Police and witnesses described the shooter as tall and Hispanic, carrying a large handgun, and wearing a dark blue shirt and shorts.
Advertisement
Some members of the Bangladeshi community served by the mosque said they wanted the shootings to be treated as a hate crime.
“There is nothing in the preliminary investigation to indicate that they were targeted due to their faith”, police told journalists.
While police have not yet determined if the attack was a hate crime, locals are insisting that law enforcement recognize it as such, even as some have blamed it on Donald Trump for spreading Islamophobic sentiment.
But Ms Sarah Sayeed of the NY mayor’s office insisted that “the NYPD is looking at all angles of this crime, including the hate crime (angle)”.
Akonjee and another man died in a fatal shooting Saturday, Aug. 13, 2016, as they left the Al-Furqan Jame Masjid mosque in the Queens borough of Ne.
Meanwhile, video footage obtained by The Post on Sunday shows the killer pumping bullets into Imam Maulama Akonjee, 55, and Thara Uddin, 64, as they walked from the Al-Furqan mosque.
The victims, identified as Imam Maulama Akonjee, 55, and Thara Uddin, 64, were both wearing religious garb at the time of shooting, police said.
The leader of a New York City mosque and a friend were fatally shot in a brazen daylight attack as they left afternoon prayers Saturday.
“CAIR will participate in the community news conference in conjunction with New York’s Majlis Ashura (Islamic Leadership Council), which will announce an effort to assist the families of the victims”, the press statement said.
A 35-year-old man from Ozone Park was taken into custody at around 11 p.m. and was being held at the 75th Precinct in East New York, according to a high ranking police source.
A suspect in the execution of a NY imam and his assistant has been arrested. Hundreds gathered gathered at a rally Saturday night to demand justice.
Surveillance video obtained by NBC 4 NY shows the moment the two men were gunned down on an Ozone Park street.
Neighbors gathered where the two men lived, just blocks from where they were killed in a Queens neighborhood as police continued searching Sunday for the suspect.
Uddin and Akonjee were walking home from Al-Furqan Jame Masjid, which serves Bangladeshi immigrants, at the time of the shooting, NBC New York reported.
In Bangladesh, the Foreign Minister, Mohammed Shahriar Alam condemned what he called a “cowardly act on peace-loving people”.
We urge the NYPD to pursue the perpetrator of this heinous crime and investigate every motive, including hate, and bring the murderer to justice.
Advertisement
Naima Akonjee, 28, one of Akonjee’s seven children, said she rushed to her parents’ home after the shooting.
