A fugitive in a deadly lounge shootout drank his freedom away Monday, when police caught him boozing at Brooklyn’s J’Ouvert festivities after he’d spent more than a year on the run, authorities said.
Haile Cummings, 34, disappeared after firing off several shots behind the bar at Taste of the City Lounge in Crown Heights during a wild gang-fueled gunfight that left three dead and 11 wounded on Aug. 17, 2025, according to the feds.
Cummings is seen on video firing several shots after the mayhem began, according to the feds, though he’s not accused of striking anyone with his bullets.
On Monday, police found him drinking at the Crown Heights festival, celebrated before the annual West Indian Day Parade.
Haile Cummings. (NYPD)
He was drinking outside the Ebbets Field Apartments when cops noticed him and tried to bust him for drinking alcohol in a public park, according to the feds. He ran and tried to hide under a parked vehicle, then gave a fake name when police caught him, law enforcement sources said.
The officers didn’t realize he was wanted for the shooting until after they arrested him and took his fingerprints, sources said.
He was arraigned in Brooklyn Federal Court Tuesday for a federal possession of a firearm charge, plus assault in aid of racketeering, and ordered held without bail
There’s no indication he was involved with any of the mayhem leading up to and during the West Indian Day Parade festivities, which left three people shot and three stabbed, none fatally, sources said.
Body is removed from the Taste of the City Lounge after deadly shooting in August 2025. (Theodore Parisienne / New York Daily News)
Video released by federal prosecutors last year shows more than 40 shots fired in just six seconds at the Taste of the City Lounge on Franklin Ave.
The three dead include Brims gang member Marvin St. Louis, 19, who cops say sparked the shooting with a derogatory hand sign and the initial barrage of bullets, Folk Nation gang member Jamel Childs, 35, who returned fire, and Amadou Diallo, 27, who police believe was a bystander.
Jamel Childs, left, and Amadou Diallo were killed in the shooting.
Most of the people shot were not involved in the gang beef, but three of them were Folk Nation members, cops said.
A total of 14 people were shot during the gunfight. Forty-two shell casings were recovered by police inside and outside the lounge.
Aug. 20, 2025: Caught in the crossfire
New York Daily News
Front page of the New York Daily News for Aug. 20, 2025: Kin mourn bystander killed in Brooklyn lounge shootout between rival gang members. Amadou Diallo was killed in shooting Sunday at Taste of the City Lounge in Crown Heights.
The feds have charged two other men in the shooting, Elijah Roy, 25, and Timothy Spence, 21, both reputed members of the 5-9 Brims gang.
Cummings, reputedly a Six Tre Folk Nation member, goes by the nickname “Ruga” or Ruga Gz,” as a reference to the Ruger gun manufacturer, because of his reputation for using guns, the feds alleged in a Tuesday court filing.
Cummings has a history with the gang dating back to 2007, and in July 2015, he was sentenced to four-and-a-half years behind bars for his role in a murder conspiracy, a shooting and jewelry store robberies with his fellow Six Tre members.
In a June 2015 letter, he asked Judge Nicholas Garaufis for mercy, saying that he joined the gang because he was “following the so called ‘cool kids’ in the neighborhood.”
Garaufis, who cut Cummings a break and didn’t give him the eight years recommended in federal sentencing guidelines, offered him a warning.
“If you go back out there when you get out of prison and you are trying to be one of the group again,” the judge said, “at some point you are going to screw up and you will be back in court and you could spend the rest of your life in one way or another dealing with the criminal justice system.
“That would be a tragedy for you and your family, and if you could do something to make things better in your community, for your community, because it will be a lost opportunity.”
“I can and will become an ever better person if given a chance,” Cummings wrote.
Spence, who pleaded guilty to assault in aid of racketeering and discharging a firearm during a crime of violence, could face between 24 and 27-and-a-half years behind bars.
Theodore Parisienne / New York Daily News
Police investigate a gang-related mass shooting at Taste of the City Lounge on Franklin Ave. in Crown Heights, Brooklyn, on Aug. 17, 2025. (Theodore Parisienne / New York Daily News)
“On August 17, 2025, in Brooklyn New York, I fired a gun at members of a rival gang, Folk Nation, in a bar lounge,” Spence told Brooklyn Federal Court Judge Orelia Merchant. “I was a member of a rival gang, the 5-9 Brims Blood set. We protected our territory with violence, members sold drugs, and some did robberies. Me and other members shot at Jamel Childs, who was also shooting at us. The shooting was part of our beef with the Folk gang. I knew what I was doing was wrong and a crime.”