Gunman on scooter charged with murder, attempted murder, for New York shootings
NEW YORK — A Brooklyn man accused of firing a gun while riding a scooter, killing an 86-year-old and injuring three other men, is charged with murder and attempted murder, police said Sunday.
The series of apparently random shootings occurred Saturday in Brooklyn and Queens, according to police. The motive of the alleged gunman, identified Sunday as Thomas Abreu, 25, was unknown, police said.
Police arrested Abreu Saturday. The New York Police Department pulled an image of the gunman from video and sent it to officers, who spotted him a couple of hours after the first shooting, police said.
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Police confiscated a scooter and a 9 mm handgun with an extended magazine. Abreu was charged with murder, two counts of attempted murder and six counts of criminal possession of a weapon.
The shootings began in Brooklyn around 11:10 a.m., when the gunman shot a 21-year-old man in the shoulder. The victim was brought to a hospital and was expected to survive, police said.
Soon after, the gunman shot Hamoo Saeidi, 86, in the Richmond Hill area of Queens. Saeidi later died at a hospital.
Shortly afterward in Queens, witnesses reported a man on a scooter firing randomly into a group of people. Eight minutes later, a 44-year-old man was shot in the face. He was in critical condition at Jamaica Hospital Medical Center.
About one minute later, a 63-year-old man was shot in the torso. He was in stable condition at a hospital.
On Sunday, police reported a related shooting at an intersection in Queens. A 40-year-old man who had been shot at was unhurt.
Killings in the nation’s most populous city have risen in recent years to about where they were a decade ago but are still well below an early-1990s peak. Gunfire injuries surged in New York City during the pandemic and remain high.
Mayor Eric Adams, a former New York City police captain, has called for getting more guns off the streets.
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