Upstate Man Sentenced to 11 Years in Prison For Shooting Woman in Queensbridge: DA

Snooze Brown (NYPD) and 41st Avenue and 10th Street (Google)

June 11, 2019 By Laura Hanrahan

An upstate man will serve 11 years in prison for the attempted murder of a woman in Queensbridge, the Queens District Attorney’s office announced today.

Snooze Brown, 23, of Middletown, New York pleaded guilty in May to shooting a bystander during a violent altercation with his girlfriend in January of 2018.

“The defendant admitted that he was in possession of an illegal firearm which he claimed ‘accidently’ went off – repeatedly – as he whipped it from his waistband while arguing with his girlfriend in the middle of the street,” said Acting Queens District Attorney John M. Ryan.

“Although he completely missed hitting his intended target, one of the stray shots unfortunately hit a bystander – a young woman two blocks away as she exited a subway station. While the woman thankfully survived being shot by the defendant, this case serves as a perfect example of just how dangerous illegal guns can be.”

The shocking series of events began early in the morning on Jan. 26, 2018. Around 7 a.m., Brown began a violent altercation with his girlfriend inside her apartment where he repeatedly punched her in the face, causing substantial pain and bruising. His girlfriend then locked herself in the bathroom and used her cell phone to call her mother for help while Brown demanded that she open the door, threatening to shoot through it.

His girlfriend eventually opened the door and fled the apartment, heading out onto the street, with Brown chasing after her. Brown caught up with her at the intersection of 41st Avenue and 10th Street and began forcefully pushing her into the middle of the intersection.

While this was happening, the girlfriend’s mother and her fiancé drove up to the scene. Brown then turned his rage toward them. He threw a bag at the vehicle and pulled out a gun, firing several shots at the mother.

One of the shots went astray and hit a 28-year-old school teacher exiting the subway at 41st Avenue and 21st Street. The teacher, who survived the shooting, says she heard a loud pop followed by a painful sensation in her abdomen. She looked down to see a small hole in her jacket and blood seeping out.

She was transported by ambulance to a local Queens hospital where she received treatment for the gunshot wound.

Following the shooting, Brown fled the scene. But just two days later, he was spotted by a member of the New York-New Jersey Regional Fugitive Task Force and was placed under arrest. At that time, police found a loaded 9mm semi-automatic pistol in his jacket, of which Brown said: “That gun is yours now . . . I know I’m a fugitive. I seen myself on TV. How much time am I going to get?”

Brown then told police that the car driven by his girlfriend’s mother tried to run him over, before turning his focus back to the gun, insisting that the shooting was an accident.

“The gun I got locked up with today is going to match the shell casings from the shooting,” Brown said. “I pulled the gun out of my waistband and the gun went off. It was an accident. I bought the gun from a crackhead in August. If the gun comes back to other things before August, it wasn’t me. I’ll take five years for this.”

When asked how many times he shot the gun, Brown was unable to answer, asking police “Well, how many shell casings did you find?”

Brown then called himself an “idiot” for holding onto the gun after the shooting.

He later apologized for shooting the innocent bystander, according to the charges.

Brown will now serve 11 years in prison, plus five years post-release supervision for the charges of second-degree attempted murder, second-degree assault and second-degree criminal possession of a weapon.