A driver who allegedly shot a Jewish father and son with a pellet gun outside a kosher supermarket on Staten Island over the weekend has been arrested and charged with a hate crime, officials said Tuesday.
Jason Kish, 25, of Staten Island, was charged with hate-crime assault, endangering the welfare of a child, reckless endangerment and assault in connection with the attack, the NYPD said.
“A father and son simply going to the store to buy groceries for their families, like I did the day before in my neighborhood, were shot at by someone that was acting, we believe and we will allege in court, out of hatred,” Staten Island District Attorney Michael McMahon said at a press conference Tuesday afternoon. “I want to be very clear, there’s no room for hatred in this borough.”
Police said Kish fired gel pellets from a toy gun at the 37-year-old father and his 7-year-old son in front of Island Kosher, at 2212 Victory Blvd. near Carmel Avenue, around 4:20 p.m. on Sunday. Police initially reported the two had been shot with a BB gun.
The pellets grazed the child in the ear and struck the father in the chest, according to police. Both were treated by EMS personnel at the scene of the attack, police said.
Police said Kish fired the pellets while driving by inside a black Ford Mustang. An hour after the shooting, officers on Staten Island stopped him in his vehicle before releasing him, NYPD Chief Michael Baldassano said at the Tuesday press conference.
The NYPD’s Hate Crime Task Force later identified a distinctive marking on the Ford Mustang believed to be used in the attack, Baldassano said. The police officers who stopped Kish recognized the marking and were able to identify him using footage from their body-worn cameras, he added.
Additionally, police obtained footage from a Staten Island resident whose doorbell camera spotted a man in a black Ford Mustang with a pellet gun in his hand a few blocks away from the scene of the attack.
Kish’s attorney information wasn’t immediately available Tuesday.