12-year-old boy is charged with killing of 15-year-old cousin in Brooklyn

NEW YORK – About 150 people gathered outside an apartment building in the Crown Heights section of Brooklyn on the evening of June 3 for a sombre purpose: to pay tribute to Jasai Guy, a 15-year-old boy who had been fatally shot by, police said, a 12-year-old cousin.

Mourners lit votive candles, wrote messages on a poster board, and clutched blue and white balloons. About a dozen New York City firefighters, colleagues of the dead teenager’s father, were among those in the crowd.

Madam Cassandra Vassell, who identified herself as Jasai’s maternal grandmother, told the mourners that her grandson was a “sweet child” and that “what we need right now is prayers”.

Also at the vigil was Mr Derelle Guy, Jasai’s father, who described his son as a “beautiful soul”.

“Know who Jasai Guy was,” Mr Guy said. “He was an honours student. He was a spelling bee champion of the division. He was a track star. As his friends said, he inspired them to be better.”

The 12-year-old, who has not been publicly identified because of his age, was charged with second-degree manslaughter, criminally negligent homicide and fourth-degree criminal possession of a weapon, officials said.

The case is being handled in the city’s Family Court because of the boy’s age. He was released to his mother on June 3 after a hearing at which an application that he be detained was denied, according to the city’s Law Department.

The boy and Jasai, who the police initially said was 14, were cousins and were in the living room at Jasai’s apartment when the fatal shot was fired, a law enforcement official said.

The 12-year-old was visiting Jasai at the home, on the fifth floor of a building on Osborn Street, where he lived with his father, said Mr Mudhil Jeter, 40, a long-time building resident and friend of Mr Guy’s.

“It’s shocking,” Mr Jeter said. “He was a very good kid.”

The police said they had received a 911 call about the shooting at 10.24am on June 2. When they arrived at the building, part of the Howard Houses complex, they found Jasai, who had been shot in the chest. He was unconscious and unresponsive. He was taken to Brookdale University Hospital and Medical Centre, where he was pronounced dead.

Mr Dushoun Almond, who runs Brownsville In Violence Out, an anti-violence organisation in the neighbourhood, said family members had told him the boys were playing with the gun when it went off. It was unclear how they got the weapon.

“It was a fatal accident,” Mr Almond said. “But nonetheless, it was an accident.”

By the morning of June 3, a small memorial had taken shape outside the Osborn Street building’s front door. A flickering candle, dollar bills, chips and cookies had been placed below a sign taped to the wall that read “Young king!” and “We love you 4ever”.

Mr Jeter lives on the building’s second floor.

“When I saw all the cops running into the building, I figured something had happened,” he said. “When I came outside, everyone was talking about it.”

Ms Delois Hall, a Brooklyn resident who visited a cousin at the complex at the weekend, said the shooting had shaken the neighbourhood.

“It hurts to know that they were so young,” she said. “Everybody’s talking about it, everybody.”

Mr James Nicholson, a pastor and former building resident whose ministry is nearby, said his son had grown up with Jasai’s father, who is now assigned to Engine Co 231 on Watkins Street, next to the Howard Houses complex.

“He’s coming back from vacation – got to come back to this, unfortunately,” Mr Nicholson said of Mr Guy. “This is a tragedy that kind of turns your whole world upside down.”

He added that the building’s residents were “like family”.

In recent weeks, police have expressed alarm at the number of teenagers being killed by other young people.

At a news conference on May 29, where Mr Eric Gonzalez, the Brooklyn district attorney, announced the takedown of a gang accused of killing two teens in a three-year span, officials bemoaned gun violence’s toll on young people.

“It’s a sad and shocking reality that the leading cause of death among children and teens in America is now gun violence,” Mr Gonzalez said.

According to an analysis published by the journal Paediatrics in 2023, from 2011 until end-2021, the rate of firearm fatalities among children under 18 increased 87 per cent in the US.

Mr Almond said it was essential that law enforcement officials and outreach workers team up to help the boy charged in the killing.

“We can’t just let the system swallow him up,” Mr Almond said.

As for Jasai, Mr Michael Johnson, the principal of Public School 161, which Jasai attended when he was younger, said that the teenager was a “special student”.

“He was a leader amongst his peers,” Mr Johnson said.

At around 7.30pm, the mourners moved to the middle of the street. They prayed, chanted a countdown and said “Long live Jasai” as they let the white and blue balloons – and one golden J-shaped balloon – float off into the sky. NYTIMES