Victim Of Queens Bus Shooting Remembered By Grieving Family Members
NEW YORK (CBSNewYork) -- Unanswered questions remain in the aftermath of Friday's shooting rampage in Queens. Police said a man killed his stepson, then gunned down an innocent passenger on a crowded city bus in Jamaica.
On Monday, CBS 2's Tony Aiello spoke with family members who were touched by the tragedy.
Two young women remembered their uncle, Marvin Gilkes, who was among two random, innocent victims Friday afternoon.
Authorities charged 34-year-old Damel Burton with murder and attempted murder and say he shot Gilkes, who died, and another man currently hospitalized in critical condition.
"He ran around the park with me. He helped me climb up trees. He was my track coach," Gilkes' niece, Taneeza Charter told CBS 2's Tony Aiello. "He was basically everything a little girl could ever ask for."
The shooting occurred on board a Q111 bus near Jamaica Center. Burton was out of jail just 15 months after serving seven years for attempted armed robbery.
"How did he get a hold of a gun to do such a terrible thing to our loved one," Gilkes' niece, Keisha Taylor, asked.
Gilkes will be buried on Wednesday. He was riding the bus to visit his mother in Brooklyn when he was shot in the back.
Federal law enforcement officials are tracing the gun as part of their investigation.
Burton's evening of inexplicable violence ended on the bus, but police said it started earlier with the shooting of his own stepson, 18-year-old Keith Murrell.
Authorities said that shooting occurred in a second-floor apartment at Baisley Park houses. Murrell's brother says Burton snapped and no one knows why.
"Everybody had a very good relationship with him. I looked at him as a dad. He pretty much raised all of us, so for him to do that, it hurts so bad," the victim's brother, Akeem Tucker, said.
For all the grief Burton allegedly caused, there could have been more. Prosecutors said he stopped firing on the bus only because his gun jammed.
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