BY MARY REINHOLZ | A street memorial for Elliot Caldwell was held last Thursday in front of a garden on E. 12th St. between Avenues B and C, drawing about 15 young men from the gritty Alphabet City neighborhood.
Some of them wore black T-shirts with messages reading, in part, “In Loving Memory of Eliot [sic] Caldwell,” with the dates of the 23-year-old’s birth and death inscribed in white.
They sat on chairs directly across the street from where Caldwell, the father of a 3-year-old son, was shot in the back late at night on Aug. 14 in front of Campos Plaza I. He had grown up there and lived nearby, according to Albert Roman, a relative and resident of the New York City Housing Authority development at 635 E. 12th St. He spoke to this reporter earlier in the day, providing information on the memorial.
“There will be a barbeque,” he said.
Few among the mourners who showed up around 4 p.m. wanted to talk about Caldwell or his relationship to his suspected killer, Theodore Holloway, also 23, who lived at Campos Plaza and allegedly fired at his neighbor from the back seat of a parked car, according to DNAinfo. Holloway was arrested April 15 by Ninth Precinct police and charged with second-degree murder.
“You ask too many questions,” said a Latino woman in her 30s who sat in a chair a few feet from a makeshift shrine to Caldwell. Lush greenery sprouted from the garden behind it.
Several men put their arms over their heads when they saw a camera.
“No pictures!” one of them shouted.
“Get the f— out of here!” said another, who rose to his feet after one photo was taken from a distance of two attendees at the memorial who had agreed to be photographed in profile.
“If you show their faces, you will put their lives in danger!” warned a heavyset woman who had been preparing food on the street. She identified herself only as Diane and demanded to see the photo.
A squad car with two cops from the Ninth Precinct was parked a few yards away. One of the officers said he could understand the anger of the mourners having their grief interrupted by an outsider.
Lieutenant Patrick Ferguson, Ninth Precinct head of special operations, said the next day that police patrol the housing project daily. He characterized the attendees at the Caldwell memorial as “Campos kids” upset by the sudden presence of media. Asked if a photograph in a newspaper would endanger their lives, he said, “That’s an exaggeration.”
Ferguson did not offer any theory on the motive for Caldwell’s killing or whether there was gang activity involved. He described the victim as a “street kid” he had known for 11 or 12 years.
“I used to talk to him all the time,” he said. “It’s sad.”
“He was a good kid,” said a clerk behind the counter at the deli around the corner at 185 Avenue C. “He used to come in here all the time.”
Halloway’s arrest was announced April 19 by Deputy Inspector Peter J. Venice, Ninth Precinct commanding officer, during a monthly meeting of the precinct’s community council at the E. Fifth St. stationhouse.
“We were in a hurry to catch the perpetrator because he was involved in other incidents, including one in January,” Venice said. “He came out of the housing project and we were able to grab this guy. We take violent crimes very seriously.”
Venice told the gathering of about 30 locals that there had been a 10 percent increase in crime in the precinct over the last 30 days, with “spikes” in categories like stolen auto (which includes motorcycle thefts) and felony assaults. In the latter category, he noted that a homeless man at the E. Third St. Men’s Shelter died Fri., April 1, after a dispute with another resident, reportedly over a $3 cigarette debt, according to the New York Daily News.
The victim — who was found with head trauma — was identified as Michael Antonicelli, 69. Police arrested Edwin Hernandez, 55, for felony assault.
“One male hit the other and he was taken to [Beth Israel] hospital where he passed on,” Venice said of the incident. “We have cops there every day,” he said of the shelter, which is run by the nonprofit Project Renewal, on 8 E. Third St. on the Bowery. “It’s unfortunate what happened,” the deputy inspector said.
A Police Department spokesperson later said that Hernandez allegedly struck Antonicelli, who fell to the floor, striking his head. The Office of the Chief Medical Examiner later ruled the death a homicide.
