A second 13-year-old boy was arrested for the fatal shooting of an innocent man visiting a friend in the Bronx, just days after Police Commissioner Jessica Tisch reported an increase in youth violence in the city.
The teen was charged with second-degree murder, first-degree manslaughter, and second-degree criminal possession of a weapon for the April 23 slaying of 28-year-old Daoud Marji, according to police.
The young teen was apprehended Wednesday evening at LaGuardia Airport by members of the NYPD’s Warrants Squad as he arrived on a flight from Miami, according to sources.
A week earlier, another 13-year-old boy turned himself in to cops in connection with the same killing, facing charges of second-degree murder, first-degree manslaughter, and criminal use of a firearm, according to authorities.
Daoud, a 28-year-old plumber’s apprentice from Yonkers, was not the intended target of the gunfire, nor was a 33-year-old woman who was struck in the hip and injured during the incident, according to law enforcement sources.
Daoud was meeting up with a friend from Detroit at University Avenue and West Kingsbridge Road shortly before 5 p.m. when bullets flew, with a single round striking him in the head, according to police and his father.
He was rushed to St. Barnabas Hospital, where he fought for his life but eventually died from his injuries.
Daoud’s father, Saed Marji, 56, previously told The Post that he advised his son not to travel to the Bronx because he had heard the area was bad.
Hours after the arrest was announced, a 15-year-old boy was shot and wounded in the Bronx, according to police.
The teen was shot once in the right thigh at 11:58 p.m. Wednesday on Exterior Street in Concourse Village, according to authorities.
According to sources, the boy told police that he heard gunshots before realizing he had been hit.
He was taken to Harlem Hospital and was listed in stable condition.
According to sources, two males fled on foot.
It was unclear whether the teen was a target or an innocent bystander.
The violence continued in broad daylight Thursday, when two 17-year-old boys were shot in the Bronx, most likely by stray bullets, according to cops and sources.
One of the boys was shot in the neck and the other in the arm around 1:20 p.m. at East 176th Street and Anthony Avenue in the Mount Hope neighborhood, according to police.
Both were taken to Columbia University Irving Medical Center and were listed in stable condition, according to police.
Neither of the victims has a criminal record, and they were shot from a distance, leading investigators to believe neither was the intended target, sources said.
Recently, Police Commissioner Jessica Tisch blamed the state’s controversial “Raise the Age” law for an increase in youth violence in New York City.
Between 2018 and 2024, the number of children under the age of 18 arrested with a gun increased by 136%, according to the top cop, who spoke alongside Mayor Eric Adams at a crime statistics briefing at City Hall on Tuesday.
Over the same time period, Tisch reported that the number of underage shooters increased by 192%, while the number of juvenile victims of gun violence increased by 81%.
