MAYHEM HITS Gun attack at B’klyn event hall
7 shot, 1 dead, in revenge for earlier
A woman was fatally shot at a “sweet 16” afterparty when gunmen burst into a Brooklyn apartment building and opened fire to avenge an earlier shooting at the main event, police said Monday.
Gunfire erupted inside the Bedford-Stuyvesant apartment building where the smaller bash was being held about 11:15 p.m. Sunday.
When officers arrived at the event on Albany Ave. near Fulton St. they found a scene of carnage — and a ballistics trail that led from outside the building to the lobby to the thirdfloor apartment where the party was being held.
“It was like 11 to 12 shots,” said Fred Waller, 52, who lives in the building. “I looked out the window and there was a young dude on the steps. He was like, ‘I’m hit, I’m hit.’ ”
Waller said he went downstairs and tried to get the rest of the crowd away from the building and checked on the victim bleedingng on the building’s front steps.
“I was talking to him, trying to keep him calm,” Waller said. “It was a little hole in his chest, a little one, and a little one in his arm.”
Waller said he stayed with the young man until an ambulance arrived.
“It’s just a sad situation, it’s out off hand,” said Waller. “It was chaos.”
A 20-year-old woman struck in thee buttocks got to Woodhull Hospitall by private means and died there att 12:36 a.m. Monday. Her name was nott immediately released.
One of the other victims, a 16-year-old boy shot in the upper body, is inn critical condition at Kings Countyy Hospital.
The others wounded include a 19-year-old man shot in the upperr body; a man and woman, both 18; and a boy, 15, all hit in the leg; and a 14-year-old girl struck in the buttocks.
They were taken to Kings County, Brookdale University Hospital and Maimonides Medical Center and were all in stable condition.
The party had moved from its original location, a hall on Liberty Ave. in East New York, to the apartment building, cops said.
The spark for the attack appears to have been a shooting where a teen was hit in the leg after revelers left the hall at the first party.
NYPD Deputy Chief Michael Kemper, head of detectives of north Brooklyn, said police were called to the hall at 7:53 p.m. Sunday after getting 911 calls about a large crowd.
Officers dispersed the group, though it wasn’t immediately clear if the party was completely shut down at that point.
Then, just past 9 p.m., the 17-year-old was shot about a block away, at Liberty Ave. and Crystal St.
“We believe the male was present at the sweet 16 party,” Kemper said.
The teen was hospitalized in stable condition.
It was not immediately clear if the dead woman or any of the others shot in Bedford-Stuyvesant were intended targets or if they had all been at the party or were struck elsewhere in the apartment building.
With shootings up more than 90% this year compared with 2019, NYPD Deputy Chief Judith Harrison called the latest incident “absolutely terrible.”
“We’re very concerned about the uptick in violence,” said Harrison, the commanding officer for north Brooklyn. “We’re very concerned about getting that under control.”
Murders citywide are up 37%, said officials who noted that there have been 416 this year, compared with 304 this time last year. Cops said that more than 1,700 people have been shot this year, more than double the number of people shot in the city last year.
Residents said they are fed up with the violence.
“We had an incident the beginning of the summer where the [NYPD] inspector put out a patrol car that stayed here from July into the middle of October,” said Sharronie Perry, 66, a community activist who has lived on the block for 23 years. “We thought things had died down, so that service wasn’t needed anymore.”
Her 24-year-old nephew was in the building when the shooting happened but not at the party. He was visiting a friend in another apartment.
“He’s shell-shocked right now,” Perry said “They were playing games, and as he was leaving that’s when the shots rang out and he ran back in his friend’s apartment. And when he didn’t hear any more shots, he went to run out to go across the street to go home and he said he had to jump over bodies to get out.”
Partygoers in the hallway were desperately seeking shelter in neighbors’ apartments.
“He said they were banging on doors, ‘Please let me in, please let me in,’ ” Perry said. “Young people were just shaken. They’re 14 to 20 years old. They’re babies.”
Perry said a lot of senior
citizens in frightened.
“We have to put an end to this,” Perry said. “How many parents are going to have to suffer? I’m tired of looking at memorials with teddy bears and flowers and candles burning. I’m tired of that.”
Brooklyn Borough President Eric Adams said such carnage should be considered a mass shooting, and come with the resources accompanied by such a designation.
“A sweet 16 should not end with bitter violence of seven people being shot,” said Adams, the building are who last week announced his run for mayor. “If in fact we don’t call this a mass shooting, it’s stating that we’ve normalized violence in our community, and that’s unacceptable.”
Adams, a former NYPD captain, said there is work to be done at the Police Department and on the street.
“We must go to the source to stop the flow of guns into the community,” Adams said. “We have to have a better real-time response to really delve into some of the beef that’s stemming from these parties and these initial shootings. Retaliatory shootings is a problem that we must resolve in a real way.”
“The fact of the matter is, our young people, and our seniors are not safe in the community,” said Councilman Robert Cornegy, who represents the area. “That’s crazy.”
Cornegy made a plea more community resources.
“We know for a fact that there were members of these gangs that want out and just don’t know how to get out,” Cornegy said. “They don’t know what resources are available to them.” for