Curtis Holley Bronx shooting victim after flicking cigarette butt in the direction of three men. Shot dead in front of wife. Latest fatality in escalating violent crime in United States.
A 36-year-old Bronx man was shot dead in front of his wife after inadvertently flicking a cigarette butt into the direction of three strangers, NYPD police have revealed.
Curtis Holley was shot in the stomach around 8:45pm on Saturday near his home on East 165th Street and Prospect Avenue after becoming embroiled in an argument with the three men.
‘He flicked a cigarette,’ a police source told the NY Post. ‘It just happened to be in the direction of three individuals. He didn’t mean to do it.’
Holley had been walking along the street with his wife at the time of the incident. The verbal confrontation that ensued quickly turned violent, with one of the men pulling out a gun and opening fire.
When EMTs responded to the scene, Holley was found unresponsive and unconscious, lying on the pavement with a single gunshot wound to the abdomen.
No arrests. Identity of shooter unknown
He was rushed to Lincoln Hospital, where he was pronounced dead just hours later at 11:55pm.
To date there have been no arrests. Authorities have yet to identify the shooter.
Neighbors of Holley at his previous home, a city-run temporary housing unit in Harlem, told the NY Daily News that the 36-year-old was ousted from the residence in July after breaking a window on the first floor.
Occupant, Philip Farrice, 67, said Holley had assaulted him and robbed him while at the shelter, the outlet reported.
‘I guess I don’t have to look over my shoulder,’ Farrice said. ‘It’s sad though’.
Other former neighbors of Holley remembered him as a kind man.
‘Every time I’d see him he was on the elevator with his wife and we would talk,’ Donna Prophete, 55, told the Daily News. ‘He’s a nice guy though. He was very friendly.’
In total, two other men were killed and several others were injured in a series of overnight shootings in New York City between Saturday and Sunday.
Of disconcert, more than 50 people were injured in at least 38 shootings over the past week, well above the 16 shootings during the same period last year.
The spree has become the latest sign of escalating gun violence in NYC, with the number of recorded shootings already exceeding the number reported in the whole of last year. The episodes show no sign of abating as brutal crimes post coronavirus and civil discord following episodes of police brutality become the new face of normal.
