A Bystander Shot to Death After Intervening in Brownsville Salon Arrest

BROWNSVILLE — On Friday, October 25, around 5.40 p.m. a male was shot six times while interfering with an arrest and bashing a cop with a chair in the head in a Brownsville nail salon.

A disorderly individual, 26-year-old Dewayne Hawkes, was caught urinating in the middle of a nail salon at 447 Mother Gaston Boulevard, police said.  Two uniformed police officers from the 73rd Precinct, were on patrol and were stopped by the salon staff, asking the officers to remove the disorderly man. The police determined the urinating individual had an active warrant and began to place him under arrest as he began to resist.

A bystander, identified by locals as 33-year-old Kwesi Ashun, selling T-shirts outside of the salon, got involved in the arrest. The vendor stepped in and engaged in a violent struggle with the officers, one of whom deployed a taser, to no avail. In response, Ashun struck one of the officers with a chair in the head, triggering the officer to discharge his firearm six times at the subject. Ashun was pronounced deceased at the location by EMS.

The officer, Lesly LaFontant, 53, who was struck in the head, was in a medically induced coma at Brookdale Hospital Medical Center and released today. The officer’s partner was treated for tinnitus at Kings County Hospital and has been released.

Hawkes, who urinated on the salon floor, was arrested and charged with resisting arrest, obstructing governmental administration, criminal trespass and disorderly conduct, reported NBC.

This was the sixth police-involved shooting across New York City since the end of September, five of which have been fatalities.

The DCPI had no comment on updates at the time of publication.

UPDATED with name of disorderly individual.