The Mount Eden community is mourning the loss of a 12-year-old boy who was fatally shot Saturday afternoon after police say he was caught in gunfire during a fight outside a neighborhood bodega.<\/p>\n
Police arrested 45-year-old William Ferrer less than 24 hours after the shooting. He is charged with murder, manslaughter and other related offenses in connection with the death of Jacob Freytes.<\/p>\n
A growing memorial now stands outside Freytes’ apartment building on Marcy Place, just a block from where the Dominican Day Parade was held Sunday. Instead of celebrating, neighbors gathered to grieve the loss of a boy they described as family.<\/p>\n
“I saw him grow. I saw him grow from the mother’s stomach. All her kids,” neighbor Milagros Dejesus said.<\/p>\n
The shooting happened just before 5 p.m. Saturday outside a bodega on Elliot Place, about two blocks from Freytes’ home. Police said a fight broke out while the 12-year-old was riding his bicycle, and he was struck by gunfire.<\/p>\n
“He had just got that bike,” neighbor Jasmine Dejesus said. “Yeah, just got that bike. So happy to ride around the neighborhood.”<\/p>\n
Neighbor Walter Colon said he spoke with Freytes only minutes before the shooting, as the boy was unlocking his bicycle outside their building.<\/p>\n
“I had just shook his hand and I said, ‘Hey, I want to tell you something, man. Look out for your brother and your little sister always, OK?'”<\/p>\n
Colon said he never imagined it would be the last conversation they would have.<\/p>\n
Neighbors said the arrest offers little comfort as they continue to process the loss of a child they say brought joy to the neighborhood.<\/p>\n
“I don’t think he had any regard to Jacob’s life,” Jasmine Dejesus said. “He could clearly see Jacob was in his clear path, but he just wanted his target.”<\/p>\n
The investigation remains ongoing.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"The Mount Eden community is mourning the loss of a 12-year-old boy who was fatally shot Saturday afternoon…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":306157,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[38],"tags":[128,9,24,63,129,131,130],"class_list":["post-306156","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-the-bronx","tag-bronx","tag-new-york","tag-new-york-city","tag-nyc","tag-the-bronx","tag-the-bronx-headlines","tag-the-bronx-news"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/306156","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=306156"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/306156\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/306157"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=306156"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=306156"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=306156"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}