Metro

Shopkeeper ‘killer’ busted on separate theft charge

The alleged gunman who fatally shot a Brooklyn shopkeeper during an attempted robbery was busted today on an unrelated theft, law enforcement sources said.

NYPD detectives took the suspect into custody at about 1 p.m. on Bradford Street in East New York, sources said.

“He’s being charged with the [unrelated] robbery for now,” said one police source. “We have to work on the homicide angle.”

Investigators used a description of the perpetrator to link him to the fatal shooting of Mohamed Bilal inside the New Attitude Printing Ink and Internet Café on New Lots Avenue around 1:30 p.m. yesterday, sources said.

Graphic surveillance video from the store captured the cold-blooded murder, sources said.

It began innocently enough with Bilal smiling and chatting with a female customer, sources said.

Suddenly, his face went blank when the “nervous” suspect walked up to him, tossed a knapsack at him and pulled out a gun, sources said.

Moments later, the thug pumped a single bullet into Bilal’s chest, causing him to fall back off a stool and collapse to the ground, sources said.

Freaked out, the female customer dashed to the back of the store.

Although the gunman fled emptyhanded, sources say, investigators believe he was there to rob the place.

Cops learned the perp’s identity after running a SIM card retrieved from the knapsack he tossed at the victim, sources said.