SHE DID — AND WAS KILLED FOR IT
Eric Adams said: ‘Don’t call 911 over illegal fireworks, talk to your neighbor’
Shatavia Walls, 33, followed Brooklyn Borough President Eric Adams’ advice in asking her neighbors to stop setting off illegal fireworks near a group of kids who were playing — and was shot to death for her trouble, taking eight bullets.
A Brooklyn woman was shot to death after following Borough President Eric Adams’ advice to settle fireworks disputes neighbor-to-neighbor rather than call 911, her mom told The Post.
Shatavia Walls, 33, was shot eight times at an East New York public-housing complex on July 7 for asking some goons to stop setting off illegal fireworks near a group of playing children — exactly how Adams had urged constituents to act in the face of the recent pyrotechnic plague, her mother said.
“She watched the news. Yes, she heard it,” a heartbroken Helen Testagros said on Sunday, referring to Adams’ advice. “It was probably in the back of her mind.”
Amid surging complaints of fireworks, Adams had said on June 21 that people should talk to their neighbors about the “nonviolent act” rather than call the authorities and risk a “heavyhanded” police response.
But Testagros said that to take that approach on the mean streets was to risk your life.
“It’s not a good idea. You don’t know who you are approaching,” she said. “These kids are not respectful anymore . . . They’re more ruthless.”
Testagros said Walls initially got into a confrontation over fireworks on July 4.
While visiting her mom, siblings and extended family in the Pink Houses, Walls was troubled by a group setting off fireworks in a playground at the sprawling development as kids frolicked just feet away, Testagros said.
A “scuffle” ensued, and one of the creeps chased Walls into her mother’s building, pulled out a gun and fired a single shot at her, according to Testagros.
The round missed Walls, who scooped up both the shell casing and a New York driver’s license the alleged gunman dropped while fleeing, Testagros said.
Walls called 911 to report the attack and supplied authorities with the name, home address and physical description of her alleged assailant based on the license, Testagros said.
The Post is withholding the identity of the man, an alleged gangbanger, because he is yet to be arrested, charged or formally identified as wanted.
An NYPD spokeswoman on Sunday disputed that account, saying that the department only became aware of the July 4 incident during an investigation into a second run-in on July 7.
In that encounter, an undeterred Walls and pal Kelvin Hernandez again asked a band of fuse-lighting people to scram from the playground at around 8:30 p.m., police sources said.
That group didn’t include the man who’d previously shot at Walls, but Testagros said she believes he was summoned with a phone call and arrived three
hours after the initial July 7 confrontation.
“He was chasing her, hopping over the gates, shooting,” Testagros said.
After one round struck Wall, the man moved in for the kill.
“He walked over,” the mother said. “She was on the ground, shot. And he kept shooting until the gun went ‘click, click, click.’ ”
Walls, who worked as a homehealth aide and as a cleaner at the Port Authority Bus Terminal, was struck eight times.
Both she and Hernandez, who was also shot, were hospitalized and identified to cops the man responsible from their beds, Testagros said.
As Hernandez recuperated, Walls succumbed to her wounds late Friday at Brookdale University Hospital Medical Center.
Adams, a presumptive 2021 mayoral candidate, extended his sympathies to Walls’ family and decried the spike in gun violence but didn’t fully dismiss his neighborly approach.
“My heart goes out to the family of Shatavia Walls on this horrific incident. “Gun violence has hurt too many innocent people in our city, from 1-year-old Davell Gardner to this dynamic young lady,” he said in a statement, referring to the boy who was fatally struck when as many as three people opened fire on a cookout outside a Bed-Stuy playground last week.
“Dangerous people are shooting innocent people for senseless reasons. I renew my call for cracking down on the scourge of illegal guns,” he added.
“Our call is to continue building an ecosystem of public safety that includes community response and police. Whenever someone exhibits violence, we should call the police, but whenever we can communicate peacefully with our neighbors, we should do so.”
Testagros, too, bemoaned the grip of gangs and guns on city streets.
“It’s all about project fame for them. Quick to shoot,” she said. “They don’t care about your life. This is a train coming down. You gotta stop them. It’s going to get worse.”
The killer remains in the wind.