The father of a teen stabbed to death in a brawl between moped riders in a Queens park thought his son was safely sleeping at a friend’s house when he didn’t come home that night.
Zavier Belizaire, 19, was slain about 8:30 p.m. Thursday inside Little Bay Park off the Cross Island Parkway in Bay Terrace after a fight broke out, cops said.
“At this point, we don’t know much. We just know he went to a park, got into a brawl and he got stabbed,” Zavier’s father, Richard Belizaire, told the Daily News Tuesday.
“We still don’t know what started this. The cops said they are still investigating.”
During the fray, the teen was stabbed in the back. He died a short time later at New York-Presbyterian Hospital Queens.
Police investigate after Zavier Belizaire was fatally stabbed in Little Bay Park in Queens early Friday. (Theodore Parisienne / New York Daily News)
Up to 20 people, most of them teens, fled the small waterfront park near the Throgs Neck Bridge on e-bikes and mopeds, a police source said.
Two mopeds were found abandoned near the victim.
“I didn’t find out until the next day,” Zavier’s father said. “He died Thursday night and I found out Friday afternoon.”
The victim lived with his parents in Briarwood.
“I thought he was hanging out at a friend’s house,” Belizaire said. “He usually sleeps over at a friend’s house and I thought he was there.”
Zavier had no ID or cell phone on him when first responders arrived in the park, police said.
Cops suspect someone made off with his belongings. The lack of ID made it hard for cops to identify Zavier.
Police investigate after Zavier Belizaire was fatally stabbed in Little Bay Park in Queens Thursday. (Theodore Parisienne / New York Daily News)
“A friend of his broke the news to us,” the father said. “The same friend I thought he was staying at was the same friend that came and told us that he was killed.”
Zavier’s parents raced to the hospital when they got the news.
“By the time I got there, the body was taken by the Medical Examiner,” Belizaire said. “We then went to the precinct (stationhouse) and spoke to detectives.”
No arrests have been made.
Cops are trying to identify those who attended the gathering to see if one of them is Zavier’s killer.
The victim was a freshman in college.
“He did music with his friend from school,” Belizaire said. “They were using AI to make music. He was very smart. Very intelligent. He was very hard working.”
The mystery behind his son’s death has left Belizaire at a loss for words.
“I don’t even know how I feel,” he said. “I’m not even angry at anyone because I don’t know the story.”
Zavier is the second teen killed in a Queens park in the last couple months.
Police investigate after Zavier Belizaire was fatally stabbed in Little Bay Park in Queens early Friday. (Theodore Parisienne / New York Daily News)
On April 16, 15-year-old Jaden Pierre was shot in the chest inside the Nautilus Playground at Roy Wilkins Park.
In footage posted to X by former Mayor Eric Adams, dozens of bystanders can be seen filming as Jaden is savagely beaten, when one of his attackers draws a firearm and shoots him at point-blank range.
Five teens were ultimately arrested for Pierre’s death.