Teen uses last breath to identify man who killed her for turning down his advances
A Brooklyn teenager used her dying breaths to tell police the name of the man who shot her for spurning his advances.
Last year, Shemel Mercurius, 16, was allegedly shot by Taariq Stephens, 25, who Mercurius said wanted to date her. She had turned him down, and he showed up at her apartment to shoot her three times with a machine gun.
Mercurius had been babysitting her 3-year-old cousin at the time that Stephens showed up at the apartment, according to testimony given on Monday by the cops who responded and stayed with Mercurius as she died.
“There was a 3-year-old male child … covered in blood crying next to the victim,” said Sgt. Ryan Habermehl.
Although Habermehl called EMS immediately, it took them 20 minutes to arrive as Mercurius struggled through her final breaths.
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Officer Kyle Thomas Daly also testified that he found Mercurius on a toy car, leaning against the wall.
“I put on gloves, took her off the car and laid her down and began rendering aid … she regained consciousness, gave me her name and date of birth,” he said.
The dying teenager drifted in and out of consciousness but told the police that she had rejected Stephens after the two of them had met a week before her murder at a daycare and exchanged phone numbers.
Stephens could be hit with 25 years to life in prison for second-degree murder and weapons charges if he is convicted.
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