NEW YORK — A man who had been laid off from an apparel importer in the shadow of the Empire State Building shot and killed a former co-worker Friday morning, Mayor Michael Bloomberg said. The man then walked along the curb in front of the Empire State Building, where he “turned his gun” on two officers on duty at the main entrance who shot and killed him, the mayor said.
Police Commissioner Raymond Kelly said that nine bystanders had been “wounded or grazed” and taken to hospitals. The mayor said some of the injured may have been hit by police bullets during the confrontation with the suspect, whom Kelly identified as Jeffrey Johnson, 58, a former clothing designer at Hazan Imports. Kelly said the two officers fired a total of 16 rounds and that he believed some of the shooting victims had been shot by the officers “based on the number of people shot and the capacity of ” the gunman’s weapon.
The sudden spasm of violence shattered the calm of the morning near one of the world’s major tourist destinations and set off pandemonium at a busy intersection that was filled with pedestrians and cars. Visitors had begun crowding into the lobby of the building waiting to ascend to the observation deck on the 86th floor, which had already opened.
The former co-worker was identified by the police as Steve Ercolino.
A co-worker of Ercolino said she was arriving with him at their workplace and was next to Ercolino when he was shot.
The co-worker, Irene Timan, 35, said they were just steps from the front door to their building on West 33rd Street when she saw Johnson lurking behind a white van parked at the curb.
“I saw him pull a gun out from his jacket, and I thought to myself, ‘Oh my God, he’s going to shoot him’ - and I wanted to turn and push Steve out of the way,” Timan said, in a telephone interview from the precinct house where she was being interviewed. “I knew it, I just knew it was going to happen. But it was too late. Steve screamed, Jeff shot him, and I just turned and ran.”
She said Johnson did not say anything before shooting Ercolino once in the chest. “He didn’t say one word,” Timan said. She said she learned later that he also shot Ercolino in the head.
Maureen Minuche, 45, said she was in a delicatessen not far from the shooting scene buying breakfast when she heard people screaming. She said she pushed through a crowd standing around a body. “He was shot in the face, probably in the face, because he was disfigured,” she said. Andrew Pellenberg, 23, and a friend, both from New Jersey, were also nearby, thinking about visiting the Empire State Building.
“We heard 10 to 15 gunshots,” Pellenberg said, “and it was all in a 30-second span.”
Another witness, Rebecca Fox, said she was standing near the building when she saw crowds running away from the area. Then, she said, she saw a man “dead on the ground in front of the Empire State Building.”
Officers had been alerted to the shooting by a construction worker who had followed Johnson from 10 W. 33rd St. - where he shot the 41-yearold former co-worker in front of the company where the two had worked - around the corner and up Fifth Avenue, said Kelly, who joined the mayor at a briefing about two hours after the shooting.
Johnson, the commissioner said, was carrying a .45-caliber semiautomatic handgun “in a bag under his arm.” It had a capacity of eight bullets, officials said, adding that Johnson had fired three at the former co-worker, who was apparently a vice president at Hazan. Bloomberg said Johnson pulled out his gun “and tried to shoot the cops and kill the cops.”
“They returned fire,” the mayor added. A law-enforcement official said later Friday that Johnson did not fire his weapon during the confrontation.
Inside the emergency room at Bellevue Hospital Center, Terence Baksmaty, 29, said his brother, Robert Asika, 23, was one of the shooting victims. Asika, his brother said, is a student at the Borough of Manhattan Community College but was in the area because he works selling tickets for Gray Line tours.
“I don’t feel too good,” Baksmaty said. “I just want to see him to make sure he is fine.” He said his mother was rushing to the hospital. “She is not doing great,” he said. “She is very sad and emotional.”
A spokesman for Bellevue said it had admitted six patients wounded in the shooting, three men and three women. The youngest was 20, said the spokesman, Ana Marengo, adding that the oldest was 43. All were in stable condition, she said, and none had life-threatening injuries. Three other shooting victims were being treated at New York-Presbyterian Hospital/Weill Cornell Medical Center.
The Empire State Building remained closed throughout the day.
Kelly said Johnson appeared to have no criminal record. He said Johnson had worked at Hazan Imports for six years. “During a downsizing at the company about a year ago,” Kelly said, “Johnson was laid off.” Kelly said Johnson and Ercolino had filed harassment complaints against each other relating from a workplace dispute.
Johnson lived on the third floor of a six-story walk-up on East 82nd Street for about 18 months, said Guillermo Suarez, 72, the building superintendent.
Johnson’s routine seemed to be the same every morning.He would leave the apartment between 7:30 and 8 a.m., say good morning and head to the McDonald’s on Third Avenue and 84th Street. After about 20 minutes, he would return carrying a McDonald’s bag. He would nearly always wear the same thing - a tannish brown suit, sometimes with a tie. Then he would generally stay in the apartment the rest of the day.
He did the same thing Friday morning, but this time he did not return.
Information for this article was contributed by Vivian Yee of The New York Times.
Front Section, Pages 1 on 08/25/2012