New details emerged Tuesday in the death of a Brooklyn teenager fatally shot over the weekend during apparent gunplay with a sawed-off shotgun.
According to NYPD Chief of Detectives Joseph Kenny, officers from the 73rd Precinct were met with a horrific scene when they arrived at the victim’s fifth-floor apartment of the Howard Houses at 80 Osborn St. in Brownsville at around 10:24 a.m. on June 2.
Responding officers spotted a trail of blood in the apartment hallway that led to a bedroom, where they found 14-year-old Josai Guy fatally shot. The scene was utter carnage, Kenny noted; blood covered the walls which were also peppered with embedded bullets.
Guy suffered a gaping gunshot wound to his chest. EMS rushed him to Brookdale University Hospital, but he could not be saved.
Police said Guy was killed with a sawed-off shotgun found inside the apartment. Chief Kenny stated that Guy’s 12-year-old cousin told police that he was trying to take the gun from his cousin when it went off.
“Both the barrel and stock were cut off to make it smaller,” Chief Kenny explained. “We had one spent shell casing at the scene and five live rounds inside the shotgun.”
Law enforcement sources also reported to amNewYork Metro that the Guy heartbreakingly told police, “I shot my cousin by accident, I don’t want him to die.”
“He is being processed as a juvenile, the case is being handled in family court,” Chief Kenny added on Tuesday. “He was charged with manslaughter, recklessly causing a death, criminal negligent homicide, and criminal possession of a weapon.”
The young shooter was released into his mother’s custody.
Police say they were alerted to the shocking incident by two 911 calls: one from the 12-year-old cousin, and the other from Guy’s grandfather.
The grandfather — who police described as being on medication and “unwell” — was babysitting at the time of the killing and awoke to the shotgun blast. Authorities were informed that he was unaware there was a gun in the house. He is not expected to be charged.
Chief Kenny also noted that the NYPD Licensing Division had not issued a permit to any resident of the apartment, or anyone involved in the incident.
Guy’s father, a FDNY firefighter, was not at home at the time of the killing. Chief Kenny said that investigators have not officially pinned down exactly who owned the shotgun.
The investigation remains ongoing.
