‘Shooting up’ spree rages on in Midtown
Addicts get high, pass out on street
Manhattan’s latest shooting gallery was back open for business on Sunday — a day after The Post reported on the disturbing daytime drug spree in the Garment District.
Three men were spotted shooting up heroin in front of an apartment building on West 36th Street between Seventh and Eighth avenues Sunday afternoon, with two of them leaving the third passed out on the sidewalk, as a traffic cop wrote tickets nearby.
“Can you call an ambulance?” one man asked after trying to revive his sick pal by pouring water on his head.
Forty minutes later, a fourth man approached the still-high man, asking if he was all right.
“They left me for dead,” the man replied.
One block away, on West 35th Street, another pair injected themselves in front of a store, with zero cops in sight.
One shot up in his arm, fingers and ankle. The other injected his arm.
The Garment District is no stranger to open-air drug use. Last summer, The Post reported significant drug use in the plaza at Broadway and West 40th Street.
“Sometimes when I’m walking, I see a lot of people doing it,” said Modou Trawally, 44, a fabric-store worker on West 35th Street.
“It’s dangerous. You see someone inject himself. He’s not a doctor. It’s a problem. If the city can help them that would be better.”
Another local worker, who asked not to be identified, said the city needs to clean up the area. “It’s horrible,” he said, adding that he witnessed someone getting high last week as he was exiting the subway at 34th Street. “I saw someone shooting up, and his friend said he’s got diabetes. I said, ‘Yeah, right.’ ”
NYPD and City Hall did not return requests for comment.
Last week, The Post witnessed open-air drug deals take place in the area, despite the presence of NYPD cops a couple blocks away.
Critics argue that junkies have been emboldened to get high in public because recent state reforms have eliminated bail for certain drug crimes — including injecting drugs and possessing needles or small amounts of heroin.