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Brazen gunslingers are shooting the daylights out of the Big Apple.
After a shocking execution in Park Slope and last Saturday afternoon’s shooting spree in Times Square, The Post requested crime data to see if the impression that criminals have become bolder in broad daylight is true.
Sadly, it appears so.
As of April 25, the NYPD recorded 374 shootings this year — and 119, or 32 percent, occurred between 7 a.m. and 6 p.m. During the same period last year there were 213 shootings — with 63, or 30 percent, happening in daylight.
The 2-percent uptick in the percentage of daylight-to-overall shootings was not as worrisome to the cops’ union as the surging frequency of daytime gunplay: the increase from 63 shootings last year to 119 this year represents an 89-percent explosion.
“The increase in brazen, broad-daylight shootings just confirms what we already knew: violent criminals have no fear anymore,” Police Benevolent Association President Pat Lynch told The Post.
“They know that the police are underfunded, understaffed and hobbled by pro-criminal politicians and a broken justice system,” he added. “They know that if we arrest them in the morning, they’ll be back out in time for dinner. If New Yorkers don’t want a city where criminals control both the night and the day, they need to push elected officials to act.”
Among the recent daylight bloodshed:
On May 8, shortly before 5 p.m., Farrakhan Muhammad, a 31-year-old CD peddler, allegedly opened fire in a bustling Times Square. The alleged triggerman was aiming for his brother following a dispute but struck a 23-year-old woman in the right thigh, a 43-year-old woman in the left foot and a 4-year-old girl in the left leg, police said. The suspect was nabbed Wednesday in Florida.
On April 21, 38-year-old Latisha Bell allegedly executed her ex-girlfriend, Nichelle Thomas, 51, in Park Slope, with a bullet to the back of the head in a chilling murder caught on video. The gunfire erupted just before 1 p.m. at St. Marks Place and Fourth Avenue. Bell later surrendered herself to police at Brooklyn’s 78th Precinct station house and confessed, cops said.
On April 26, a 20-year-old man was shot dead while sitting behind the wheel of a parked SUV on the Upper East Side just before 2:30 p.m., police said. An unknown gunman walked up to the Honda HRV on East 95th Street and shot Chris Delinois of Brooklyn in the stomach, cops said. The NYPD released a shocking video of the brazen murder.
On April 29, a 17-year-old student died after being shot outside a Brooklyn charter school, cops said. Devonte Lewis was fatally struck in the stomach and hand around 2:45 p.m. in front of the Urban Dove school on East 21st Street in Midwood. The NYPD is looking for two gunmen who ran from the scene.
“I haven’t seen this many daylight shootings in a long, long time,” said Joseph Giacalone, a retired NYPD sergeant and adjunct professor at John Jay College of Criminal Justice. “It appears that the shooters have no fear of the police nor being identified in broad daylight. That behavior is a harbinger of worse things to come, especially with the warm weather and relaxed Covid restrictions.
“It’s a sign of a city in decline.”
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