Metro
A 61-year-old father died after a 30-year-old tow truck driver allegedly punched him in the face, causing him to fall back onto the pavement following a dispute over a parking spot that cost a measly $10 Saturday night in Brooklyn.
The deadly dispute broke out around 8:45 p.m. at a Shell gas station at 1143 Clarkson Avenue in Brownsville, according to officials.
The argument “became physical” and the tow truck driver punched the older man in the face, causing him to “fall and hit the pavement,” police said.
A friend of the victim, who identified him as Carlyle Thomas, said Sunday morning that he lived right next door to the station and sometimes parks temporarily in gas station parking spots.
On Saturday evening, someone called Thomas to warn him that the gas station manager had called a tow truck to impound his car, the friend said.
“He came running. He open the door of the tow truck and the guy punch him in the head! He go down and bam!,” the tipster said.
“Dead. He die right there in front of pump 6! He never touch the guy, only touch his door and the guy come out and punch him.
“He’s a cool guy. Got a young son. Why they do that to him! One punch? Kill him?!”
Thomas, a former horse jocket who worked at Aqueduct Racetrack in Queens, has a son, daughter and step-children, his loved ones said.
His step-daughters told The Post the gas station would charge people in the neighborhood $10 to park overnight if they couldn’t find a spot on the street — but that Thomas had a relationship with the shop and sometimes wouldn’t pay until after he got his car.
“He’s lived here a long time and has a relationship with them, so he didn’t pay right away,” his step-daughter Andrele Peter’s said, adding that once he found out his car was being towed he went down to investigate.
“He’s verbally arguing with the tow truck guy and from what I hear next the guy hits him so hard he fell to the floor and his heart stopped. That hit was so hard to the floor he died here. He didn’t make it to the hospital and the hospital is three minutes away.”
His other step-daughter Alexis Peter’s echoed the sentiment.
“He always tried to help them out any way he could. And he did pay to park! But sometimes, you know, I mean they’re friends, so sometimes he paid after when he came back,” she said.
“Why he got to die over $10? He’s short, he’s shorter than my sister here. He’s a little man, you got to punch him like that? You got to kill him over $10?!”
The victim’s nephew Dominic Graham, 37, said his family was coming to the apartment Sunday morning after receiving the “tough” news.
“He was a good guy. Around here he was the neighborhood boss. He knows everyone. And everyone from the gas station to 93rd Street knew him. Everyone,” Graham said of his uncle, who worked at the Aqueduct Racetrack in Queens, training and feeding the horses.
“He was in shock because he thought the gas station guys were cool because he was always in there helping them like unpacking the soda and chips and stuff. Not because he worked there but just because he was hanging around you know with his buddies or whatever, he thought they were friends.”
His friend and neighbor, Errol Pottinger, 55, told him not to stress the small stuff when they were talking just hours before his death.
“When I was talking to him last night he said he’s taking life easy. He told me, don’t stress about life, you don’t know how many years you have left. He said, ‘You don’t know if you have 25 years left,’” Pottinger said.
Pottinger said he has also paid the gas station to park there and had his car towed a few months ago after forgetting to pay.
“It’s not pleasant. It cost me $350,” he said, adding, “It just don’t make any sense to me because he’s so friendly with the people here. The manager did not call the tow truck, the manager and him are friends. The owner called the tow truck and the manager called him to tell him his car was being towed.”
Emergency responders were called to the scene and brought Thomas to Brookdale Hospital Medical Center. He was pronounced dead at 9:17 p.m., police said.
The tow truck driver was taken into custody at the scene and charges were pending, according to the NYPD.
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