Your Neighborhood — Your News® June 23, 2019
Prospect Ave.
co-named in
honor of
Emmanuel
Mensah BAD BLOOD
Son Arrested In Murder
Of Sally Daz page 4
CSI on the scene at the murder of Sally Daz (insert) at a McDonald’s Drive Thru on Webster Ave. October 4, 2018.
Insert Photo File Photo, Background Photo by Edwin Soto
Justice For Junior: 5 killers to spend their lives in prison
BY ALEX MITCHELL
Justice for Junior has been
served.
Five conspirators in the murder
of 15-year-old Lesandro ‘Junior’
Guzman-Feliz were found
guilty on Friday, June 14. Jonaiki
Martinez Estrella, Antonio Rodriguez,
Hernandez Santiago,
Manuel Rivera, Jose Muniz and
Elvin Garcia were found guilty
of fi rst-degree Murder, second-degree
Murder, second-degree Conspiracy
and second-degree Gang
Assault, the Bronx District Attorney’s
offi ce confi rmed almost a
year after the Wednesday, June 20,
2018 attack.
Court proceedings in the gruesome
case began on Thursday, October
25. That’s when Junior’s parents,
Leandra Feliz and Lesandro
Guzman fi rst went face-to-face
with their son’s alleged ruthless
killers in the beginning of the grueling
process.
After what police said to be
a case of mistaken identity on a
gang ordered stabbing, surveillance
video showed Junior running
into a bodega, attempting to
hide behind the counter. When
the worker attempts to hide the
boy, the gang members come into
the store and drag him out to the
street. The travesty unfolded on
the corner of East 183rd Street and
Bathgate Avenue, which is now
named after the fallen NYPD Explorer.
After the senseless knife and
machete attack, Junior runs back
in the store where the people there
advise him to seek medical attention
at St. Barnabas Hospital, a
block away. Mortally wounded he
collapses, and dies before he can
get help.
Some neighbors watched the attack
unfold from their apartments
above.
Continued on Page 11
“We heard ‘Open up! They’re
going to murder me!’ and by the
time we saw what was going on
from our window, it was all over.
The entire attack was less than ten
seconds,” one neighbor said.
Higher-ups in the gang that is
being blamed for the horrendous
attack have taken to social media
to claim the attack wasn’t meant
for Guzman-Feliz and even went
to the extent of expressing condolences
to his family.
Images and videos from the
mistaken, rapid murder had been
played throughout the near fi ve-
BY PATRICK ROCCHIO
A true American hero who
lost his life saving his neighbors
was immortalized with a street
co-naming in his honor.
U.S. Army Private First Class
Emmanuel Mensah, who is credited
with running back into a
burning apartment building on
Prospect Avenue four times to
save neighbors before perishing
in the 2017 fi re, was honored on
Friday, June 14.
The co-naming occurred at
the corner of Prospect Avenue
and East 187th Street in Fordham,
just steps from the scene of
heroism, with Mensah’s family
and friends, including his dad
Kwabena Mensah.
They assembled to remember
the young man’s life and receive
the honorary street sign
proclaiming that part of Prospect
Avenue ‘Emmanuel Mensah
Way’.
Mensah had arrived in America
from Ghana just fi ve years
before the fi re, and was visiting
home for the fi rst time attending
boot camp. He was in the U.S.
Army National Guard.
Councilman Ritchie Torres,
who carried the street sign legislation
through the NYC City
Council, said that Mensah was
Belmont’s bravest and that he
thought that the street named in
his honor was the most appropriate
co-naming he’s ever done.
“He is a national hero and it
is not often that we have an occasion
to rename a street after
a genuine American hero who
went knowingly into a burning
building to sacrifi ce his own
life to save others,” said Torres.
“Even though he didn’t die on
the battlefi eld, he had a soldier’s
bravery.”
LOCAL
CL ASSIFIEDS
PA GE 14
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