Bronx cabbie Jose Morillo’s alleged killer stalked him in hospital, says family; NYPD seeking upgraded charge as death ruled a homicide

As staff at a Bronx hospital connected 62-year-old cab driver and assault victim Jose Morillo to life support, his accused killer sat in a hospital seating area next to his wife, Morillo’s devastated family said Saturday.

“My mom was sitting face to face with her husband’s killer, and we have no idea why,” said Susan Negron, the victim’s daughter.

Morillo’s accused attacker, Arkym Davis, was arrested in the case on May 27, six days after the May 21 incident. Morillo died June 5, and police said Saturday that his death was deemed a homicide.

Davis, 49, remained jailed Saturday at Rikers Island on $2,500 cash bail on a pair of assault charges, records show. Police plan to ask the Bronx DA to bring a homicide charge in the case.

Morillo was leaving a laundromat on Grand Concourse near E. 182nd Street in Fordham Heights on May 21 when Davis attacked him without warning, hurling him to the street and stomping on his head, said Lizzette Negron, Morillo’s wife.

“Some crazy man came up to him, said nothing and just attacked him,” said Negron, who was on the phone with her husband as he was attacked.

Davis laughed maniacally as he beat her husband, Negron said.

“[My husband] kept screaming and he kept saying in Spanish, ‘The guy is laughing. He’s laughing,” said Negron. “I was scared.”

Negron called her daughter Susan, who rushed to the laundromat. “When I got there my dad was wounded, bleeding, unconscious,” Susan Negron said. “I had no idea the extent of his injury.”

And unbeknownst to Susan, her father’s attacker stood next to her as she called 911 and helped paramedics load him into an ambulance.

“His killer was still there, drinking and smoking right next to my dad in front of the laundromat,” she recounted. “I saw him, but I had no idea that that’s the person who attacked my dad. My focus was to save my dad’s life.”

Medics rushed Morillo to the Bronxcare Health Systems hospital on the Grand Concourse in Claremont Village, where doctors performed life saving brain surgery.

But Morillo ended up in a coma, and had to be placed on life support, his daughter said.

On May 24 — three days after Morillo was beaten, police unveiled surveillance footage of Davis — leading Susan and Lizzette Negron to realize the man they spotted at the scene and at the hospital was their loved one’s killer.

“When the news story aired and I saw the photos, I called detectives to let them know that the man was next to me when I saved my dad’s life,” said Susan Negron. “It was a hard pill to swallow.”

Davis was arrested three days after that.

In the meantime, Morillo’s condition deteriorated.

“He could not breathe on his own, he couldn’t talk. He spent about two weeks in a painful, agonizing fighting for his life,” said Susan Negron.

Doctors pronounced Morillo dead on June 5.

Susan Negron said her father was a who had driven a yellow cab for the past eight years and worked seven days a week to support his family.

“My dad was 62 years old and still working,” she said. “He was a very good man.”

Davis had a reputation amongst local businesses as an aggressive, drug-addicted alcoholic, who routinely harassed older and more vulnerable people in the neighborhood, according to Susan Negron.

“He targets women, he targets old people, he spits on them, and he attacks them,” she said. “This is something police may not know, but the neighborhood knows.”

Morillo was arrested at least twice before his attack on Morillo, including for another assault in 2018 and criminal possession of stolen property in 2015, cops said.

But the thought of Davis spending the rest of his life behind bars brings Morillo’s family little comfort, and Susan said the system failed him — and his killer.

“People are saying he has been treated for mental issues in the past,” she said. “Why was this person on the street? He was failed,” she said. “I want to hate him. But I can’t.”