Mark Carson
WHAT’S SO FUNNY? Elliot Morales flashes a twisted smirk as cops arrest him following the deadly shooting. (
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The homophobic ex-con accused of “executing’’ a gay man in Greenwich Village laughed and boasted about the murder, prosecutors said yesterday.
“Yeah, I shot him in the head,” Elliot Morales, 33, sneered while “laughing on the ground” as cops were handcuffing him for fatally shooting Mark Carson, 32, early Saturday morning, according to prosecutors.
Morales yesterday was held without bail on charges of second-degree murder as a hate crime, menacing and two counts of criminal possession of a weapon.
He is accused of first hissing anti-gay slurs at Carson and a friend while they were walking on Sixth Avenue near West Eighth Street at around midnight Saturday, and then gunning down Carson.
“Look at these faggots,” said Morales, who was accompanied by two friends, according to police.
“What are you, gay wrestlers?” he challenged Carson and his pal, who were wearing boots, cut-off shorts and tank tops.
Carson and his friend kept walking to avoid a confrontation, but Morales — whose friends left him before he turned violent — followed the duo, spewing more hate before snarling, “Do you want to die here?” authorities said.
When the victim’s companion challenged him, Morales seethed to Carson, “Are you with him?”
The victim replied, “Yes.’’
Morales then allegedly whipped out a silver Taurus .38-caliber revolver and blasted Carson in the cheek, “executing him in the street,’’ said Manhattan prosecutor Joan Illuzzi-Orbon at Morales’ court arraignment.
Carson died at Beth Israel Hospital.
“The victim did nothing to antagonize or instigate the shooter. It was only done because the shooter believed him to be gay,” Police Commissioner Ray Kelly said yesterday.
In court, Illuzzi-Orbon said authorities have footage of a crazed Morales spewing anti-gay remarks about 20 minutes earlier at the staff of the nearby Annisa restaurant — and threatening to put a bullet through a bartender’s forehead if he called cops.
“Are you afraid?” he barked at the worker after being chided for urinating outside the restaurant. “Do you watch the news? Do you know what happened in Sandy Hook?’’
Police sources said the suspect had two holsters on him, one with a gun in it. Cops later found an assault weapon with a yellow banana-shaped clip that belonged to Morales at the Queens home where he was staying.
The friends he was staying with had been complaining to him about the guns, since there were children in the home, law-enforcement sources said.
Morales had a fake ID on him when he was nabbed in Carson’s murder and refused to tell cops his real name. He was finally identified through facial-recognition technology.
He has six prior arrests, including one for attempted murder in 1998 and others for criminal possession of a weapon. He has served more than nine years in both city and state prisons.
Additional reporting by Kirstan Conley and Jamie Schram