Two men were killed and eight people wounded in a spate of shootings over a bloody six-hour span in New York City stretching into early Sunday — including a caught-on-video slaying where a hooded gunman executed a man at a crowded block party.
The string of shootings, which spanned three boroughs and are not believed to be related, began at the block party in Sunset Park, Brooklyn, where about 50 people had gathered to celebrate a longtime neighbor’s 78th birthday, a witness told the Daily News.
Shocking surveillance video obtained by the Daily News shows the unsuspecting victim Roberto Cuevas sitting in a plastic chair on a sidewalk during the party at Fourth Ave. and 57th St. about 9:10 p.m. Saturday.
The shooter, a slim man in a black hoodie with his hands in his pockets, shuffles slowly up to him as bystanders continue to party.
Suddenly the killer whips a gun out of his pocket and spins around to fire five times at close range at Cuevas, 45, as the crowd around them scatters in a panic.
“There was no argument. The guy (the killer) just came around the corner. (Cuevas) was talking to a lady. He was sitting down,” said one witness, a 45-year-old man who didn’t give his name. “Boom boom boom! He shot him … It was meant for him.”
Medics rushed Cuevas to NYU Langone Hospital-Brooklyn, where he later died. He was about a mile from home when he was shot, according to cops.
“The party was supposed to be over by then. The police were already here to tell (the partygoers) to shut it down,” the witness told The News. “Everything was happy. There was no arguing. Everything was fine.”
The witness said he knew Cuevas from the neighborhood and is also familiar with the killer.
“He was a party guy. He liked to party,” the witness said of Cuevas. “I feel bad because I knew him 20, 30 years from the neighborhood. He’s a very known person.”
Obtained by Daily News
Roberto Cuevas, 45 (left), was fatally shot at a block party in Sunset Park, Brooklyn on Saturday. (Obtained by Daily News)
Police say no one has yet been charged in the case but a nearby house owner on 57th St. near the Belt Parkway said a suspect was busted in his garage trying to hide.
“They caught him in my garage. He tried to go into the house where the garage was open. The cops were chasing him,” the 60-year-old house owner said.
“I’m just hiding,” the suspect said, according to the house owner. When the garage’s occupants tried to push him out, he resisted.
“He went for a gun and that’s when the cops came into the garage and they apprehended him,” the owner said. “They pushed him to the floor and they got the gun off him.”
Brooklyn saw a second fatal shooting when a 23-year-old man was shot in the left shoulder on Pine St. near Etna St. in Cypress Hills about 2:25 a.m. Sunday, police said.
Medics took him to Brookdale University Hospital but he could not be saved. His name was not immediately released.
No arrests have been made but cops are looking for two men who fled the scene on a moped.
The killings come amid a sharp drop in shootings and homicides across the city this year. As of Aug. 3, murders are down citywide by nearly 26%, with 179 slayings this year through Aug. 3 compared to 245 in the same time frame last year. Shootings are down 21%, with 422 incidents compared to 534 by this time last year.
Two more shootings in Brooklyn Sunday left four people wounded. Just before 1:20 a.m. Sunday, a man believed to be in his 20s was shot in the right arm and a 35-year-old woman was blasted in the chest and right arm on Bushwick Ave. near Jefferson St. in Bushwick, police said.
Both are expected to survive and neither were initially cooperating with investigators, cops said.
Just 10 minutes later, a 59-year-old man was shot in the chest and a 35-year-old man was shot in the arm at E. 52nd St. at Farragut Road in East Flatbush. Medics took both victims to Kings County Hospital in critical condition but both are expected to survive, police said.
In the Bronx, a 22-year-old woman was shot in the arm a 32-year-old was struck in the back on Crotona Parkway near Elsmere Place in West Farms about 12:50 a.m. Sunday.
Medics took both to St. Barnabas Hospital, where the older woman was in critical condition with life-threatening injuries. A 37-year-old man walked into the same hospital with a gunshot wound not long after and police believe he was shot in the same incident, cops said.
Theodore Parisienne / New York Daily News
Police investigate after two women were shot on Crotona Parkway near Elsmere Place in West Farms early Sunday. (Theodore Parisienne / New York Daily News)
And in Queens, a 30-year-old woman was shot in the right side of her chest about 3:05 a.m. at Beach 17th St. by the Rockaway Beach boardwalk in Far Rockaway, cops said. Medics took her to Jamaica Hospital, where she was in stable condition.
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