A VIDEO FROM a local store shows victims running away from shots being fired on the Grand Concourse at the corner of East 184th Street and the Grand Concourse by Dunkin Donuts in Fordham Manor on Monday, March 4, 2024. Video courtesy of a local business.

A 16-year-old male youth reportedly sprinted for his life away from gunfire across the Grand Concourse in Fordham Manor, together with his two younger siblings aged 13 and 10, and later pleaded with local workmen to hide him from the shooter, one worker told Norwood News.

Police later said that the incident unfolded at around 5.44 p.m. on Monday, March 4, when officers responded to a 911 call regarding a person who had been shot. Upon arrival, they said officers were informed of a confirmed male shot in the vicinity of East 184th Street and the Grand Concourse.

“The victim is a 16-year-old male with a gunshot wound to his left ankle,” a police spokesperson said. “The victim was removed to St. Barnabas Hospital in stable condition. There are no arrests at this time and the investigation remains ongoing.”

 

Speaking in Spanish, a man standing on Valentine Avenue and East 184th Street after the incident who asked to be described as “a worker” and who declined to be identified, told Norwood News he had been inside a building located on the corner of Valentine Avenue and East 184th Street when he heard about five gunshots.

 

He said a group of plumbers who had been outside on the street by an open doorway leading onto Valentine Avenue told him a terrified youth came running around the corner with his two siblings and ran into the open door and into the building.

 

The worker said the youth was bleeding from his leg. He said, he cried, “They’re going to kill me!” and pleaded with the plumbers not to make him exit the building. The worker said they put a makeshift tourniquet on the youth’s leg and called 911.

He said the police and emergency services later arrived and took the three siblings away in an ambulance.

 

The worker said he had children of his own and felt it was the right thing to do. He lamented that many youth were influenced by gang pressure / gang violence.

We asked if he knew if the youth in question was part of a gang or if he had been running from a gang and he said he didn’t know but he suspected he was. He did not know the youth.

 

He went on to say that the 16-year-old was in a lot of pain and was losing a lot of blood. “He was lucky he didn’t die,” the worker said and later shared a photo of a blood-soaked scene inside the building where the workers had helped the young man and had stopped him from bleeding out.

 

One of the plumbers later contacted Norwood News directly and further described what happened once the kids ran into the building, saying in part, “We locked both doors and told everyone stay quiet. I took off my red belt and did my best to slow the bleeding.”

 

Police had cordoned off various separate crime scenes in the area, including on both corners of East 184th Street and the Grand Concourse as well as at East 184th Street and Valentine Avenue.

The window of a Dunkin’ Donuts on the corner of East 184th Street and the Grand Concourse was seen smashed after the incident. A police official was heard responding to a passerby and saying nobody who had been inside the location had been hurt.

 

Several plastic markers were seen close to a median/island on the Grand Concourse closest to the corner of the Grand Concourse and East 184th Street where Kennedy Fried Chicken was located, indicating that around 5 shots had been fired. We spoke to a few people inside Kennedy’s Fried Chicken but nobody had seen the incident unfold.

We also spoke to a male worker employed in a store located near Dunkin’ Donuts on the Grand Concourse and East 184th Street. The man also declined to be identified though he said he was from Yemen and suggested he had seen a lot of bad things happen in his life already. He said he heard four gunshots.

 

“I was in my store,” he said. “I was taking care of the customers and then I went outside. I didn’t see nothing.” He said he was told by someone else that either the victim or the shooter had been in Dunkin’ Donuts. “I see the people running and I come back [inside], save myself,” he said.

Asked if he saw the victim or anyone else involved in the incident, the employee, who said it was just his second week in his current role at the store, said he didn’t see anyone injured or shot on the street. He just saw people running away.

 

The store employee was later seen praying on a mat behind the glass-enclosed counter of the store. Since Ramadan has begun, he said he prays five times a day. Asked if he was also praying to give thanks for not being shot, the man said he was and added, “Al Hamd Lala Habib” which he said means “Thanks God.”

Asked if he felt unsafe or nervous working in the area now that someone was shot so close to his work place, the employee said, “I don’t feel nervous. This is real life for me.”

Asked if he had contemplated that it might have been him who had been shot, he said, “I’m not scared because everybody will die. If it was time for me to die today, I’m gonna die today.”

On the oppostie side of Grand Concourse, also on an island/median near Kennedy Fried Chicken, were the remains of what appeared to be a mangled e-bike entangled in some crime scene tape. We asked a police officer guarding the crime scene if the mangled e-bike was part of the current crime scene related to the shooting or unrelated. He said he was unable to share any information in this regard.

Shootings in the 46th Precinct, where the incident took place are down according to police statistics (attached), though shootings in the borough as a whole are up, compared to the same timeframe last year.

When we suggested to the worker who had assisted the victim that he was a hero for having done so, given others in similar circumstances during other violent incidents had initially been afraid to help an injured victim who had also told them he was afraid of being killed, the man said, “I like to think that if you do something good, something good will happen to you in return.”

Anyone with information regarding 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 Crimestoppers website at https://crimestoppers.nypdonline.org/, or on Twitter @NYPDTips.

 

All calls are strictly confidential.