Police have arrested a man in the killing of a young mother who was shot in the head while walking her 3-month-old baby in a stroller in New York City this week.
A senior law enforcement official confirmed the arrest to The Daily Beast, identifying the suspect as the baby’s father. Police have not officially released the name of the man, who was taken into custody by United States Marshals and the New York City Police Department’s Fugitive Task Force.
The arrest comes two days after the brutal killing of 20-year-old Asia Johnson shocked the city. The young mother, an aspiring nurse, was shot in the head near the corner of Lexington Boulevard and 95th Street Wednesday night by an assailant seen on surveillance footage wearing a black hoodie and sweatpants. He approached her from behind before firing the fatal shot.
The officer said Johnson was preparing to meet the baby’s father that evening and actually texted a relative just before she was killed to say he could see him in the area.
“He’s here. I can see him. He’s dressed all in black,” the employee said, she wrote.
Moments later, she was shot, and her attacker, according to the officer, began to drop his outer clothing as he fled the scene. Police later recovered some of the items and arrested him in Brooklyn.
Johnson’s family said she filed several domestic abuse complaints in the months before she was killed, but no arrests were ever made. Law enforcement sources confirmed that she has filed multiple complaints about more than one alleged abuser.
The senior official who spoke to The Daily Beast said Johnson’s suspected killer had been in the sights of law enforcement since an incident on New Year’s Day in which he threw her into a wall. He was gone when officers arrived, but the officer said the man had been issued an investigation card on suspicion of felonious assault, meaning he was wanted for questioning in connection with the alleged assault. He had not yet been arrested in that case at the time of the shooting.
“We used to call domestic violence every day [unit]. You know what they told me, it’s not harassment if he’s making threats,” Johnson’s mother, Lisa Desort, said at a vigil Thursday night for the slain young mother.
“Now my daughter is dead. She’s dead!” she cried.
Investigators reportedly targeted one of Johnson’s exes shortly after her murder, with law enforcement sources telling the New York Post they were treating the killing as a “domestic” incident.
“She was targeted. It was a close range shot to the head and there were gunpowder burns,” one source was quoted as saying.
Johnson’s mother addressed the man she believed responsible for her daughter’s murder in comments to NBC New York: “I treated you like a son. I welcomed you into my home. I talked to you and comforted you when you were upset. Your baby girl does not and will never have a father or a mother.”
Johnson left behind the 3-month-old child she was with at the time of her murder, along with a 1-year-old child.
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