The Donut Shoppe on Avenue U and 15th Street, where José Miguel Serrano-Mu?oz was fatally shot. (Lynn La/The Brooklyn Ink)
By Lynn La
Police arrested a suspect linked to a fatal shooting Tuesday morning when he returned to the scene of the murder and swooped underneath crime scene tape in attempt to sneak by officers, police said.
Salvador Avelino, 20, fled after allegedly shooting José Miguel Serrano-Mu?oz, 23, several times in the torso in front of the Donut Shoppe on Avenue U and 15th Street around 4:48 a.m. Serrano-Mu?oz was rushed to Kings County Hospital where he was pronounced dead on arrival.
Police were called to the scene immediately and began closing the area off for investigation. While being questioned by the police, witnesses of the shooting then recognized Avelino as he returned to the scene and pointed him out to the police. According to a neighboring convenient store’s surveillance tape,?Avelino?casually walked by an officer while slipping under police tape.
Avelino?ran toward a subway station nearby, but was quickly apprehended. He is charged with murder two and criminal possession of a weapon.
Minutes before the shooting took place,?Avelino?entered the Donut Shoppe, where Serrano-Mu?oz and two unidentified men were already eating. The restaurant’s supervisor, Vidal Macoto-Torres said that?Avelino?ordered what he always ordered, a cheeseburger, he added. Serrano-Mu?oz and Salvador exchanged glances and then began arguing.
“It looked like they might have recognized each other, but they started to fight about why he was looking at them and why they were looking at him,” said Macoto-Torres.
Macoto-Torres said that after?Avelino?returned from the restaurant’s bathroom, Serrano-Mu?oz and the two other men promptly jumped?Avelino, leaving him injured outside the Donut Shoppe.
“Miguel wanted to start trouble. Salvador didn’t want to fight,” said Gustavol Gutierrez, a worker at the restaurant who witnessed the murder.
When the three men walked back inside the restaurant to finish their meal, Salvador went next door to his apartment upstairs to grab his gun, said Gutierrez. He returned to the restaurant and pointed the gun at Serrano-Mu?oz.
“Miguel and them, they laughed,” said Macoto-Torres. “They said, ‘That’s not a real gun, that’s a fake gun.’”?Avelino?then allegedly shot Serrano-Mu?oz multiple times in the stomach, said police. Macoto-Torres said the two men who were with Serrano-Mu?oz at the time attempted to catch?Avelino?when he fled, but were unsuccessful.
“I heard three shots across the street,” said Sammy Mohamed, a worker at the convenience store next to the Donut Shoppe. “Salvador didn’t talk a lot. He barely spoke any English, mainly Spanish. He hung out around this area most nights.” According to Mohamed, the store, otherwise known as Avenue U Candy Deli and Grocery, had surveillance video that filmed Avelino running away from the scene and returning to it a few minutes after.
“He was a quiet guy,” said Macoto-Torres. “He would order a cheeseburger everyday, no drink, just a cheeseburger. Sometimes once or twice a day.”
Although police could not confirm, witnesses at the scene reported that both parties were?drinking the night of the murder
You can watch the New York Post’s footage here.
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