DADDY’S GIRL: Reynaldo Cuevas poses with his daughter, whom he had been working to support. (Top left, Page 1 of yesterday’s Post.)
DADDY’S GIRL:Reynaldo Cuevas poses with his daughter, whom he had been working to support. (
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The heartbroken mother of a bodega worker accidentally killed by a Bronx cop said yesterday she’s furious with the NYPD — and claimed police Commissioner Ray Kelly admitted fault in the tragedy.
“He escaped death inside, and they killed him outside,” a weeping Ana Cuevas said outside her Eastchester building a day after her son, Reynaldo Cuevas, 20, was fatally shot while fleeing an alleged stickup at the store.
“His death could have been avoided. I want justice. The police are at fault.”
Kelly called Ana Cuevas on Friday, and she said he accepted blame in her son’s death.
“He said it was his fault,” she said in Spanish.
She said Kelly’s admission did not soothe her pain.
“I feel dead. It’s like they killed me,” she said.
The NYPD could not confirm Kelly’s comments yesterday.
The commissioner told reporters that Reynaldo’s death was an accident. He said the housing cop — identified by sources as Officer Ramysh Bangali — had his gun drawn when Cuevas ran into him while fleeing the bodega.
Cuevas worked long hours at the Morrisania store, owned by his family, so he could send money back to his 3-year-old daughter in the Dominican Republic, relatives and friends said.
He was about to leave work after a long shift at about 2 a.m. Friday when he went back to pick up a bar of soap.
But three thugs pounced, pistol-whipping the manager, Felix Mora, 43, and demanding cash, police say.
As cops arrived, the victims bolted out the front door, leading to the deadly shooting.
The three alleged robbers — Orlando Ramos, 31, Ernesto Delgado, 28, and Christopher Dorsey, 17 — were charged with murder, robbery and weapons possession. The trio were held without bail at their arraignment last night.
More than 20 relatives of Dorsey were in the courtroom.
“I spoke to him briefly,” said the teen’s grandmother, Anna Cabrera. “He’s scared. He’s not a kid who does things like this.
“He was just coerced by Orlando. He’s simple minded. This should have never happened.”
Dorsey’s uncle Ronald, 54, blasted the murder charge against his nephew, who is legally on the hook for Cuevas’ death since the robbery sparked the shooting.
“He didn’t pull the trigger. Why should he pay for someone else’s mistake?” the uncle said outside the courtroom. “The police pulled the trigger, not him.”
Workers at the Franklin Avenue bodega, owned by Cuevas’ uncle, Alcibiades, mourned his death as they cleaned up the mess left behind from the robbery.
“I wish it was me and not him,” said Reynaldo Nazario, 43. “He left a 3-year-old daughter behind. When that baby grows up, where is her father?”
The accused robbers were known in the neighborhood.
“They live around here. I know all of them,” Nazario said. “They hang out around here. They are people we trust, and this is what they do to us.”
Cuevas’ father was killed two years ago in the Dominican Republic — also during a robbery.
Maleno Cuevas was shot in the back by two thugs on a moped who tried to snatch his gold chain, friends and relatives said.
“When the driver turned around and saw them fighting, the passenger told the driver to shoot him,” said a bodega regular named Chico, 54, who said Reynaldo had told him the story the day before he died.
“I’m now wondering if this was a sign that his time was coming up.”
Family members are planning to bury Cuevas next to his father in the Dominican Republic.
No one answered the door at Bangali’s home yesterday.
The cop, a seven-year NYPD veteran who works at PSA 7, was placed on administrative duty after the shooting.
Additional reporting by Kevin Fasick