Two charged in Bronx shooting death of man once arrested for murder
Two arrests have been made in the Bronx shooting death of a man who himself was once arrested for murder, police said Wednesday.
Victim Craig Thomas, 41, was shot in the chest near E. 214th St. and Wilson Ave. in Williamsbridge just before 1:30 p.m. Aug. 27. About two hours later a 34-year-old man struck in the right arm walked into Montefiore Medical Center. Cops determined he was wounded in the same incident.
Michael Spand, 24, has been arrested for murder, manslaughter and weapon possession, cops said Wednesday. A second suspect, Johnson Gayle , 41, was arrested earlier this month on gun possession and reckless endangerment charges.
Thomas, also known as Jacob Pitts, had a rap sheet dating back to 1990, including a murder charge along with kidnapping and robbery offenses, cops said. He was living in West Hempstead, L.I., at the time of his slaying, according to cops.
Spand, a member of the Touch Money gang, lives in Harlem’s Grant Houses and has about a dozen arrests on his record, police said. He served more than four years in state prison for a Bronx robbery and was paroled in June 2021.
Gayle has more than a dozen prior arrests and lives in the Wakefield section of the Bronx, police said.
