A good Samaritan who attempted to intervene in a domestic dispute between neighbors has been shot and is in critical condition, according to reports.
ABC7 reported Thursday that 41-year-old Jemina Garay overheard a 35-year-old man in a heated argument with his girlfriend in an East Harlem apartment building on Wednesday shortly after 8:00pm.
When Garay attempted to stop the fight, the gunman sprayed Garay with bullets, hitting her in the left eye, back, abdomen and buttocks.
The victim is currently being treated for severe wounds at Harlem Hospital. The suspect’s girlfriend was not injured; neither were her children who were in the apartment where the shooting took place.
“They had told me that someone had just gotten shot in the head, a woman,” Marisol Otero, a resident in the neighborhood told ABC7. “I got scared, I got paranoid. I’m like, oh my God, right here in the building. I was scared to come out but I have an appointment so I got to go. I heard gunshots, I heard something. I’m still scared. I’m like, how am I going to go outside?”
A 9mm shell casing was found and recovered in the hallway of the building where the incident took place.
A manhunt is currently underway to find the suspect, who authorities say is armed and dangerous. Police say the gunman, whose name has not been revealed, fled the scene and has a criminal past.
Neighbors told the news outlet that the suspect does not live with his girlfriend, who lives alone with a young child. They added that they had hoped she would have left the man sooner because he treated her so poorly, although they were surprised that he would go to the lengths of shooting someone attempting to defend his girlfriend.
“Nobody’s thinking about the fact that my children are going to see this,” the victim’s husband, Eric Garay told the New York Post in a phone call while shedding tears. “And they’re going to have to relive this over and over again. Her name was J-E-M-I-N-A G-A-R-A-Y and she was the f*cking best. That’s all I’m giving everybody. She was the f*cking best.”
