WRONG PLACE, WRONG TIME
Innocent Bronx teen shot dead
An innocent teenage boy in “the wrong place at the wrong time” was shot to death in the hallway of his Bronx building — gunned down by a heartless assailant who was making a getaway after blasting two other young men moments earlier, police said Tuesday.
The mayhem began about 11:45 p.m. on Monday on the ninth floor of an apartment building on Webster Ave. near W. Gun Hill Road in Norwood.
Four visitors were about to enter an apartment where a house party was planned when the gunman stepped out from the stairs and fired down the hall, police said. A 19-year-old man was struck in the upper body and a 22-year-old man was hit in the ankle. Two other party guests, a man and woman, were not hurt, officials said.
As residents cowered behind their doors, the shooter then took off — and came across building resident Kahlik Grier, 16.
“He heads down the stairs then encounters, a floor down, our 16-year-old victim and shoots him one time in the neck,” NYPD Chief of Detectives Rodney Harrison said. “We believe [the victim] was unfortunately in the wrong place at the wrong time.”
Medics rushed the bleeding teen to Jacobi Medical Center, where he died.
“Why didn’t he just push him and keep on going? Why he had to shoot him? What happened?” Kahlik’s sister-in-law told the Daily News. She spoke on the condition her name not be used. “What’s in your ... mind to shoot an innocent kid? You don’t even know him!”
Kahlik was on his way home after playing video games with a friend on the seventh floor, the sister-in-law said. He was shot in the ninth-floor stairwell, she said.
“It sounded like they were shooting in my apartment,” one ninth-floor resident told The News. “It was crazy and loud. ... You hear the one shot and then after that like eight more — Bam! Bam! Bam! I’m still shaking. It was that close.”
The two wounded men ran off with their two friends, taking themselves to Montefiore Medical Center. Medics transferred them to Jacobi Medical Center, where they were in stable condition.
Kahlik had just started ninth grade, and was taking virtual classes because of the COVID-19 pandemic.
He spent his free time playing Madden, Call of Duty and Fortnite with friends, his sister-in-law said.
“He was a little boy so he liked to sit there and play his video games and watch TV shows, listening to music and all that,” she said. “He wasn’t nobody to go outside and do nothing.”
Kahlik stayed out of trouble, and hung out with his classmates from eighth grade, his sister-inlaw said.
“I see him every day and now he’s gone,” she said, her eyes filling with tears. “I don’t know what to do.”
It wasn’t immediately clear what set off the bloodshed, though Harrison said it might be connected to warring gangs. The initial shooting on the ninth floor was captured on video, sources said.
“It’s been a problem,” Harrison said. “A lot of the gang violence then leads to unintended people being struck.”
Residents of the eighth floor recalled opening their doors to see the dying teen. Bullet holes were visible on the walls and the ceiling on the ninth floor of the building.
“No one was helping him. No one came out of their apartments,” one woman who lives on the eighth floor lamented. “I was the only one that helped. I saw him and called the cops.”