SHEA: ‘WORK TO DO’
Commish reacts to spate of homicides in Bx.
The city’s top cop acknowledged Tuesday there’s “work to do” after a Daily News report on a shocking spate of five homicides in five days in a single Bronx precinct.
NYPD Commissioner Dermot Shea said the Bronx accounts for about one-third of the city’s shootings. Through Sept 5, there have been 364 shootings in the borough.
The five recent slayings all happened in the 47th Precinct, which covers parts of Wakefield and adjoining northern Bronx neighborhoods.
“Every loss of life is tragic,” Shea said. “Particularly, I saw an article in the Bronx about Wakefield with a number of shootings over the weekend. So we have more work to do.”
Beginning on Sept. 1, five men were fatally shot in separate incidents stretching over the next five days, doubling the number of homicides in the 47th Precinct this year, The News reported Monday.
There have been no arrests in any of the five slayings.
“There’s a lot of work going on up there,” Shea said. “We have great confidence in the men and women who are working on the issue in terms of police deployment . ... I was up in the Bronx myself checking up on the ground what it looks like. I spoke to some cops. The work is there — it’s just we’re going to need a little bit more of criminals off the street.”
Two of the slayings happened so close together that two different families held vigils for lost loved ones around the corner from each other.
Murders are up in the Bronx this year by 40% through Sept. 5, with 105 so far this year compared to 75 in the same period last year.
Citywide, murders are slightly down this year through Sept. 5, with 314 victims compared to 321 by the same point last year, a 2% drop.