A 15-year-old is shot dead near Crotona Park, a day before the Council hears a gun violence hotline bill

A 15-year-old boy was shot and killed Thursday morning near Crotona Park in the Claremont section of the Bronx, amNY reported. He was shot once in the abdomen just before 9:30 a.m. near East 171st Street and Crotona Place. Officers from the 42nd Precinct drove him in a patrol car to St. Barnabas Hospital, where he died.

Police are looking for three teenagers who were wearing black clothes and surgical masks and ran south into Crotona Park, amNY reported. CBS New York said police believe the suspects are 16 to 18 years old. No arrests had been made. Reports differ on whether the boy was walking to school. Police could not confirm that, amNY said. Anyone with information can call Crime Stoppers at 800-577-TIPS.

Why it matters to residents: the killing came on a weekday morning near a park, at an hour when students are on their way to class. Today the Council takes up bills on how the city prevents violence like this.

What our records add

It happened in the Public Safety chair's district. The location is in District 15, represented by Oswald J. Feliz, who chairs the Committee on Public Safety.

His committee hears a hotline bill today. At 1 p.m. Friday, Public Safety and the Governmental Operations Committee hold a joint hearing on the Office of Community Safety and non-police ways to reduce violence (meeting page). One of the three bills on the agenda is Int. 414, from Kevin C. Riley, which would create a three-digit gun violence intervention hotline. It has 20 sponsors, including Feliz, and has waited 274 days for this first hearing. The hearing also covers Int. 403, which would create a Department of Community Safety.

Bronx prosecutors gave the Council numbers on Tuesday. At an Oct. 27 Children and Youth Committee hearing on youth detention, Bronx District Attorney Darcel Clark testified that the Bronx is home to about 20% of the city's residents under 18. Yet it accounts for about a third of youth gun arrests and youth shooting victims, and nearly half of youth shooting defendants, she said (16:25). We covered that hearing's findings on youth detention.

A new law will count shots fired. Feliz's Int. 935 requires the NYPD to report every quarter on confirmed shots-fired incidents by borough and precinct, including those where no one is hit. At the Aug. 13 committee vote, Feliz said current shooting statistics leave out incidents where no one is struck (0:04). The committee approved it 8-0, the full Council passed it the same day, and it became law Sept. 14 without the mayor's signature.

Other gun violence items are waiting. Int. 325, from Mercedes Narcisse, concerns notifications from the Office for Neighborhood Safety and the Prevention of Gun Violence. Res. 231, from Crystal Hudson, backs a state Office of Gun Violence Prevention. Neither has had a hearing. Earlier this month, Mayor Zohran Mamdani announced $4.8 million to expand the Crisis Management System, the network of community violence prevention groups, into three more neighborhoods, as we reported.

What's next

The NYPD investigation continues. Today's hearing is the first on Int. 414 and Int. 403. Both bills would need a committee vote before going to the full Council, whose next stated meeting is Nov. 12.