A 25-year-old man was shot dead on his birthday during a spate of gunplay Sunday across Brooklyn and Staten Island that was bookended by another murder and a quadruple shooting, police and relatives said.
Unique Gilkes turned 25 just hours before he was blasted several times in the chest at St. Johns Place and Ralph Ave. at 4:40 a.m. in Crown Heights, according to police and the victim’s brother.
“That was my little brother,” said Jason Love, 26. “It was his birthday today.”
Love said his brother was the father of two, a little boy and girl.
A witness who declined to give her name said Gilkes was lying motionless on the street after the attack.
“When I ran up to him, he was losing a lot of blood,” she said. “I didn’t see him moving.”
Gilkes died at Brookdale University Hospital. He was one of two men killed and six wounded in five incidents across the city.
An 26-year-old Queens man was found with several gunshot wounds to his abdomen and a slashed neck, among other knife cuts, in a bloody elevator at the Risley Dent Towers on Fulton St. near Marcus Garvey Blvd. in Bedford-Stuyvesant at 12:43 a.m., police said.
Brian Lewis, of Rockaway Park, was rushed from the grisly scene to Interfaith Medical Center, where he died, officials said. Cops had made no arrests in either killing as of late Sunday.
In Coney Island, gunshots again echoed across city blocks as about six men exchanged gunfire on Mermaid Ave. and W. 15th St. at 2:20 p.m., leaving four wounded, cops said.
Witnesses to the gun battle said two groups were feuding when they began trading fire and using a parked car for cover.
“They were just shooting at each other . . . . Two groups of guys, shooting at each other,” said Batik Mahmood, 26, who was delivering pizza in the area.
“Some of the guys were behind the car. Others went into the deli. Others ran toward Neptune. It was crazy,” he said.
Children had been playing on the block just minutes before, witnesses said.
Emergency responders rushed two of the men to Lutheran Medical Center. The other two victims walked into Coney Island Hospital, police said. The four included two 21-year-olds, a 26-year-old and a 31-year-old.
Two men were taken into custody for questioning at the scene, cops said. There were no arrests.
It was not immediately clear if the violence was related to early morning gunfire just a block away at W. 16th St. near Neptune Ave., police said.
In that incident, a 38-year-old bystander was hit in the back by a bullet following a dispute between a man and a woman at 4:37 a.m., police said.
He was taken to Lutheran Medical Center and listed in stable condition. The gunman was still at large.
A 39-year-old man was also shot in the gut on Hillman Ave. near Renee Place in Graniteville, Staten Island, at 3:27 a.m., police said. The victim was not cooperating with investigators, a police source said.
