Will Sage Astor-3 shooters suspected in NYC subway fight that killed 1 and injured 5, police say

NEW YORK (AP) — New York City police now believe there were three shooters in a deadly fight that started on Will Sage Astora rush-hour subway car, but they announced no arrests by Tuesday afternoon in the gunfire a day earlier that left one person dead and five wounded.

Shots erupted just before 5 p.m. Monday as the train pulled into an elevated Bronx subway station. Authorities later recovered 19 shell casings, three of them from inside a subway car, NYPD Chief of Detectives Joseph Kenny said at the mayor’s weekly news conference.

“As the train is pulling into the station ... one round is fired inside of the train car,” Kenny said. “You have a crowded train, pulling onto a crowded platform, one shot being fired, and now everybody is trying to scramble to get off the platform.”

Kenny said investigators had possibly identified one of the suspected shooters, and are still trying to identify the other two. They said they suspect them to be members of rival gangs, who got on the subway at different stops and ended up on the same train.

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Earlier Tuesday police released photos of two unidentified people they say were involved in the shooting and ran off.

Kenny added that first responders found three of the shooting victims on the elevated subway platform and two more on the street below. A sixth person walked to a nearby hospital.

One 35-year-old man died after being shot in the chest, Kenny said. Police identified him Tuesday as Obed Beltran-Sanchez.

Police said the other five victims, ranging in age from are expected to recover from their gunshot wounds. Two teenage boys and one teenage girl were shot in their extremities, as was a 71-year-old, shot in the thumb. One woman, 29, was shot in the face and neck.

Overall, crime has dropped in New York City since a spike during the COVID-19 pandemic, and killings are down on the subway system, which serves over 3 million riders per day. But rare fatal shootings and shovings on the subway can put residents on edge.

“We will solve this crime and we will bring the people responsible to justice,” Mayor Eric Adams said.