Hunt susp in park slay of Bronx grad
The NYPD is zeroing in on a suspect in the senseless slaying of a 19-year-old woman mistakenly shot while celebrating her college graduation in a Bronx park, police said Tuesday.
Cops released surveillance video of a suspect Tuesday and offered a $10,000 reward for information leading to an arrests in the June 12 slaying of Tyana Johnson in Wakefield’s Shoelace Park. A second suspect is also being sought.
A police source said Bloods gang members were in the park and that detectives are investigating if the shooting was in retaliation for another shooting in the area last year.
Johnson was struck a number of times, including in the head, after the killers climbed out of a light-colored BMW at about 11 p.m. and opened fire on the crowd of about 150 young people, surveillance video shows. It was not clear if one or both men fired.
The men — who also wounded three others — got back in the car with others and drove off. A short time later, one of the suspects (inset) was captured on surveillance video walking and running while looking over his shoulder.
Johnson was rushed to the hospital, but couldn’t be saved. Cops say she was shot by mistake.
It wasn’t clear if any of the wounded — a 24-year-old man shot in the groin, a 16-year-old boy struck in the ankle and a 15-year-old boy hit in the buttocks — were intended targets.
Johnson, a business major, had invited her friends to the park in advance of her Monroe College virtual graduation the following week. She earned her associate’s degree in the fall and was continuing on at the school to get her bachelor’s, her family said.
Johnson grew up in the Bronx near the park but moved to Connecticut a few years ago. She recently moved back to the borough while she finished her degree.
Anyone with information is asked to call Crime Stoppers at (800) 577-TIPS. All calls will be kept confidential.