Albany and Washington for failed policies and inaction. (YPD YouTube feed.)
For almost a year, no one has been shot and killed in Yonkers. Crime is down. Nodine Hill, once notorious for gang activity, has not seen a gang-related shooting in three years. The city proudly pitches itself as the safest in the state.
Then shots are fired. A young man dies. Four youths are rushed to the hospital in critical condition. And a 15-year-old boy is run down and cuffed. An illegal gun — a 9mm Taurus handgun stolen in Georgia — is recovered by investigators.
Now the family of Brandon Garcia, 20, has gone online to raise money for funeral expenses. Garcia died of gunshot wounds to the back. He moved to Virginia when he was six and came back to Yonkers for visits, his parents told lohud.com.
At a rainy press conference Monday, Mayor Mike Spano came to the mic, not his usual affable self. Visibly angry, he pointedly blamed members of his own Democratic Party in Albany for bail reform and other measures. “People want to know who to blame?” he said. “Go to the state legislature, because they’ve succeeded in taking the handcuffs off the bad guys and putting them on law enforcement and the judges.”
He didn’t spare Washington or the Republicans, faulting them “because of their inability to do things that will allow for law enforcement to take guns, illegal guns off the streets.”
According to Yonkers police, the shooting occurred at 8:43 p.m. Sunday near Elm Street and Palisade Avenue. By coincidence, a Yonkers police captain was nearby — close enough to hear the shots — and responded immediately. He saw the suspect running and followed him while directing other officers to the scene.
The four youths hit by gunfire include a 16-year-old male shot in the left shoulder; two 15-year-old males, one hit in the left thigh and the other in the stomach; and a 14-year-old female shot in the left leg. All four were still hospitalized in critical condition as of Monday; authorities have declined to release further information about their condition since then.
The incident unfolded as the 15-year-old suspect walked past a parked bus at Elm Street and Palisade Avenue, then fired eight rounds at the group. Surveillance video obtained by several social media accounts and TV stations shows the alleged gunman holding his gun up as he fired, troublingly reminiscent of a dark video game scene.
The suspect fled eastbound on Elm Street before he was caught on St. Casimir Avenue.
Authorities have characterized the incident as “group violence”; however, it remains unclear whether all the victims were intended targets. That raises the threatening prospect that the shooting was gang-related — and could touch off a new cycle of violence.
The last spate of gang-related violence, in 2023, took one life and left several people seriously injured in multiple shootings. It came a year after a major undercover investigation led to a dozen arrests tied to drug sales, murder and stabbings in Nodine Hill.
The Gang Unit was among the specialized units on the scene Sunday night, along with Major Case Squad detectives, the Crime Scene Unit and the Digital Forensics Unit.
The suspect has been charged with second-degree murder, second-degree attempted murder, first-degree assault, second-degree criminal possession of a weapon and first-degree reckless endangerment, police said. New York law prohibits the release of identifying information about juvenile offenders.
The suspect was arraigned in the Youth Part of Westchester County Court on Aug. 3 and remanded into custody, where he remains pending his next court appearance later this week.
Now a police mobile command unit stands watch where Brandon Garcia lost his life. “We’re not going to let the bad guys think they somehow control Elm Street. They don’t,” the mayor said Monday.
