Collared at JFK after parking spat leads to slay
A MAN LAY dead on a Brooklyn street — stabbed in the heart Sunday night during a fight over a parking space. His alleged killer’s first instinct was to run.
Djems Jean-Paul, 41, made a desperate dash toward Kennedy Airport, booking a JetBlue flight to his native Haiti while en route. He was waiting in line at the ticket counter for a flight to Port-auPrince when NYPD homicide detectives grabbed him.
“We placed a travel alert on (him) early this morning,” Assistant Chief Patrick Conry told reporters. “We responded to the airport, prior to him getting on the flight, and we were able to apprehend him.”
Jean-Paul was hauled back to Brooklyn and charged with manslaughter in the death of Omri Dahan, 23. He also was charged with attempted assault in the slashing of the victim’s brother Ayal Dahan on the arm.
A grim and sober Jean-Paul — wearing a gray V-neck shirt and mustard pants — left the 63rd Precinct stationhouse for Central Booking on Monday afternoon without saying a word.
Meanwhile, more than 100 people attended the former Israeli soldier’s funeral at the Shomrei Hadas Chapel in Borough Park. His body was slated to be flown to Israel.
The tragedy was compounded by the fact that Dahan’s father Shlomo, 49, his brother Harel, and a third man died in 2009, after they were overcome by toxic fumes while trying to unclog a drain at a Queens sewage treatment plant. Like Omri, Harel was only 23 when he died.
“Omri was so strong with how he coped with everything, and stayed strong for his friends and family and his brothers,” said Ella Glozman, 22, a close friend. “It’s awful that he’s gone now. It’s just not fair. He deserved to live. He had a great future.”
Added another close friend, Gary Sulkis, 22: “Omri always cared about other people. You’re mad at this person because they took away someone so special.”
The senseless brawl on E. 73rd St. near Avenue M started when Ayal Dahan, 29, arrived home in his car and found the driveway blocked, sources said.
“What happened was, the Jewish (man) came home, the Haitian guy’s car was double-parked in front of his driveway,” said Ricky Zawacki, 28, who lives across the street.
He honked his horn, and JeanPaul, who was visiting friends on the block, came out, sources said.
“The guy was beeping for 10 minutes straight and they were ignoring him,” Zawacki said. “As soon as the guy came down to move the car, the Jewish kid got out of the car and started yelling at the man, saying, ‘Move your effing car.’ ”
The two men argued, and Jean-Paul slammed his fist into the side of Ayal Dahan’s head.
“They started fighting, physically,” Zawacki said. “Then another Haitian man had come out of the house to help the man that was being attacked or whatever.”
A friend of Jean-Paul’s tried to break up the fight, sources said.
Dahan ran inside to get Omri Dahan. The younger man came out, and the confrontation spiraled further out of control.
“After that, the Jewish kid (Ayal) went back into his house and he went to wake up his little brother (Omri) to come help him, and as he was coming out with his little brother.”
Ayal Dahan emerged wielding a child gate and used it to whack Jean-Paul on the head, Zawacki said.
Someone threw a glass bottle from above at Ayal Dahan, the witness added.
Jean-Paul went to his car, grabbed a knife and stabbed each of the brothers, officials said.
“There was a lot of blood on the sidewalk. It was crazy, it was horrible,” Zawacki said.
“It never should have gone down like that . . . I thought it was just gonna be a little scuffle and that would have been it.”
The victims’ 27-year-old cousin, who identified himself as Mike and lives across the street, described the chaos after the stabbings.
“My father was there. He tried saving him, he tried blocking the blood,” he said.
“He tried slapping him to keep him awake. They tried stopping the blood, my father. His mother ran out, his mother held him for those few seconds that he had left.”
Omri died at Beth Israel Hospital just before 12:30 a.m. Monday. Medics took his brother to the same hospital, where he was in stable condition.
Jean-Paul drove off in a gray Volkswagen Passat with Taxi and Limousine Commission plates, cops said.
At his arraignment Monday, Jean-Paul’s lawyer described him as a U.S. citizen and said one of the brothers punched him. “He was attacked by these brothers and he was acting in self-defense,” lawyer Irene Elliott said. He was ordered held without bail.
Jean-Paul’s friend, who had tried to intervene in the fight, stayed at the scene and is not expected to be charged.
The brothers’ cousin said Ayal is beside himself with guilt.
“He has huge guilt,” Mike said. “He wants to murder himself. What can he do (about) the past?”
“The mother’s not taking much control, I guess,” he said. “She lost her son, her oldest son, and the father and now the baby son.”
Of the suspect, he said, “Of course I’m happy he’s not on the run, he’s not free. What is he gonna face? 30 years? He’s gonna be released in 15 years on good behavior.”
Jean-Paul has no prior arrests.