Suspect Charged In Brooklyn Shooting That Left Man Dead, 2 Others Hurt
NEW YORK (CBSNewYork) -- A man was charged Tuesday night in a shooting in Brooklyn that left one man dead and two others, including a teenage girl, hurt.
Bryant Aponte, 20, of Brooklyn, was charged with second-degree murder and two counts of criminal possession of a weapon in the shooting on Tuesday, Oct. 6. He was identified as a suspect the day of the shooting.
The shooting in Bushwick left Michael Matusiak, 53, dead.
Police said it began with a trio of car burglars breaking into vehicles in Bushwick on Tuesday morning.
Just before 8 a.m., Matusiak spotted them and tried to chase them down as they ransacked a white minivan outside of the ABNY sheet metal shop on Grattan Street and Knickerbocker Avenue, where he worked, police said.
"They were going car to car," company owner Eli Benyamin told CBS2's Janelle Burrell at the time. "Two of my guys -- one of them was Mike -- they followed them over there."
The thieves opened fire. Matuisak was hit in the torso and killed, police said.
"He was shaking," said a co-worker who did not want to be identified. "I got on my knees, I held his hand, he kept shaking and then he stopped shaking. That was it."
Derrick Robinson, 56, Matusiak's co-worker, suffered graze wounds to his torso and ear. A stray bullet also grazed the hip of a 13-year-old girl walking to school.
Robinson said they pursued the men, but once they got around this corner it seemed the thieves were waiting for them.
"We try to pursue the guys and say, 'What do you break into people's car for?'" Robinson told CBS2's Diane Macedo earlier this month. "By the time we opened our mouth and said that, they took out a gun and started firing like crazy."
No information was provided late Tuesday on the second man police had been seeking.