Posted on 06/02/2003 8:59:28 AM PDT by george wythe
A man apparently outraged by his neighbors' loud music and late-night partying opened fire on a Miami Beach birthday bash early Sunday, killing three revelers and wounding two others, police said.
The spray of bullets silenced the celebration for the wife of one of the victims and sent partygoers diving for cover at about 4 a.m., police said.
Among the dead: two young fathers and a Brazilian woman, hit as she stood partying inside unit 1 at Ronna Apartments, a peach-colored, two story building at 501 77th St.
All of the dead were South American immigrants. All died at the scene, their loved ones crying over their bodies. The suspected gunman, Kevin Evers, who lives in an apartment on the second floor of the building, was later arrested in Broward County.
The injured were taken to Mount Sinai Medical Center. They are expected to recover.
Police said they believed ''loud music'' led to the triple slaying that terrorized partygoers. It was unclear whether Evers confronted partygoers over the music before the shooting, but witnesses said there was an argument.
AT LEAST 9 BULLETS
Bright yellow police cones placed by detectives outside the apartment Sunday indicated at least nine bullets tore into the crowd.
Several neighbors said that a woman who was injured had a baby in her arms when she was shot and that the bullet just missed the baby's head and hit her shoulder.
After the shooting, Evers, 41, ran away. He was later arrested at his parents home in Sunrise, police said. Sunday afternoon, Evers was transported back to Miami Beach police headquarters for interrogation. He faces three murder charges and two attempted murder charges. Evers had no serious criminal background in Florida, records indicate.
But there was a trespassing warning issued against him 10 days ago at a Coral Springs shopping mall, police said.
A NEWCOMER
Evers was a newcomer to the building, which has about 10 units. He had been living there with his girlfriend for a short time, police said.
''He came down here, and got into some type of argument,'' said Miami Beach police spokesman Bobby Hernandez, standing outside the building Sunday morning. ``The subject pulls out a gun and started firing off rounds.''
Hernandez called the shootings the first slayings on Miami Beach this year.
Unlike in the south end of Miami Beach, Hernandez said, police do not field many noise complaints from the area where the shooting occurred and none that night. Police said Evers did not call police to complain about the party.
By city ordinance, music should not be audible within 100 feet of a residence after 11 p.m., police said.
Neighbor Fernández, who lived across the street, said that about 1 a.m. she heard Latin music blaring from the ground floor apartment where the party was taking place.
''It was loud,'' said Fernández, who thought it sounded like merengue, a hard-thumping dance music from the Dominican Republic.
After feeding her baby, she said she went to bed and woke up to the sound of gunshots several hours later. ''It was about six shots, one after the other,'' she said. Other neighbors said they heard as many as 10 shots.
NOTICED THE PARTY
Two other neighbors also noticed the party, but didn't recall the music being particularly loud.
''I was sleeping and first I heard screaming, then the shots,'' Nicolás Fernando-López, who lives in the building next door, said. `It must have been 10 or 11. Bam, bam, bam, bam, bam, bam, bam. A lot.''
When Fernando-López, 40, and other neighbors ran out to see what had happened, one man lay bleeding on the sidewalk, another on the patio of the apartment building. A third person lay over the doorway, Fernando-López said.
Beach police spokesman Hernandez said Evers was acquainted with at least some of the victims.
Hernandez said Evers did not have any prior convictions. He said a store owner in the Broward County mall filed a complaint with police after a tiff with Evers.
WIFE'S BIRTHDAY
Friends said it was Fondovila's wife -- identified as Melina Fondovila -- who was being feted Saturday night. Her birthday was Sunday.
They also said the couple had just celebrated their daughter's first birthday on Tuesday.
(Excerpt) Read more at miami.com ...
I did the apartment thing while I was a young college lad, but I will never go back to living in such close quarters.
If I had limited funds, I would rent a room attached to a family house or rent a trailer in the boondocks
It also depends on the crowd one's dealing with. In the neighborhood I grew up in, I wouldn't hesitate for a second to confront the partygoers, and would feel completely safe in doing so. That neighborhood in Miami is another story altogether.
It's worth a try. Better than murdering three of your neighbors in any case.
As for the rest of your post (#32), I assume it's sarcasm, but don't find it humorous.
If you check the posting guidelines, you can see that it states "...No racism or violence in posts".
That's the one .... my mistake.
I got tired of calling the cops and was close to hurting the low life. What I did was move to a more expensive area where people had more brains and respect for each other.
Some people are also missing the point, as a lot of people think they are required to give their names and addresses to law enforcement when they make a complaint, as they always ask for personal information like name and address. This could have been one of those people that was afraid of retribution or retaliation if he called the police.
And besides, people who get the cops called on them generally always know who did it, and they are generally right. Like at this party, if people from apartments on both sides of the party apartment were in attendance, the likely person to call the cops would be the one that lived directly above the party apartment. It's generally not hard to figure out who the cop callers are.
Thanks.
I'll be the first to tell you that the shooter was a dumb*$$ and should be tried for murder, pure and simple. Now I'am looking for the Liberal Spin that it was a hate crime somehow.
OTOH, I wonder how this story would have been played if the shooter been a fellow latino. Page 17B, lower inside left column, under "Local Crime"?
And I agree with everything you said, however, there are a lot of people out there that belive the are required to give their name to file or make a complaint. And again, most people that get the cops called on them, generally have a good idea who the ones doing it are.
This guy just went sideways, possibly after he was threatend or confronted at the door by some macho drunk. He may as well shot himself too.
All dance music is.
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