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BROOKLYN WEEKLY, SEPTEMBER 29, 2019
‘Miracle’ deal
Cumbo made a big
show of grilling developers
at a Council hearing in
November , asking representatives
for the builder
pointed questions about
how gentrifi cation made
them feel, but the councilwoman
appeared at a subsequent
hearing the following
month to announce
her wonder deal , which
added 118 below-marketrate
units on top of the 140
already promised by the
developer in exchange for
the city’s permission to exceed
existing height regulations.
“This is nothing short
of a miracle to announce
I have secured commitments
to increase affordable
housing,” Cumbo
boasted at the Dec. 13
Council hearing.
However, despite multiple
requests made between
Sept. 19 and Sept. 24, Cumbo’s
offi ce was similarly
unable to turn over any
formal paper trail related
to her pact with developers.
A spokeswoman for
Cumbo, after initially declining
to comment, provided
a memo on Sept. 24
outlining the deal in bullet
points, but that document
was neither signed by
any party, nor dated. The
spokeswoman then did not
respond to any of several
follow-up questions.
Both developers involved
in the project —
Cornell Realty and Carmel
Partners — did not respond
to multiple requests
for comment.
A non-profi t contractor
tasked with construction
of some of the added
affordable units — Asian
Americans for Equality —
declined to comment.
The Department of
Housing Preservation and
Development, which oversees
the city’s stockpile of
affordable housing units,
claimed they were not yet
involved in the agreement
between the developers
and City Council — and
therefore had no knowledge
of deal.
ARRESTED: 50-year-old Antonio Graham was arrested for allegedly murdering a 60-year-old man in Crown Heights on Sept. 17.
Photo by Paul Martinka
One-legged suspect cuffed for murder
BY AIDAN GRAHAM
Cops arrested a one-legged, wheelchair
bound homeless man for allegedly
beating another man to death with
a metal rod on Schenectady Avenue in
Crown Heights on Sept. 17.
Prosecutors charged 50-year-old Antonio
Graham — who had previously
been arrested a staggering 45 times —
with felony charges of manslaughter,
assault, and criminal possession of a
weapon, according to a complaint fi led
by the Brooklyn District Attorney’s offi
ce.
The suspect allegedly began arguing
with the victim between Lincoln
and St. Johns places shortly before
5 am, when the confrontation
turned deadly and Graham repeatedly
plunged the metal bar into 60-year-old
Gary Smith’s face, according to court
documents.
Graham had wheeled away from
the crime scene by the time police offi
cers from the 77th Precinct arrived
and found Smith lying unconscious in
a pool of his own blood, according to
police.
First responders took Smith — who
lived four blocks away from where the
incident took place — to Kings County
Hospital, where doctors pronounced
him dead from what the city’s medical
examiner would later rule blunt force
trauma to the head, according to authorities.
Cops cuffed Graham on Sept. 20 and
found the murder weapon in his possession,
a cording to court documents.
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