The gunman who allegedly shot a 17-year-old boy near his Upper West Side high school – sparking a burst of gun violence in possible retaliation – has been charged with attempted murder, cops said Wednesday.
Cheick Coulibaly, 19, was busted a short time after the shooting that erupted around 9:50 a.m. Tuesday at the corner of Amsterdam Avenue and West 68th Street, police said.
Coulibaly – who was out on bail in a 2021 armed robbery case – allegedly shot the young victim several times in the torso, cops said. The teen had to undergo surgery but was expected to survive.
The bloodshed stemmed from a dispute that began two blocks north, involving four or five teenage boys, authorities said.
After being shot, the victim staggered to his school, The Maxine Greene High School for Imaginative Inquiry, police said. That school, in addition to nearby LaGuardia High School of Music, was placed on lockdown after the shooting.
Coulibaly, meanwhile, got away in a yellow cab that he had hailed – but quick-thinking witnesses tipped off cops, who were able to stop the taxi a block away and arrest him.
“The cab was going downtown,” said a doorman who watched the arrest go down outside 165 West End Avenue. “There were about five cop cars. They cornered the cab from the back and front. The cops got out with their guns drawn and told the guy to get out. He got out and they arrested him.”
In addition to attempted murder, Coulibaly was also charged with assault, criminal use of a firearm and criminal possession of a weapon, cops said. He was awaiting arraignment on the charges Wednesday.
Coulibaly has three prior arrests, Chief of Patrol John Chell told reporters Wednesday. This includes two narcotics arrests this year in The Bronx and the armed robbery with a firearm charge for which he was indicted in 2021 in Manhattan.
Records show he made $50,000 bail in the ongoing case in November. His next court date is April 18.
Just over three hours after the Upper West Side shooting, a 16-year-old boy and a 27-year-old male innocent bystander were shot at East 129th Street and Madison Avenue – in what police sources are calling a possible retaliatory strike.
The teen and four other students at Harlem Renaissance High School were going out for lunch at around 1 p.m. when three men approached them and a fight broke out, cops said.
Bullets flew during the brawl, leaving the teen — who sources said was on his first day at the school — with a bullet wound to the leg.
The bystander was also shot in the leg and rushed to Harlem Hospital, according to cops.
The three suspected shooters fled, cops said. Police believe the teen was the intended target and say that the shooting was gang-related.
A third incident — involving a report of shots fired at East 105th Street and Park Avenue at around 3 p.m. — was also believed to be connected, police said.
Four shell casings were recovered at that scene, but no one was struck.
No arrests have been made in those cases.
“The last five hours we got three shooting incidents in the northern side of Manhattan,” Chell said at a press briefing in East Harlem Tuesday.
“Right now, we’re proceeding like they’re all connected,” he added. “Why do I say that? In proximity, geography, around schools, age of our victims, and now we confirmed at least one incident, this incident here is gang-motivated.”
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