(Updated) An apparent dispute led to the shooting death of 45-year-old Ji’Tu Garrett at Congress Avenue and Vernon Street early Friday morning.
New Haven Police Department spokesperson Capt. Rose Dell announced news of that bout of deadly gun violence in an email press release sent out soon after 11 a.m. She sent a follow-up press release with more details at around 4:45 p.m.
She wrote, at around 6:35 a.m. Firday, city police responded to reports of a shooting on Vernon Street at Congress Avenue.
Upon arrival, they found Garrett, who was from Meriden, suffering from gunshot wounds. “The victim was immediately transported to Yale-New Haven Hospital but died soon after.”
She wrote that detectives from the city police department’s Major Crimes Unit and Bureau of Identification interviewed potential witnesses and collected evidence at the scene. “According to preliminary investigations, the incident appears to have stemmed from a dispute,” Dell wrote.
In a follow-up phone interview with the Independent, Police Chief Karl Jacobson said that, while the homicide victim did not have a New Haven address, he did “have ties to New Haven.”
Based on video footage of the incident, Jacobson said, it “looks like some kind of dispute,” “like a targeted incident.”
Even though that corner of Congress and Vernon is near the APT Foundation, a methadone clinic that has seen violence outside its doors in the past, Jacobson said that the victim had no connections to APT. He also said that police notified John C. Daniels School, which is near that same intersection, and put school resource officers (SROs) at the school for the day in response to the nearby shooting.
“We are actively investigating this incident and are asking anyone with any information to come forward and contact the police department,” Jacobson is quoted as saying in Dell’s Friday afternoon press release. “This type of gun violence is unacceptable, and we’re committed to finding those responsible and bringing them to justice.”
Anyone with information on this incident is urged to call 203 – 946-6304 or through the department’s anonymous tip-line at 866 – 888-TIPS (8477).
Friday morning’s homicide is the 11th of the year so far. On Jan. 1, a 23-year-old New Haven man named Dontae Myers was shot dead near Poplar Street and Grand Avenue in Fair Haven. On Jan. 6, a 41-year-old West Haven man named Charles Miller was shot and killed on Pond Lily Avenue. On Jan. 7, a 30-year-old New Havener named Kentel Robinson died from injuries he suffered when someone shot him repeatedly on Chapel Street between Beers and Orchard Streets on Jan. 4. On Jan. 18, a 40-year-old man named Alexander Pedraza was shot and killed near River and James Streets in Fair Haven. And in the early hours of Jan. 23, 33-year-old Michael Wint was shot and killed in his car on Whalley Avenue. On March 15, 25-year-old Ramon Yates was shot on Dixwell Avenue near West Hazel Street and died in the hospital three days later. On April 1, 27-year-old Jonathan Garcia and 40-year-old Marquis Darnell McNeill were shot and killed on Winthrop Avenue. Early in the morning on April 23, 26-year-old Tayna Rodriguez was shot and killed following a dispute between two other people on Saltonstall. On April 27, 39-year-old Juan Carlos Colon was shot to death on Forbes Avenue after a dispute with a business partner turned fatal.
My condolences to the family and friends of this person lost to gun violence.
Our collective trauma continues.