At Least 5 Killed In Violent Memorial Day Weekend: NYPD

NEW YORK CITY — A bloody Memorial Day weekend in New York City unfolded with at least five people dying in shootings and stabbings, police said.

The wave of shootings and stabbing continued into the early morning hours Tuesday, when officers found a man, 29, with a gunshot wound to his head in Bed-Stuy, police said.

The carnage coincided with renewed national attention on guns following the recent mass shootings in Buffalo and Uvalde, Texas. Mayor Eric Adams, who has spent his mayoralty focused on gun violence, said the problem isn't just a local one for New York, Atlanta and Chicago.

"This is a national crisis and we have not been attacking this as a national crisis," he said Tuesday on MSNBC's "Morning Joe."

The spate of violence actually began early Saturday when NYPD officers responded to a call of shots fired near a nightclub Broadway and Lorimer Street in Williamsburg and ended up non-fatally shooting a 21-year-old man, said John Chell, the NYPD's deputy chief in charge of Brooklyn North detectives.

Chell said officers stopped one vehicle several blocks away at Meeker and Vandeervoort avenues that believed was connected to the nightclub area shooting. He said the driver — the 21-year-old man — tried to flee in a white Honda CRV and struck two cops in the process.

Police opened fire and struck the man in the chest, Chell said. The man walked into Wyckoff Hospital about 20 minutes later, he said.

The first fatal incidents that weekend unfolded within minutes of each other Saturday night.

In the first, NYPD officers found two men at West 146th Street and Amsterdam Avenue with stab wounds about 11:06 a.m., authorities said.

Jason Jenkins, 40, who suffered multiple stabs wounds to his abdomen was pronounced deceased at a Harlem hospital, police said. A second man, 29, was listed in stable condition with a stab wound to his chest, authorities said.

Hours later, police arrested the accused stabber — Silverio Quirino, 33 — on requested charges of murder and assault, authorities said.

The second fatal incident occurred 11:25 p.m. with a 911 call about shots fired in front of a Decatur Street home near Malcolm X Boulevard, police said. Officers found a 53-year-old man with a fatal gunshot wound to his head, authorities said.

The shooting is still under investigation, NYPD officials said.

Barely an hour later early Sunday, police found Davy Donovan, 45, with gunshot wounds to his neck and leg near East 35th Street and Church Avenue, authorities said.

Doctors pronounced Donovan deceased at Kings County Hospital. He worked at the TSA and apparently was talking to his sister on the phone as a shooter fired the fatal shots, the New York Post first reported.

“I heard gunshots — about three or four,” Donovan's sister told the Post, according to the report. “After that, I didn’t hear anything. I was like, ‘Donovan, Donovan.’ I kept saying it, and he wasn’t responding.”

The next fatal shooting unfolded about 10:42 a.m. Sunday in Brownsville, when police found Waleek Watford, 31, with a gunshot wound to his shoulder and stab wounds to his lower back, authorities said.

As with Donovan's death, police are still investigating who shot and stabbed Watford.

Memorial Day itself came to a blood-soaked end as police responded to at least three shootings late Monday, including an 80-year-old woman struck in the arm by a stray bullet in Queens, the New York Post first reported.

The final fatal shooting technically unfolded early Tuesday as most New Yorkers were wrapping up the holiday weekend.

At about 1:30 a.m. Tuesday, police got a 911 call of a shooting near the corner of Marcy and Lexington avenues in Bed-Stuy, the NYPD said. They found a man, 29, with a fatal gunshot wound to his head.

Patch writer Kayla Levy contributed to this report.