I witnessed a gunfight.

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Hey guys,

I just got back from a Columbia U journalism conference with my high school. While we were there, we went to Greenwich to walk around, eat, et cetera.

Here's my interpretation:
We (15 or so kids) were walking along, looking for a restaurant. All of a sudden, we hear about nine bangs ahead of us and to the right. I stood there for a second and just listened. The shots weren't loud at all (sounded as loud as... I don't know, like a .22 Short), so I assumed we were somewhat safe. Then I was like, "Guys, those were gunshots," or something like that. Then we all just BOLTED into a CVS which was behind us. We all went to the back and just waited. Fast forward five minutes; there were police cars everywhere. Finally, we went outside to look. It turns out it happened ONE BLOCK from where we were. It was very surreal. We had no idea just how close it was.

When we got the cabs to go back to the hotel, we just kind of laughed it off, assuming it was one bad drug dealer shooting another bad drug dealer.

The next morning, we read the NY Post and find out that it was an ex-Marine who shoot a bartender/manager of a restaurant, and two UNARMED volunteer police officers, before armed police shot him. They found another handgun (a 1911 of some sort), and ~100 rounds in a bag.

I guess the moral of the story is that if you hear any kind of a gunshot, no matter how quiet or far away it may seem, run like hell in the opposite direction.


Here's the Post story:

Two auxiliary cops and a bartender were shot dead last night during a gun battle that raged through the streets of Greenwich Village.

At least 30 shots were fired during the mayhem - which included cops in radio cars speeding along busy sidewalks packed with New Yorkers and tourists enjoying the spring-like weather.

The wild pursuit ended when police shot and killed the gunman on Bleecker Street outside the Village Tannery.

The carnage came only 24 hours after two NYPD officers were seriously injured in attacks in Brooklyn and Manhattan.

Last night's shootout began at 9:23 p.m., when the gunman, identified as David Garvin, in his 50s, walked into De Marco's Pizzeria and Restaurant at 146 West Houston St. at MacDougal Street, disguised with a phony beard, a police source said.

Garvin began talking to the bartender. Suddenly, he fired 15 bullets at the unidentified man - killing him - then ran outside, dropping a black messenger bag filled with 100 rounds of ammunition and another gun, police and witnesses said.

As Garvin ran, he came upon two auxiliary cops on Sullivan Street, north of Bleecker.

Apparently fearing the auxiliary cops, both in uniform, would shoot him, the gunman pulled out a 9 mm semiautomatic and fired a bullet into the head of one of the volunteers. He shot the other in the chest.

Auxiliary cops are unarmed and are not issued bulletproof vests.

The one shot in the head died at the scene. The other died at St. Vincent's Hospital.

They were identified as Nicholas Pekaro, 28, and Eugene Marshalik, an NYU student and Russian immigrant who was two weeks shy of his 20th birthday.

The NYPD said college students living in the city can serve as auxiliary cops to earn college credits.

After shooting the officers, the gunman doubled back - running south along Sullivan Street, then turning onto Bleecker, police said.

"I saw cops - anywhere from eight to 10 of them - chasing him," said Erin De Losier, 31, who watched from her apartment window.

One officer tackled Garvin, but he fought off the cop and threw him to the ground, witnesses said.

"A cop tried to wrestle him to the ground, but he punched the officer in the head," said José Ochoa, 27, of Manhattan.

Ochoa and two friends then hid behind a parked car as bullets whizzed past them.

"I was paralyzed," Ochoa said.

As some cops ran after the gunman on foot, other officers in two marked patrol cars jumped the curb and joined the chase.

"The cops were in a patrol car and following him up on the curb," said Ariel Trybuch, 27, who was having dinner outside Pancito's Restaurant at MacDougal and Bleecker streets. "Then we heard the first pop."

Two officers and a sergeant finally caught up with the gunman in front of the Village Tannery at 173 Bleecker St. and bullets started flying, a police official told The Post.

"It was a spray of bullets," Trybuch said. "We ran inside the restaurant. It was about 10 seconds of gunfire."

Tony Uraga, 22, who works at Pizza Box across the street, at 176 Bleecker, said that when the cops caught up to the gunman, they shouted at him, "Drop the gun! Drop the gun!"

Uraga said the killer ignored the cops' pleas.

"They just shot him," he said. "They shot him four or five times. The guy dropped with his face down. There was a gun by his body."

Garvin was pronounced dead at the scene.

Another witness, a block away on Sullivan Street, initially heard at least 10 shots.

"As soon as the shots started, people started to run for cover," said the woman, who did not want to be identified. "It was crazy."

Jeff Sears, 48, said the gunman was "full of bullets" once cops were done with him.

"There was a dead guy lying face down on the sidewalk," he said. "There was blood everywhere. Within minutes, there were cops everywhere."

Dozens of police officers closed off several blocks around the crime scenes as restaurant patrons and local residents streamed into the streets following the shootings.

A woman who has lived in the building above De Marco's for 10 years said the eatery attracts "unpleasant people."

"They look sketchy," she said. "They are not the normal neighborhood people. They're smoking and throwing their [cigarette] butts all over the place."

Other residents described De Marco's as a combination of a pizza stand, bar, restaurant and karaoke house.

Alexandra Hart, 34, who also lives upstairs, said, "There's definitely something strange going on down there, but they make good food."

Hart said she has only had pleasant interactions with the bartenders at De Marco's.

"Everyone has always been super nice," she said.

"I would never have expected it at De Marco's."

On Tuesday night, rookie cop Angel Cruz was stabbed through the skull on a platform of the Broadway Junction subway station in East New York by an ex-con he had stopped for smoking.

Despite his injuries, he managed to draw his weapon and bring down his crazed assailant. Cruz was expected to survive.

In Harlem, Officer Robert Tejada was shot and wounded in a cafe trying to arrest a thug brandishing a stolen Colt .45.

The officer was injured but his life was saved by his bulletproof vest.

The gunman was shot to death by Tejada's fellow officers.

The two auxiliary cops shot last night were the first to die on duty since Jan. 29, 1989, when two auxiliary sergeants were killed by a drunken driver in The Bronx.

Noel Faide and Larry Cohen had been investigating an abandoned car on the New England Thruway when they were struck and killed by a car driven by Jorge Valentin.

Two off-duty Bronx auxiliaries also died heroically.

Auxiliary Officer Milton Clarke was shot and killed by a suspect he tried to stop from leaving the scene of a shooting on Dec. 1, 1993.

The NYPD's Auxiliary Police Program is a volunteer unit made up of about 4,000 men and women, according to the department's Web site.

http://http://www.nypost.com/seven/03152007/news/regionalnews/slay_rampage_in_the_village_regionalnews_brad_hamilton__eric_lenkowitz_and_larry_celona.htm?page=0
 
Yes, Scriv, auditory witness. Thank God no more.

And yes, same event as the one in the other thread. Didn't see it.

I also have a couple of pictures of the TONS of police cars and commotion. I'll post them up once I develop them.


And I can't help but wonder what would have happened if the volunteer policemen were ARMED like they should have been.[hmmm]
 
Last edited:
Since Lk was there, I'm leaving it open for people to talk about his experience. Any discussion of the event itself can be continued in the other thread. And, since I'm the only Mod on right at the moment, I guess I can do that.
 
There was a followup story in the Post this morning that mentioned it. Let me try to find it. Lynne, thanks and sorry about this repost.
Edit: right here.

A chilling video shows a deranged ex-Marine pumping five shots into an unarmed auxiliary cop slumped behind a car in Greenwich Village before chasing down the victim's teenage partner and coldbloodedly executing him with a bullet to his head.

In the shocking footage played by NYPD Commissioner Ray Kelly at a press conference yesterday, it takes gunman David Garvin only seven seconds to kill hero auxiliary cops Nicholas Pekearo, 28, and Eugene Marshalik, 19, on Wednesday night.

Friends said Garvin, 42, a divorced father of two who recently lost his job as a bartender, had become increasingly paranoid. Cops discovered an arsenal of weapons in a bag he dropped near the shooting scene and at his Bronx home.

"You were clearly dealing with a very dangerous individual," Kelly said. "The fact that there were not more lives lost was in no small measure due to the [auxiliary] officers."

Kelly said Garvin had served in the Marines from 1996 to 1998, when he left with a less than honorable discharge. Friends and former colleagues painted a picture of a lonely man who bragged about breaking stories as an award-winning journalist, wrote screenplays and acted in movies.

Recently, Kelly said, the killer had told pals he thought someone was out to get him.

He had worked a string of jobs - including at The Wall Street Journal and as a motivational coach. Cops said he was dating an investment banker named Jennifer Webber for the past few months. She refused to comment.

Garvin, who is from Missouri, came to Manhattan last year and worked at the downtown Raccoon Lodge.

Manager Brian Barrow said he quit in February, two weeks before he was going to be fired because the receipts were down.

"You could say he didn't have charisma," Barrow said. "There were no complaints, but the guy was a little strange - but we're all strange, aren't we?"

A worker at the bar, who identified herself only as Carrie, said Garvin called her obsessively every Sunday for months.

"He weirded me out. He was creepy," she said.

Kelly said that Garvin had regularly eaten at De Marco's on West Houston Street near MacDougal Street, the restaurant where he began his rampage.

Five minutes before the video starts, Garvin - wearing a Yankee cap over his buzz cut and a fake beard glued around his pencil-thin moustache - walked into De Marco's and fired 15 shots into the back of bartender Alfredo Romero Morales.

Staffers said Garvin had been a regular for the past year - always eating by himself and ordering the same dish, spaghetti Bolognese.

Anthony Ruffino, a cook at De Marco's, said Garvin altered his usual routine last week when he ate at the bar, instead of a table.

Ruffino said Garvin had some sort of ailment that made skin peel from his face.

"But he never caused any sort of problems. Normally, he would just eat and leave," Ruffino said.

Kelly said, however, that Garvin had been asked to leave the eatery on at least two previous occasions.

Restaurant owner Margie De Marco said he "seemed a bit weird, but we never thought he was dangerous."

Kelly said detectives were investigating a theory that Garvin went to De Marco's - with two clips loaded with 30 rounds each and a 9mm gun - because his pal was recently fired as a chef there.

Four patrons at the restaurant later told cops that Romero recognized Garvin, despite the obviously fake beard and the globs of glue on his face.

Romero appeared to be nervous, they said. His hands shook as he gave out menus. The two men exchanged hushed, heated words.

Then, Romero turned and Garvin suddenly opened fire.

Garvin fled the restaurant and ran into the auxiliary officers at Bleecker and Sullivan streets.

The two ordered him to drop his bag, which was later found to contain a .380-caliber pistol and 90 rounds of ammunition.

After dropping it, Garvin suddenly slammed Marshalik in the face and knocked him to the ground, before fleeing north up Sullivan Street.

At that point - 9:53 and 5 seconds - the tape starts picking up the action.

The two auxiliaries follow him at a safe distance from the other side of the street. Nine seconds later, Garvin pivots on his heels and starts crossing the street - apparently realizing that men coming toward him are NYPD plainclothes officers.

Pekearo, who was wearing a bulletproof vest, dives behind a car for cover and Garvin fires a shot across the vehicle. As Pekearo lies face down, the gunman runs up to him and shoots him five times.

He then chases Marshalik to the other side of the street - as a plainclothes cop is seen running down the middle of Sullivan.

The cop fires at Garvin, but misses. Then, at 9:53 and 26 seconds the madman pumps a single bullet into Marshalik's head as the young victim crouches behind a car.

"He was clearly taking them out," a police official said.

"These are true heroes," Kelly said of the auxiliaries. "They tried to follow and report what he was doing, and he turned and brutally killed them."

The video ends with Garvin running toward Bleecker Street, where several uniformed cops enter the scene.

Knowing he's being chased, Garvin runs into the Village Tannery store on Bleecker Street, but exits from the front door soon after.

At that point, cops order him to drop his gun.

When he points it at them two-handed, commando-style, they open fire, hitting him 30 times.

Garvin falls next to a tree on the sidewalk, both his thumbs ripped off by the fusillade.

The NYPD cops fired 56 times while pursuing him, Kelly said. Garvin let off 23 shots in the wild gun battle that raged through the streets.

Garvin and his wife, Donna, divorced in 2000. The couple had two kids, ages 11 and 8.

He had lived in The Bronx with a friend, an emergency medical technician named James Reichman, with whom he'd grown up in Missouri.

Cops raided Garvin's Bronx apartment early yesterday and seized two computers and a .357-caliber handgun along with another 100 rounds of ammo.

Garvin worked at The Wall Street Journal as the information graphics coordinator from 2000 to 2005. He calls himself as a Pulitzer Prize recipient on his online résumé; the entire staff of the paper was honored for the newspaper's coverage of 9/11.

He also taught "interpersonal relations" at Mojave Community College in Arizona.

http://http://www.nypost.com/seven/03162007/news/regionalnews/shock_anatomy_of_a_slaughter_regionalnews_murray_weiss__john_mazor_and_leela_de_kretser.htm?page=0
 
I can't. Not 18 yet. [laugh]

? I was 13 when I bought an Irish Sweepstakes ticket and well under 18 when I bought one of the first NH Lottery tickets. [laugh] [laugh2]

When there is a will, there is a way.

I did it "because you weren't supposed to" and it was a lark. I never buy lottery/sweepstakes tickets any more and have only done that a handful of times in my life.
 
I've been there before, and other thoughts

MacDougal Street in the "Village" was my destination whenever I would visit NYC. I went there many times to visit http://www.cest-magnifique.com/ a jewelry store. I collect biker, skull, and tattoo related silver rings. They have all kinds of cool stuff.

MacDougal Street has been a place of murder in the past. Back in 1994, Alfonso Albrizio, the original owner was killed by a crazy man in the store.[sad] Unfortunately, Al was in his 70's and was unable to defend himself.[frown] He was a great man. His nephew, also named Al, is the current owner.

It's weird that I've been thinking of going into the city for a visit. I'm glad I didn't go when this happened. I'm also glad you are ok.

The reserve officers are heros for running toward the gunfire to help, while disregarding their own safety. I'm not sure I'd have done that without being able to defend myself.

As for the gun used by the BG, I wonder what it was that had a 30 round, 9mm magazine. I have an idea, but I hope it wasn't what I think it was...[sad2]



Reptile
 
If the story isn't BS (very good chance it is), it could be a G17 with a G18 (FA 9mm) extended mag. Those 32 rd (IIRC) mags are readily available and fit any 9mm Glock.
 
Allow me to put forth this question.

If you were there when this happened, was legally CCWing, and had a good shot at the shooter, would you have drawn and fired?
 
? I was 13 when I bought an Irish Sweepstakes ticket and well under 18 when I bought one of the first NH Lottery tickets. [laugh]

What gets interesting is if an underage person attempts to cash a big lottery ticket - do they return the ticket and tell him to have an adult cash it, or confiscate the ticket without payment since it was used in a crime (since it's illegal for underage people to play the lottery).

Yeah, it's obvious an underage person shouldn't try to cash a ticket on their own ... just wondering if there has ever been a case of one trying and what happened.
 
Rob, no idea. I only bought it because I "couldn't"!

If I had won, I would have had my Parents cash it. Of course it was "illegal" to sell (buy?) Irish Sweepstakes tickets back then even if you were an adult! Knowing MA's insane laws, it probably was illegal for a MA Resident to buy NH Lottery tickets and bring them into MA back then too (it was when their lottery first started and I think they were the first state in the US to sanction a lottery).!
 
Knowing MA's insane laws, it probably was illegal for a MA Resident to buy NH Lottery tickets and bring them into MA back then too (it was when their lottery first started and I think they were the first state in the US to sanction a lottery).!

Not relevant. If it had been for a small amount, nobody would have known; if it had been big, you probably nevery would have come back tp pay the 12% on "unearned" income. [wink]

Ken
 
Allow me to put forth this question.

If you were there when this happened, was legally CCWing, and had a good shot at the shooter, would you have drawn and fired?


That's a good question. I'd say it depends on the individual situation. I can think of a situation where one would want to draw and fire, and another (more probable) situation where it would be better to seek cover.
 
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