Bullets fly on train
Teen, man shot on C during rush hour
An innocent straphanger and a teenage boy were shot aboard a moving subway car in Brooklyn during the evening rush hour Tuesday, police said.
Bullets flew through a Manhattan-bound C train at around 5:40 p.m. after a fight broke out between a 17-year-old boy and a male suspect, according to cops and sources.
The suspect opened fire, striking the teen and a 52year-old man who was an intended target, police and sources said.
The teen was shot once in the right hand and the man was struck in the ankle.
The northbound train was held at the next station, Ralph Avenue, until officers and paramedics arrived.
EMS rushed the teen to Bellevue Hospital and the man to Kings County Hospital. Both were in stable condition, according to the NYPD.
The gunman fled the scene and was at large. The investigation is ongoing.
The shooting caused a messy commute as C trains ran express for the next two hours, skipping stops including Ralph Avenue as police investigated the scene.
By 7:40 p.m., C trains resumed making local stops but were still running with delays, according to the MTA.
The commuter violence came despite the fact that there’s been a 44% drop in murders underground so far in 2023 compared with last year.
There have been five murders clocked on the trains or in stations during the first 10 months of the year — down from a tally of nine recorded over the same period in 2022.
Overall, crime in the subway system is down 3.9% year over year, but assaults remain slightly above last year’s tally.
However, subway crime remains above pre-pandemic levels, when the system would often see only one or two murders for the entire year.