NYC high schooler accused of stabbing 2 students acted in self-defense, charges dropped: sources
A teen charged with stabbing two fellow students inside their Queens high school will not be prosecuted after social media video backed his contention that he was jumped by a large group, police sources said Friday.
Instead, the two 17-year-olds who were stabbed Thursday inside Martin Van Buren High School— one of whom has been investigated for his role in two shootings, including a murder — have been charged with gang assault, sources said.
The other teen was also charged with gun possession for the Smith & Wesson 9 mm pistol allegedly found in his jacket pocket, sources said.
The stabbing happened at 1:20 p.m. Thursday inside Martin Van Buren on Hillside Ave. near 230th St. in Queens Village following a fight that erupted in the stairwell between the first and second floors, a witness told the Daily News.
“I was trying to walk my girlfriend to her class and as we got to the staircase we saw them get in an altercation,” a 14-year-old student told The News on Thursday. “These two boys had an altercation. One of them was losing bad and he pulled out a knife and stabbed [the other one].”
Medics rushed both teens to Long Island Jewish Cohens Hospital, one with stab wounds to his upper body, the other with two stab wounds to his back and one to his shoulder.
The school, which has cameras but not scanners, was put into a soft lockdown, meaning there was no reason to believe anyone else would be in danger.
Sources said that as school safety agents tended to the stab victims, an agent found a gun inside the pocket of a coat belonging to the teen with back and shoulder wounds.
When NYPD officers arrived on the scene they recovered the knife and grabbed the suspected stabber, a 16-year-old boy police initially identified as 17.
The boy was taken to the 105th Precinct. With his mother present, he claimed self-defense and identified the teens that were stabbed as part of a larger group that jumped into the fight.
He then pointed authorities to social media video taken of the attack that backed up his claim.
The Queens District Attorney’s Office then told police to void the 16-year-old’s arrest, sources said.
He suffered only minor injuries in the beatdown and did not need medical attention. He has no prior arrests.
Sources said the teen with the gun also has no prior arrests. The other teen who was stabbed, however, is no stranger to police, sources said.
He was arrested last October for grand larceny and prosecuted as an adolescent offender. The case is now sealed.
The same teen is considered a suspect in a non-fatal Queens shooting in August 2022, when he was 15, and a fatal shooting from last May, when he was 16. He has not been charged in either crime.
