Warm up for the De Blasio smackdown.
Via NY Daily News
At least five people were shot, one fatally, near the route of Brooklyn’s West Indian Day Parade in a string of early morning shootings Monday.
A gunman opened fire into a crowd that had already begun parade festivities in Crown Heights about 3:30 a.m., police said, hitting three people and an unmarked police vehicle.
A 55-year-old man, shot in the midsection, died at the scene at the corner of Empire Blvd. and Rogers Ave. — about six blocks from the route of the parade that kicked off at 11 a.m.[…]
A 26-year-old suspect was taken into custody in the fatal shooting and a firearm was recovered, cops said.
Police Commissioner William Bratton called the suspect a “career criminal” and said he was recently paroled. His name wasn’t immediately released.
Minutes later, a 28-year-old woman was shot in the butt on Utica Ave. near St. John’s Place, just two blocks from the parade’s Eastern Parkway route, officials said. […]
Mayor Bill de Blasio defended the importance of the parade despite the violence and said the “vast majority have a wonderful time and only a few individuals get out of line.” He was joined at the parade by his wife, Chirlane McCray, who is of Caribbean decent, and their children, Dante and Chiara.