The brute accused of killing a 44-year-old dad with a random knockout punch as he rode his bike in Brooklyn greater than seven years in the past was arrested and charged with manslaughter Wednesday, police stated.
Gary Anderson, 34, was additionally charged with criminally negligent murder in connection to the unprovoked June 8, 2017 Bedford-Stuyvesant assault that in the end took Domingo D. Tapia’s life, cops stated.
Tapia was driving on Fulton Avenue close to the Kingston-Throop subway station round 1:30 a.m. when the bearded stranger instantly socked him in his face, knocking him to the bottom, in response to cops.
Tapia, a married father of two, had suffered extreme head trauma and was taken to Kings County Hospital, the place he was positioned in a medically-induced coma, in response to authorities.
Anderson was initially arrested weeks after the assault and charged with third-degree assault, a misdemeanor, in response to cops and a legal grievance.
He pleaded responsible in 2019 to second-degree assault – a felony – and was sentenced to a few years behind bars with the understanding that if the sufferer died, he would face further expenses, in response to a spokesman for the Brooklyn District Lawyer’s Workplace.
He was launched in Could of 2022 on parole, which expired in November of 2023, State Corrections information present.
However then Tapia – who had already spent almost seven years in a coma – died in March of 2024 – prompting the upgraded expenses for Anderson, authorities stated.
Anderson stated nothing as detectives escorted him out of the 81st Precinct and into an awaiting unmarked police automobile Wednesday afternoon – however was greeted by the cheers and jeers of a bunch of schoolkids who regarded on.
Anderson – who has no less than 5 prior arrests, cops stated – was awaiting arraignment on the brand new expenses Wednesday night.
The mindless assault got here 10 days earlier than Father’s Day, leaving Tapia’s spouse, Esther Diaz struggling to inform the couple’s sons – who had been 5 and seven on the time – what had occurred to their dad.
“I don’t know learn how to inform my kids,” Diaz informed The Submit on the time, via sobs. “Father’s Day is that this weekend, and their dad isn’t house, and I don’t know what I’m gonna do.”
Tapia had arrived within the US from Mexico 18 years earlier than the assault and labored at a fruit stand on Church Avenue.
He was the household’s solely earner whereas his spouse watched after the youngsters for the summer season, she stated.
“All I would like is that the individual hand himself in — whoever did it … and to pay for what he did, as a result of now my children want a dad,” Diaz stated in 2017 earlier than Anderson was arrested.
The brazen assault got here on the peak of the disturbing and so-called “knockout sport” — meant to slug strangers into unconsciousness — throughout the town and the nation.
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