THE failure of city officials to make changes to combat violent crime is making commuters vulnerable and leaving New York “crushed,” the founder of the Guardian Angels has warned.
The seemingly random fatal shooting on an NYC subway in broad daylight on Sunday – and the gunman’s escape – is “exactly why people are extraordinarily nervous” right now, Curtis Sliwa told The Sun.
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And why The Big Apple will continue to rot, the leader of NYC’s Guardian Angels predicted.
Shortly before noon on Sunday, a man paced back and forth in the last Manhattan-bound subway car when he suddenly shot Daniel Enriquez in the chest, the NYPD said.
The “beloved” 48-year-old investment researcher at Goldman Sachs was on his way to a weekend brunch.
After the shooting, the Q train pulled into the Canal Street station, where passengers and the gunman took off.
There are reports that a person of interest in Enriquez’s “tragic, senseless shooting” is in custody, but the NYPD hasn’t confirmed.
Sliwa said brazen crimes like this will continue to happen if police aren’t more active and cameras aren’t installed on each of the subway cars.
Cameras in the subways and vigilant officers walking through the subway cars will deter crime and catch crimes before they escalate like they did Sunday and then allow law enforcement to quickly arrest the perp, he said.
“Police need to have more of a presence on the subways. That means walking up and down the subway cars,” Sliwa said.
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“This is a perfect case where doing that could’ve prevented this crime.
“Someone would’ve told the officer going up and down the subway cars that there’s a guy who looks troubled and they could’ve intervened.
“Instead, the guy pulls a handgun and indiscriminately shoots a man and flees. And there are no cameras on the trains to catch the culprit or serve as a deterrent, so he flees.”
When asked about taking a more active approach on the train, the NYPD said in an email: “Officers riding the trains are called Train Patrol. Train Patrol continues to this day.”
The Sun participated in multiple nights of ride-along with the Guardian Angels over the last months – after the NYPD denied requests – and if officers were at a station, they stood on the platform.
“Canal Street is a busy station. Where were the police? What’s the strategy?” Sliwa said.
“There should be cameras in every (subway) car, so the conductor knows what’s going on in each car, and so police can catch the culprit in the act. It’ll also be a deterrent.
“Now they’re throwing stuff at the wall and hoping it works. Go back to basics and use the technology available.”
THE GUNMAN’S ESCAPE PLAN
After shooting Enriquez, the suspect was seen on a surveillance camera handing the gun to a homeless man who sold it to another person, police sources told The Post.
It’s unclear if any of the men knew each other.
The NYPD released images of the suspect on social media and asked riders and New Yorkers to be on the lookout as the manhunt continues.
Sunday’s fatal subway shooting happened just over a month after Frank James allegedly opened fire in a crowded Brooklyn subway station and injured at least 29 people.
‘MANHATTAN IS IN DECAY’
The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) released a report on May 10 about the drastic increase in shooting deaths during the pandemic.
Firearms were involved in 79 percent of all homicides in 2020 – a 35 percent increase from 2019 – according to the CDC’s May 10 report.
There were 19,384 gun murders in 2020, which surpassed the previous high of 18,253 recorded by the CDC in 1993.
“It’s about to be a crazy summer. You can feel it in the air,” Damon Jones told The Sun.
Jones, who spent three decades in law enforcement, is New York State’s representative of Blacks in Law Enforcement of America and publishes the local newspaper Black Westchester.
“It’s 6.30 in the morning, and we turn on the TV at work and there’s always a story about someone getting shot,” Jones said.
With so much violence, Sliwa said people living in the boroughs won’t travel to Manhattan, which will continue to stunt the city’s growth after the pandemic.
“Manhattan is being crushed. The city is in decay,” Sliwa said.
“People like this man who was killed going out for brunch in Manhattan is what the city’s economy needs.
“They have to come from the outer burrows, but now they’re saying, ‘We’re not leaving our neighborhood.’
“The subways are the veins and arteries in and out of the city, and this gives people another reason to avoid Manhattan.”
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