SUBWAY ‘KILLER’ BUSTED
‘Shooter’ tried to give up directly
The career criminal sought in the weekend’s subway shooting death of Goldman Sachs employee Daniel Enriquez was busted Tuesday — after trying to get cops to allow him to surrender directly to Mayor Adams, sources said.
Andrew Abdullah, 25, was cuffed at his lawyers’ office and charged with murder after negotiations with police — which involved a controversial ex-con minister, who showed up in a Rolls-Royce — broke down in the early afternoon.
“I’m glad for the city,” the slain man’s partner, Adam Pollack, said Tuesday of the bust. “It doesn’t change anything for me, though. I don’t get any relief.”
Abdullah had been on the lam since fatally shooting Enriquez in the chest as the victim rode a Manhattan-bound Q train to brunch on Sunday morning, police said.
He was charged with second-degree murder and second-degree criminal possession and was awaiting arraignment late Tuesday.
“A killer is off our streets,” Adams said.
‘Muttering to himself’
At a press briefing Tuesday, NYPD Chief of Detectives James Essig described new details of the slaying, saying the gunman was “pacing back and forth inside the train car muttering to himself ” before opening fire.
“The only distinguishable words heard were ‘no phones,’ ” Essig said. “The male suddenly and without any prior interactions or provocation walked up to our victim . . . and shot him one time in the chest.”
NYPD spokesman John Miller also confirmed Tuesday that cops had stopped Abdullah as he fled the station — but let him go because he had changed his appearance.
Miller said the accused slayer told an officer, “‘Why are you stopping me? I didn’t do anything,’ and so forth. They radio back. They get the description of the black hoodie [the shooter had been wearing]. They document the stop and there’s nothing to connect him to that.
“Later, when we get that picture that you saw yesterday, you see the sweatpants, the sneakers, the hoodie and underneath it you can see this orange or red shirt,” he said. “And the transit officer looked at that and says, ‘That’s got to be the guy I stopped.’ ”
‘Spoke’ with mayor
After the bust, Bishop Lamor Whitehead, who tried to help with Abdullah’s surrender, claimed he had been talking to Adams himself Tuesday before negotiations with cops broke down.
“Mayor Adams, we’ve been in contact all morning, and he was ready to be here for the young man to be turned in. I wish the Police Department would have done it a little different and allowed what pastors do,” said Whitehead, who called Abdullah “innocent” and said he had “mental-health issues.”
When asked what he said to the mayor, Whitehead would only say, “I had multiple conversations. I don’t really want to get into it, but he was very in support of this young man turning himself in, because Mayor Adams is cleaning this city up. And to hear that the alleged person did the crime is willing to turn himself in, he was glad to hear this.”
When asked about Whitehead’s claims, Adams side-stepped the questions and said, “Well, we always encourage, particularly the religious leaders, I have a good relationship with many of the religious leaders throughout the city . . . And when it was placed on my radar, that this person wanted to turn themselves in, I communicated with law enforcement because it’s about getting the bad guy off the street.”
Whitehead has made headlines before for his close ties to Adams. Whitehead himself has a criminal record for identity fraud and grand larceny, and he has also been accused of pushing bogus youthmentoring programs. But Adams nevertheless stood by Whitehead when asked about him in 2016.
Abdullah’s lawyers, meanwhile, complained about how he was nabbed while the talks over his surrender were continuing. “What
transpired today was completely inappropriate and unwarranted given those conversations,” the Legal Aid Society said in a statement.
19 arrests since 2015
Abdullah, who has at least 19 arrests in more than a dozen incidents since 2015, fled the Canal Street station after the shooting and had been the subject of a police manhunt.
He had been freed after a stolencar bust in April, despite Brooklyn prosecutors asking that he be held on $15,000 bail.
Pollack, the victim’s partner, told The Post Monday that Enriquez had only recently started taking the subway to work due to a surge in Uber pricing.
The killer fled after the 11:42 a.m. incident, handing the murder weapon off to a homeless man at Centre Street before running off.
Cops said the homeless man then sold the weapon — a 9mm Luger — to another vagrant in exchange for $10 worth of crack cocaine, with that man then turning the gun over to police.
Essig said the gun had been reported stolen in Virginia in 2019.
On Tuesday, police sources said tests on that gun positively identified it as the weapon that killed Enriquez on the subway train.
Additional reporting by Morphet
If it’s one thing Kim Kardashian knows, it’s faking it.
The reality-TV maven is adding another role to her résumé, inking an endorsement deal with Beyond Meat to promote its plant-based products. Kardashian, 41, will hold the honorary title of “chief taste consultant” and will star in a new advertising campaign for the vegan meat firm. The “Keeping Up with the Kardashians” star will also share her preferred Beyond Meat items in a company-released newsletter that will also include personalized recipes and offers, the company said in an announcement.
“I am really inspired by Beyond Meat’s mission and love that they are not only making plant-based eating delicious and accessible, but are doing so in a way that benefits both people and the planet,” Kardashian said in a statement. Beyond Meat is made of plant products but made to look like meat, even mimicking “juiciness.” Kardashian is known for accentuating her appearance as well, sometimes through the use of Photoshop and perhaps even fillers or other plastic surgeries.
The announcement provided an initial bump to Beyond Meat’s shares in trading Tuesday, but the stock closed down 7%, at $22.94 a share, amid a broader market sell-off,
Beyond Meat did not disclose the financial terms of the partnership. Company representatives did not return a request for further comment.
Kardashian’s social-media presence, which includes more than 300 million followers on Instagram alone, could boost Beyond Meat’s effort to distinguish itself from rivals in the increasingly competitive meat-alternatives sector.
Beyond Meat is betting that Kardashian’s star power will help the company reverse a lengthy losing streak. Its shares have plunged more than 80% over the last 12 months and were trading near their 52-week low this week.
Eat my ‘shorts’
Earlier this year, The Post reported that Beyond Meat ranked as one of the most shorted stocks on Wall Street, with short positions accounting for 37% of the company’s freely traded shares at the time.
The company’s business has struggled with pandemic-related disruptions, including shipping delays and a labor shortage.
For Kardashian, the deal is another addition to a burgeoning business empire. Her estimated fortune hovered at $1.8 billion as of Tuesday, according to Forbes’ calculations.