Police in New York City searched Monday for a gunman who fatally shot a subway rider in an apparently random attack.
The shooting occurred Sunday morning on a Manhattan-bound Q train traveling over the Manhattan Bridge, NYPD Chief Kenneth Corey said.
The suspect pulled out a gun after pacing in the last train car and “without provocation” shot the victim at close range, Corey said at a news conference Sunday.
The suspect fled once the train arrived at the Canal Street station, and police reviewed surveillance video from the station, Corey said. Police and EMS arrived at the station, and the victim was transported to a hospital where he died, Corey said.
Police identified the victim as Daniel Enriquez, 48, of Brooklyn. Enriquez’s sister, Griselda Vile, told The New York Times and Post her brother was heading to brunch when the shooting occurred. Enriquez lived in Park Slope and worked at Goldman Sachs, she said, telling the Times he was “a special, jovial guy.”
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Goldman chair and CEO David Solomon said in a statement Enriquez was a dedicated and beloved employee who “epitomized our culture of collaboration and excellence.”
No other injuries occurred during the shooting, and witnesses worked with police, Corey said. The suspect was described as a dark-skinned, heavyset male with a beard wearing a dark hooded sweatshirt, gray sweatpants and white sneakers, Corey said.
Police Commissioner Keechant Sewell tweeted a photo of the unidentified man Monday, asking for the public’s help in locating him.
After the shooting, a train operator began chest compressions on the victim while the conductor contacted the rail control center to dispatch police and EMS, the transit workers union said. “They deserve the city’s thanks and praise. We’re very proud of them,” TWU Local 100 President Tony Utano said in a statement.
At least three people have been killed this year on the nation’s largest transit system compared with four as of this time last year, according to police statistics. The number of felony assaults, grand larcenies and robberies has increased, and transit crime overall is up 62.5% year to year.
Gov. Kathy Hochul said she was working closely with the Metropolitan Transportation Authority and offered assistance to the NYPD as it investigates the shooting. “My heart breaks for the victim’s family. Everyone deserves to feel safe on our subways. I’ll keep fighting to make that a reality,” she tweeted.
Mayor Eric Adams called the shooting “unimaginable.”
“You’re sitting down, going to brunch, going to visit a family member, a person walks up to you and shoots you for no reason,” Adams said Monday. “That is the worst nightmare.”
Despite the increase in transit crime, Adams encouraged riders to return to the city’s subways, vowing to make the trains safer.
More than 3 million people take the subway on a given weekday, but ridership has hovered around 60% of its pre-pandemic levels.
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Adams, who won office campaigning on a message promoting public safety, released a subway safety plan in February that focused on adding police officers to patrol trains and preventing people experiencing homelessness from sheltering inside the system. He made addressing gun violence a priority of his first term.
In January, Michelle Alyssa Go was killed after a man police said was experiencing homelessness and had a history of mental health problems shoved her onto the tracks at the Times Square station.
In April, 10 people were shot and more than a dozen were injured in an attack on a Brooklyn subway car. The shooting, in which no one was killed, sparked a search that lasted more than a day for the gunman who used smoke bombs before firing into the car.
Contributing: The Associated Press