NEW YORK — A 19-year-old budding rapper was fatally shot in the eye in the lobby of his Bronx apartment building, police said Thursday.
Tyquill Daugherty, who performed under the name “Ty Swish,” was killed inside his building on Prospect Ave. near E.182nd St. in Belmont about 11:35 p.m. Wednesday, cops said.
He ran outside the building, where he collapsed. He had been shot in the eye, one witness said.
Family friend Taisha Ramos said her two children and Daugherty’s mother found the teen unconscious sprawled out on the ground outside the building.
“I was at work and my daughter started screaming and my son started screaming and they found him out here,” said Ramos, who had just offered Daugherty a job to babysit her children when she was at work. “He was a sweetheart. He loved kids. He was always smiling. He was an up-and-coming musician.”
Medics rushed Daugherty to St. Barnabas Hospital but he could not be saved.
“When I walked out the building I saw him lying down on the ground with a bullet in his head,” said a neighbor who gave his name only as Abel. “I wish I didn’t see him that way.”
Abel, 40, said Daugherty was a friendly young man who doted on his younger sister and would run out and get groceries for neighbors.
“I’ve been in this building 10 years. I saw that kid grow up,” Abel said. “He had a big smile on his face always. He used to be in the hallway rapping and doing his music. Looking at videos, singing outside.”
“I got a bad back and a bad knee and he helped me out. He carried my groceries,” he added. “Sometimes he goes to the store for me. I give a few dollars he gets me whatever I need.”
“He was a good kid,” the neighbor said. “It’s a shame what happened.”
Neighbor Julio Rodriguez was shocked by the slaying.
“There was so much blood on the floor,” Rodriguez, 24, said. “He was a good person never getting into trouble. He had a good voice.”
The gunman fled in a dark-colored four-door sedan and has not been caught, officials said.
“He was like a son to me,” Ramos, 42, said of the victim. Always in my house, always checking to see, ‘Hey, Ma, what’s going on, do you need anything?’”
Police sources said Daugherty had no gang affiliations but had been arrested for assault, burglary and harassment on March 10. He was released without bail and the case was pending when he was killed, officials said.
Daugherty’s grief-stricken friends visited the building all morning, with one man crying, “That’s my boy!”
“Everybody’s finding out this morning,” Ramos said. “There’s gonna be a lot of that today.”
Longtime friend Christian Baez, who produced beats for Daugherty’s rap tracks, wondered why someone would take his life without a second thought.
“My question is for what? For what?” Baez asked. “His two favorite things were rapping and playing 2K (video games).”
Baez, 22, was working on an album with Daugherty and was left disheartened that they never finished the project.
“He was urging me to help him make an album. That’s where I slacked,” he said. “I could of done it but at the time my equipment wasn’t right. With his talent he should have the best.”
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