Police on Tuesday arrested a man wanted in connection with a fatal shooting inside a New York subway car, the latest attack to spark worries over the safety of the city’s trains.
Andrew Abdullah, 25, was taken into custody but has not yet been charged, John Grimpel with New York Police’s Office of the Deputy Commissioner, Public Information confirmed to USA TODAY.
Authorities had been hunting for the gunman since the fatal shooting inside the Manhattan-bound Q train on Sunday, which left one man dead in what police said was an attack “without provocation.”
Video from NBC New York showed Abdullah being escorted into the Fifth Precinct in handcuffs Tuesday afternoon.
Police on Tuesday had tweeted a photo of a man they said is wanted in connection with the shooting.
“Do you know where Andrew Abdullah is? He’s wanted for shooting a fellow New Yorker in the chest on Sunday, May 22nd, causing the victim’s death, while on a ‘Q’ train in Manhattan,” the New York City Police Department tweeted.
Police Commissioner Keechant Sewell on Monday shared surveillance photos of a man tied to the shooting, saying, “We need all eyes on this.”
The shooting comes as Mayor Eric Adams has sought to balance encouraging riders back into a system still recovering from the COVID-19 pandemic and promising safety after other violent attacks on the trains, including the mass shooting last month on a Brooklyn subway car.
“When you have an incident like this, it sends a chilling impact. There’s no getting around that,” Adams said Monday.
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Crime in the New York transit system is up 62.5% so far this year, according to the latest statistics from the New York City Police Department but is on par with crime levels from years before the pandemic, with last year seeing a sharp dip in transit crime by this time.
Before Sunday’s shooting, there had been at least three murders in the transit system so far this year, compared to four at this time last year. The number of grand larcenies, felony assaults and robberies is up, according to police statistics.
Ridership, however, remains around 60% of its pre-pandemic levels, according to data from the Metropolitan Transportation Authority: 3 to 3.6 million riders on a given weekday recently.
Adams on Monday repeated his overture for riders to return to the subway: “The call is to come back to work. And the subway system being safe is a major driver to doing that.”
There was no police officer in the car where the shooting occurred Sunday, Adams said.
In February, Adams released a safety plan that aims to surge more officers into the system and connect homeless riders with city services. The plan came a month after the death of Michelle Alyssa Go, who was shoved onto the tracks at the Times Square station.
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After the Sunset Park mass shooting in April, Adams vowed to look into new technologies that could detect firearms and be placed at the entrances of subway stations. He said Monday the city was still considering the technologies and that hewanted mobile units that could be moved between stations. The technology is different from a metal detector but could still identify a firearm, Adams said.
The shooting Sunday left Daniel Enriquez, 48, of Brooklyn, dead, police said. Enriquez had largely avoided the subway at the height of the pandemic and recently because of safety concerns, preferring Ubers to get to Manhattan from his home in Park Slope, his partner, Adam Pollack, told the New York Times.
NYPD Chief of Department Kenneth Corey said at a news conference Sunday that Enriquez and the gunman were in the last train car traveling on the Manhattan Bridge when the shooting occurred. Witnesses told police the gunman was pacing before firing one shot at Enriquez, striking his chest, Corey said.
The train pulled into the Canal Street station, and the gunman fled, Corey said. The transit workers union said a train operator began chest compressions before police and EMS arrived. Enriquez was transported to a hospital, where he died Sunday, Corey said.
David Solomon, chairman and CEO of Goldman Sachs, where Enriquez worked, said in a statement Enriquez was a dedicated and beloved employee who “epitomized our culture of collaboration and excellence.”
Contributing: Associated Press