Google Maps
Police were called about an assault Friday morning at 65 West 96th Street (at the corner of Columbus Avenue), also known as Tower West Apartments.
Advertisement
An NYPD official said they got the call at about 10:20 a.m. and upon arrival, discovered a 46-year-old male with multiple stab wounds to the stomach and chest.
The man, who’s been identified as Alfred Soto, was transported by EMS to Mount Sinai Morningside Hospital in critical condition. He was later pronounced deceased.
It was later revealed that the incident began when a group of four or five men broke into a sixth floor apartment to “take a number of dogs,” as ABC7 reports. A teenage girl and her special needs brother were home at the time. The girl called her mom who then called her friend, Alfred Soto, for help.
Soto ran down from his eleventh floor apartment to confront the suspects, but was fatally stabbed in the process.
No arrests have been made. The suspects were last seen fleeing in an unmarked U-Haul van.
Soto was a father of three who recently lost his mom to cancer, a relative told the New York Daily News.
“He died a hero in my eyes,” Soto’s sister told PIX 11. “He did what he had to do to protect children.”
“He was trying to be a good guy. I guess that’s how he was killed,” a friend of Soto’s told NBC News.
Have a news tip? Send it to us here!
I do not know this for a fact so I am asking a question: if four armed men showed up when they knew that the Mother of the teen girl and special needs son was not home, then they came with the intent to steal dogs, yes?
That seems to suggest that the dogs were valuable enough to warrant them kicking the door down. A “puppy mill?” If so, that “mother” shares the blame for her neighbors death.
Oh, for God’s sake. Do you have nothing better to do than sit around fulminating, speculating on the scenario in your head and wildly commenting on this tragedy? Pretty damned sad life you must have there.
So JLUWS and Ish Kibibble, I’d say you owe me an apology.
I correctly surmised what the incentive was and a tenant in the building confirmed it.
So you guys can bot kiss my Irish arse!
What a ridiculous take away.
So JLUWS and Ish Kibibble, I’d say you owe me an apology.
I correctly surmised what the incentive was and a tenant in the building confirmed it.
So you guys can both kiss my Irish arse!
You are 100% correct. How do I know? I live in that building. They were breeding French bulldogs in that apartment. The woman’s boyfriend came for those dogs. The woman had a black pitbull that I never once saw her walk. The dogs were housed in cages, feces everywhere, the woman in charge of that apartment knew exactly the kind of man that she was with. I blame her for everything that happened because she allowed it to begin with. Unfortunately by law buildings have to have a certain number of low income apartments and this is the result, garbage like her.
The real fault here is with the criminal justice system. Time and time again people who have committed dozens of criminal acts are let loose on the general population because of incompetent legislatures and prosecutors. Unfortunately, the public’s only resource is to elect extremists of the other sorts purely as an act of self-defense against the idiots who don’t seem to care about most of their constituents.
I feel bad for the girl and her brother who had to witness this horrific scene. It is definitely correct thst the mother should also be blamed for this. Why wasn’t building management made aware of this breeding business going on I. The building, and what happened to the security in the building-how did this group gain entry?
To respond to Rosie, not all low income tenants are ‘garbage’. This woman may have been labeled as low income to get into the building and pay a lie rent, but she was making tons of money on the side breeding those dogs. She put her children at risk and caused her neighbor to be killed protecting her children. Shame on her!!!
ISH and JLUWS I’m still waiting for my apology a month later.