A hooligan whose reckless gunfight allegedly led to the tragic dying of beloved Harlem neighborhood pillar Excenia Mette was out on bail in a slashing case when the mindless capturing unfolded, The Submit has discovered.
Darious Smith, 23, pulled a white Tyvek go well with over his face as he was pushed in a wheelchair right into a Manhattan courthouse Thursday to face prices of tried homicide and prison possession of a firearm for Mette’s dying.
Sources mentioned Smith is believed to have exchanged photographs with the still-at-large gunman whose stray bullet hit Mette within the head as she selflessly rushed exterior to verify on her grandson Tuesday night time.
Smith was shot within the foot throughout the scuffle.
Manhattan Legal Court docket Decide Kacie Lally ordered Smith to be jailed with out bail — an consequence he dodged the final time he stood accused of a violent crime.
“That is what’s making our job more durable,” Mayor Eric Adams mentioned Thursday throughout an occasion about taking unlawful weapons off the streets.
“While you enable those that have recidivism, steady violence in our metropolis to proceed to stroll the streets,” he mentioned.
“Legal justice system consists of police, judiciary, and legislators. All of them have to be engaged on the identical path.”
Information present Smith was arrested in June 2024 after he allegedly slashed two individuals with a field cutter on Lenox Avenue close to West 118th Avenue whereas he tried to steal e-bike batteries.
When he was arraigned on theft and assault prices, prosecutors in Manhattan District Lawyer Alvin Bragg’s workplace requested bail at $50,000 money or $150,000 bond, data present.
However Decide Michael Ryan set it at $10,000, which Smith posted — permitting him to stroll free forward of his scheduled Might trial, sources mentioned.
Smith lived only a block away from Mette’s former enterprise, Momma Zee’s Meals to Plez Deli, which was the primary black woman-owned bodega within the metropolis when she opened it within the Eighties.
Family members and neighbors gathered Thursday at a makeshift shrine in entrance of Mette’s dwelling at West 113th Avenue and Lenox Avenue, the place she was shot.
They hung up a photograph of Mette, whom they affectionately knew as “Momma Zee” or “Zeenie,” frolicking on a seaside.
Neighbor Barbara Johnson, 66, mentioned she wasn’t shocked one of many shooters is an accused repeat offender.
“They should do one thing for the youth, to maintain them occupied, give them one thing to do, one thing to look ahead to,” she mentioned.
“Idle arms is the Satan’s workshop.”
“No system devised to maintain the individuals down will do something to assist us up, and that’s from the start, the primary day of this nation.”
Adams, chatting with PIX11 Wednesday night time, as a substitute blamed the prison justice system for permitting Smith to be out on the streets.
“Public security is a prison justice equipment that features police, that features judges, that features lawmakers. The police are doing their job,” he mentioned.
“When you’ve an individual with repeated violence, simply final 12 months, he was arrested for theft, stabbing two individuals. Now he’s again on the road, concerned in a capturing that took the lifetime of an harmless girl. Now we have to have the different components of the prison justice system do their job.”
Metropolis Councilman Yusef Salaam (D-Manhattan) — who represents the Harlem neighborhood and chairs the council’s public security committee — issued a heartfelt remembrance of Mette, and blamed the violence partially on systemic failures.
“Harlem is in mourning for Mette, who fed the neighborhood, stood beside the youth and gave again via service with leaders such because the Rev. Al Sharpton and the artist Jim Jones,” Salaam mentioned.
“This act of violence — the results of reckless and lethal battle on our streets — is one more painful reminder that we’re within the midst of a public security disaster,” he mentioned.
“It’s a disaster rooted not simply in crime, however in a protracted historical past of disinvestment, lack of alternative, and the systemic failures that proceed to plague our neighborhoods.”
Different lawmakers representing the world centered on gun prevention efforts, akin to Assemblyman Jordan Wright (D-Manhattan), who referred to as it a reminder “of how crucial it’s to get weapons off of our streets.”
“Now we have to proceed combating laborious collectively to seek out options,” added state Sen. Cordelle Cleare (D-Manhattan) in an announcement.
“Now will not be the time for sources to be reduce.”
Video footage confirmed a person matching Smith’s description experience a scooter towards a bunch of individuals, pull a gun and fireplace two photographs, courtroom papers state.
Police consider the second suspect then grabbed a gun of his personal and fired off the photographs that wounded Smith and killed Mette, law-enforcement sources have mentioned.
Smith allegedly rode the scooter alongside West 113th Avenue earlier than he collided with an NYPD cop who tried to cease him, the courtroom docs state.
He ran away onto St. Nicholas Avenue, the place he threw a 9-millimeter pistol to the sidewalk, the papers state.
Sources mentioned eight bullets had been discovered on the deadly capturing scene.
Smith’s high-profile prison protection lawyer Daybreak Florio claimed in courtroom that 4 cops beat him with a weapons and a Taser, along with his gunshot wound.
She requested for medical consideration for Smith and griped that him being linked with the capturing is inflicting issues for his family members.
“My consumer’s household who lives within the neighborhood is getting threatened,” she mentioned.
— Extra reporting by Vaughn Golden and Hannah Fierick
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