NEW YORK, June 14 (Our New York News) — The New York Police Department said three persons of interest were taken into custody after a 17-year-old male was shot near 42nd Street and Broadway in Times Square as crowds celebrated the Knicks’ NBA championship win.
The shooting was reported at about 2:01 a.m., according to NYPD information cited in national accounts. Police said the teenager was shot once in the left foot and taken to Bellevue Hospital in stable condition. Police also said a firearm was recovered at the scene.
Those police statements form the clearest official account of the overnight violence in Midtown Manhattan. The public record available so far is thinner on what happened next: No court filing, criminal complaint, case caption, prosecutor statement, defense statement or named defendant tied to the shooting or property damage was identified in the reports reviewed by Times Media Service.
That matters because the available evidence points to several different kinds of events happening at once: a shooting investigated by police, broader crowd disorder, damage to police vehicles and buses, and at least one reported bus fire. The shooting details come from the NYPD. Many of the property-damage details come from video reviewed by news organizations or from firsthand observations by reporters and video journalists, not from charging documents.
Police said multiple arrests were made during the unrest, according to the Associated Press, but AP reported that police did not yet have a final arrest total later Sunday. The NYPD accounts reviewed did not identify the three persons of interest by name, age or charge.
The celebrations began Saturday night and spread through parts of New York City, including Times Square and areas around Madison Square Garden, according to AP and CNN reporting. As the night went on, videos and firsthand reports showed crowds climbing on vehicles and damaging property in and around Times Square.
Video circulating online appeared to show two people jumping onto the roof of an NYPD vehicle and smashing its windshield, according to Fox News Digital’s review of the footage. Other video appeared to show people climbing on and entering school buses near Times Square. Those descriptions are visual observations of video, not official findings that identify the people involved or establish criminal liability.
AP reported that rowdy fans were seen smashing windshields, scaling scaffolding, light poles and a statue, climbing into and onto school buses in Times Square, and trying to hitch a ride on a moving fire truck. AP also reported that gunfire was reported around 2 a.m. near 42nd Street and Broadway, citing police.
Reuters reported, based on a Reuters video journalist who witnessed the scene, that hundreds of mostly young people swarmed a convoy of about 15 shuttle buses in Times Square. Some climbed onto the roofs, entered the buses and sat in drivers’ seats, Reuters reported. Reuters also reported that one yellow school bus hired by the city government to help transport soccer fans was in flames and that at least three other shuttle buses sustained heavy damage.
CNN reported that officers moved in after a crowd began damaging a parked school bus and tearing off part of its hood. The bus was also seen being rocked back and forth, CNN reported. On Sixth Avenue around 2 a.m., CNN reported that multiple police cars were damaged, their windshields shattered, and bottles and coolers were thrown toward officers as more police moved in.
The available accounts leave several key questions unanswered. They do not identify a shooter or motive. They do not say what type of firearm police recovered. They do not establish whether the three persons of interest were later charged. They also do not include an official fire department finding on the bus fire or an official damage estimate for police or transport vehicles.
There is also a conflict in the early injury information. AP reported that preliminary police reports indicated no one was injured, while other NYPD-linked accounts said a 17-year-old was shot in the foot and hospitalized in stable condition. The later, specific police account of the teenage victim is the more detailed account available in the reviewed material, but the discrepancy shows how incomplete the early record remained.
For now, the documented finding is narrower than the scenes shown in viral video: NYPD said a teenager was shot in Times Square, a firearm was recovered and three persons of interest were taken into custody, while video and firsthand media accounts show separate disorder involving damaged vehicles and buses during the same overnight celebration.
