One day after burying her 20-year-old daughter in Woodlawn cemetery, a Norwood mother said she has been threatened by gang members, has fled her home of ten years, along with her family, and has gone into hiding at a Bronx hotel.

 

Cynthia Duffy, mother of Delila Vásquez, 20, confirmed her daughter died at Jacobi Medical Center just before midnight on Wednesday, March 17. As reported by Norwood News, she was discovered with a gunshot wound to her head inside a third-floor apartment at 3339 Hull Avenue, near East 209th Street in Norwood at 10:09 p.m. the same night.

 

Police had not released Vásquez’s name. She became the first recorded homicide victim of 2021 in the 52nd precinct. Speaking at the Bronx Community Board 7 (CB7) executive committee meeting on March 18, Deputy Inspector Thomas J Alps, the commanding officer of the precinct, described the shooting as an “absolute tragic incident.”

 

He said the victim had been “still alive and breathing” when officers responded at the scene at around 10 o’clock. “We had her transported quickly to Jacobi Medical Center where she was pronounced deceased at 23.49 hours,” he said.

 

“It was difficult to experience for my officers, as well,” he said, adding that he would be having some counsellors come in to speak to the officers who he guessed had experienced some psychological trauma from witnessing the event.

 

WABC-TV had reported that an unidentified male who was inside the apartment on the night of the shooting was arrested at the scene and was taken into custody on an unrelated charge the same evening. In an email dated March 25, in response to a request for further information about that arrest, Sergeant Ishmael of the NYPD confirmed that the male in question had been arrested for an “open warrant,” unrelated to Vásquez’s death. He declined to provide the male’s name or other information.

On March 26, the NYPD announced that Precious Williams, 20, of Dekalb Avenue in Norwood, was arrested on March 19 and charged with criminal possession of a weapon and criminal possession of a controlled substance. Police also confirmed on the same date that an unidentified 16-year-old male from the Bronx was also charged with weapon and drug possession. They confirmed that both arrests were made in connection with the inquiry into Vásquez’s death. The name of the 16-year-old was not made public due to his age.

 

During a telephone interview with Duffy on Sunday, March 29, the grieving mother confirmed to the Norwood News that she had been harassed by gang members, saying, “Yes, I sent everything to the police, and today, they [the gang members] were writing to me, ‘We’re so glad that Delila’s dead.’” She added that they also, allegedly, told her they had urinated on the young woman’s grave.

 

Duffy said the police had traced several of the harassing Instagram messages she received to the South Bronx but that, so far, they had been unable to locate those responsible for them. When questioned by the Norwood News about the gang-related links, one NYPD source said he was unaware of a gang connection to the case.

 

On Wednesday, March 24, a local pastor, whose name the Norwood News has withheld, told us in a phone call that after participating in a vigil and anti-violence rally in honor of Vásquez on Hull Avenue, the previous day, members of the clergy had been verbally threatened. At the March 23 rally, some family members and friends of Vásquez wore T-shirts and sweatshirts displaying her photo, while others held photos of her.

 

The clergy member also said, “The family told me yesterday that they are being threatened by the Bloods.” According to the NYPD, the Bloods are a gang who surfaced in New York City in section C-73 at the Department of Correction facility of Riker’s Island in 1993. He added, “Yesterday, when I went there [at the peace rally] they told me we couldn’t have the prayer vigil there.”

 

When asked about the separate alleged threat to the clergy, Duffy said, “Yes, they [the gang members] said all over ‘gram [Instagram] that if they see anyone with Delila shirts, they’re going to shoot anyone wearing Delila shirts.”

 

We also asked Duffy about another allegation made by the same clergy member, who told the Norwood News that a handgun had been found on the roof of a Hull Avenue building around the time of the vigil. She responded, “Yes… no. I can’t really talk about that, but they did.”

 

The NYPD did not respond to a request for comment regarding the alleged threats made against Duffy, against those attending the vigil or the claims that a weapon was recovered from a Hull Avenue rooftop at the time of the vigil.

 

The vigil was organized by the Bronx Community Council and the Muslim and Immigrant Coalition for Justice. It was attended by members of Stand Up to Violence (SUV), an anti-violence organization based at Jacobi Medical Center, Imam Ibrahim Issa of Montefiore Hospital, the 49th Precinct Clergy Coalition, over a dozen local senior clergy leaders, as well as by family members and friends of Vásquez.

 

Video by David Greene

 

During the vigil, which was also attended by about eight to ten police officers, Duffy told the crowd of mourners and residents of the block, “It’s unfair that your own (expletive) friends kill you.” Appealing to those present for help with the investigation, the mother pleaded, “I need everybody to communicate, for everybody to say what they know. Please, I’m begging you.”

 

Aldo Rafael Perez, a member of both the Bronx Community Council and the Muslim and Immigrant Coalition for Justice, later told residents, “Gun violence has risen 75 percent since last year, and our city is freakin’ tired of what’s going on.” He added, “Today, we are here with Mrs. Duffy and we’re standing with her, calling for justice.”

 

Assemblyman José Rivera, who was also present at the vigil, said he had left the budget negotiations at the State capital in order to attend. When Rivera began to console Duffy, in Spanish, he was informed she was Irish American, creating a very brief, light-hearted moment which drew some smiles from the crowd. Referring to the recent wave of gun violence engulfing the Bronx, Rivera then said, “This is a sad moment. I can’t take it anymore. Every time you turn on the TV, someone is taken away from us.”

 

Pastor Jay Gooding, the president of the 49th Precinct Clergy Council and director of community outreach at SUV, then addressed the mourners and residents, saying, “Our prayer is that God will send his angels of protection in this community. Too much senseless gun violence is happening in our country, in our community.”

 

Gooding added, “We see what happened last week in Atlanta, yesterday in Colorado, what’s happening right here in the Bronx; it’s time to put the guns down.”

At the Bronx CB7, March 18 meeting, Alps had confirmed that while six out of the seven index crimes for the 52^nd precinct were down, compared to the same period last year, the command was struggling with gun violence. “Year to date, we have six shootings versus three last year,” he said.

 

After consoling the grieving mother at the March 23 vigil, Alps told the crowd of about fifty, “As far as the investigation goes, I don’t want to get into too many details about it. There’s been some arrests in relation to it. The Bronx DA is working closely with us, obviously, in the investigation.”

 

Alps added, “I anticipate further arrests as information comes in.” He then reminded residents that anyone with information on the case could call the Crime Stoppers Hotline or the 52nd precinct directly.

 

The next day, in a March 24 telephone interview with a source with knowledge of 3339 Hull Avenue, the source told the Norwood News that the tenant of record for the apartment where the shooting occurred was a woman in her 50s who had been arrested about two or three months earlier. “Whoever was in that apartment was not supposed to be there,” he said. “There were a lot of young guys going in and out of that apartment. What they were doing inside the apartment, I don’t know.”

 

Norwood News spoke with a second, unidentified Hull Avenue neighborhood source, and asked if he knew the female tenant of record for the apartment at 3339 Hull Avenue. He said, “The lady got arrested about three months ago, and the apartment was left in the care of somebody else… the Bloods took over the apartment and they used it as a stash house (for drugs) and to keep guns in the house.” He also corroborated what the first source said about the apartment being a hangout for local gang members.

 

Meanwhile, describing her late daughter, Duffy said Vásquez loved to help her friends, and had enjoyed helping take care of her younger brother. She concluded, “Right before this happened, she was texting me saying she wanted to go to church every Sunday and to follow God more, because I used to take her to church when she was younger.”

 

A person arrested and accused of a crime is innocent unless and until convicted in a court of law.

 

Anyone with information with regard to this incident is asked to call the NYPD’s Crime Stoppers Hotline at 1-800-577-TIPS (8477) or for Spanish, 1-888-57-PISTA (74782). The public can also submit their tips by logging onto the Crime Stoppers website at WWW.NYPDCRIMESTOPPERS.COM, or on Twitter @NYPDTips.

 

All calls are strictly confidential.