Teen charged as adult
Migrant kid faces 2 counts of attempted murder in Times Sq. shooting
The 15-year-old migrant boy who allegedly shot a tourist and opened fire on a cop in Times Square — then bawled like a baby when he was arrested — was charged as an adult in Manhattan Criminal Court on Saturday with two counts of attempted murder.
The teen, whose name is being withheld by the Daily News because of his age, also faces assault and weapons possession charges for the gunplay at the Crossroads of the World on Thursday evening.
At his arraignment, the Venezuelan immigrant, who came to the U.S. in September, was ordered held without bail after Manhattan Assistant District Attorney Kathleen Coulson argued to a judge that the suspect “cannot be trusted to return to court.”
After the Times Square shootings on Thursday night, the teen ran to a subway stop on Sixth Ave., returned to his home at an Upper West Side migrant shelter, and “immediately began to flee,” prosecutors said.
Mother and son packed up their belongings and by 6 a.m. on Friday they were out of the city, prosecutors said. The teen was arrested later Friday at a house in Yonkers, where the DA’s office says he was found “hiding behind a wardrobe in a further attempt to evade police.”
The incident began about 7 p.m. on Thursday when the alleged teen shooter and at least one other youth tried to shoplift some items in JD Sports on the corner of W. 42nd St. and Broadway about 7 p.m. on Thursday.
The teens tried to leave the store with the items in a brown paper bag, says the criminal complaint. Police said earlier the items were either a jacket or some shoes. The teen shooter was clad in white, and also carried a “cross-body bag,” the criminal complaint says.
After the loss prevention worker took the paper bag with the shoplifted items from the teens, “she observed the person wearing all white pull a firearm out of his cross-body bag and point in her direction.”
The shooter fired. His bullet missed the guard, but struck Tatiele Ribeiro, 38, a Brazilian tourist who was in line to buy a pair of sneakers.
“I felt a lot of pain but didn’t know where the pain was coming from. It was a scary moment,” Ribeiro told NBC 4 during an interview Friday. “I started checking myself. I looked at my leg and saw blood dripping down. But I was able to stay calm.”
Ribeiro was treated at Bellevue Hospital and released.
The teen, still clad all in white and armed with a .45-caliber handgun, ran out of the store. Police Officer Roman Velasquez gave chase, the complaint says.
The teen ran uptown and then east on W. 47th St. He then ran to a sidewalk-level passage between W. 47th and W. 48th Sts. at 1211 Sixth Ave., the home to the Fox News studios.
“Officer Velasquez ... observed the person brandish a firearm, turn, and point the firearm at him and fire, such that he heard a loud gunshot sound,” the criminal complaint says.
The shooting was captured on Velasquez’s body-worn camera, the complaint says.
Velasquez drew his service weapon, NYPD Chief of Patrol John Chell said at a news conference Friday — but did not fire because there were “too many people around.”
The teen kept running and fired a second shot at the officer from under his armpit, Chell said. The officer did not return fire in that situation, again because too many people were present, Chell said.
“That officer was well aware of the danger that firing that gun on a crowded, busy street could potentially inflict,” Detective Bureau Assistant Chief Jason Savino said Friday.
The teen ran into the subway system at around W. 51st St. and Sixth Ave. and disappeared, said the complaint. But subway station cameras got pictures of him that were distributed by police.
Cops and the U.S. marshals tracked the teen to Yonkers on Friday, where he wept openly while being placed in handcuffs. The teen’s mother was present when he was taken away.
Cops apprehended two other teens that were shoplifting with the gun-toting suspect, but they were released as cops build a case against them, officials said.
The teen shooter lived with his family at the Stratford Arms on W. 70th St. on the Upper West Side — a 10-story building and former SRO with more than 100 units that now house migrants.
“He’s a very calm kid who went to church with his parents,” an Ecuadoran shelter resident who said he works as a commercial painter and did not want to give his name told the Daily News on Friday. “He was never any problem. Very tranquilo,” said the Ecuadoran man. He added: “I never saw him with any other kids. I always saw him alone.”
Cops on Saturday were trying to determine if the teen’s gun was used in a Jan 27 armed robbery in the Bronx and a shooting in Bryant Park on Jan. 25, police said.