Anthony
Super Moderator
New York Police are searching for the man who fatally shot Antiq Hennis, a 16-month-old boy while he was sitting in a stroller on a Brooklyn street Sunday night.
Antiq was visiting his grandmother, a block away from his parents house in the Brownsville section when witnesses said three or four shots were fired.
"All of a sudden, we hear shots," Hennis' grandmother, Lenore Steele, told reporters Monday at the site of the shooting.
"He was screaming 'My baby got shot.' He was going crazy," said Gina Gamboa. "The baby was breathing, but his eyes were closed. It's crazy. They just will start shooting."
Antiq died just before 9 p.m. at the Brookdale University Hospital.
Anthony Hennis, has a record of more than 20 arrests in New York and Pennsylvania for narcotics, weapons possession and other crimes.
A law enforcement source and a few family members told reporters they believe the child's father was the intended target and the shooting was payback for an earlier dispute.
"He was very energetic, happy," said the child'd uncle, Chris Dobson. He said Antiq's parents, who hail from Trinidad, celebrated their son's first birthday in May.
"Tragedy happened," Dobson said. "It's just sad."
Bishop Willie Billops of the Church of Faith, Hope and Charity, who knows the boy's father, told reporters that he drove the parents to the hospital to identify the body of their only child.
"I'm outraged at the murder of a one-year-old baby," Billops said. "I grew up in this neighborhood and I've seen a lot, but this is the worst."
"The family is shocked and devastated," Councilman Charles Barron said, "The child didn't even get a chance to start his life, and now it's over."
"He was such a beautiful little baby, smiling and talking to everybody," the boy’s grandmother said.