park. Yunior Marquez, blasted in the back of the head, was killed just before 7:30 p.m. Tuesday, cut down in a drug-related beef, police sources said. “Boom! Everybody dropped,” said the victim’s uncle, Edward Marquez, 24. “His hand, his leg is no good. So, he couldn’t get down.” Three friends who were sitting with Marquez at the Morton Playground in Morris Heights escaped the gunfire. The gunman, described as a teen wearing a green hoodie, was aiming for a different group of men sitting nearby. “This little park was tranquil,” his sobbing mother, Anna Marquez, said Wednesday. “I never thought that park would cost my son his life.” Marquez’s parents said he was born paralyzed on his right side, but it never got him down. Instead, he was so determined to make his way that he recently got his high school equivalency diploma and was set to start taking classes at Bronx Community College soon. “He wanted to get a job and help the family,” said his father, Michael Marquez. Yunior Marquez (photo), who grew up in the Dominican Republic and moved to New York three years ago, had gone to the park to play basketball. He dribbled and shot the ball with one hand. When Marquez and his pals sat down, the gunman had words with the intended targets and opened fire. No one in the targeted group was hit.