By Karen Frantz
Police were asking the public’s help in identifying a man suspected in connection with the shooting death of a Rockaway Beach man early in the morning Monday outside an Ozone Park nightclub. The NYPD supplied what appears to be images from a surveillance camera showing the man sitting at a bar.
Boutin Williams, 22, was shot on 80th Street and Rockaway Boulevard, authorities said, near the Ozone Park club Flirt, where witnesses said the victim was fighting with several other individuals. Williams was shot in the back, according to police and the city medical examiner’s office.
A witness who did not want to give his name was watching from a convenience store as police put up crime tape at the scene. He said he spoke with a Flirt employee soon after the incident who said the victim and two or three other men were “talking trash” and fighting inside the club before getting kicked out by a bouncer.
“Once they got out of the club, they were fighting outside,” the man said. “And I guess one guy got p—ed off enough, went back to his car or wherever, grabbed his gun and just shot the guy.”
He said he lives a few blocks away from the club and heard about four or five shots fired.
“There was a pop, and then there was a pop, pop, pop, pop after that. Then that was it,” he said.
But the manager of Flirt, who also did not give his name, said there was no fighting inside the club and the venue had just closed around the time of the shooting. He said he was not sure whether Williams was ever inside the club and he had not heard the gunshots.
The victim’s friends put Williams in a car to drive him to a hospital and were pulled over by a patrol car after running several red lights, police said. EMS pronounced him dead at the scene, authorities said.
The man who was looking at the scene from the convenience store said he felt nervous after the incident but not surprised that it had happened.
“There’s more guns in this neighborhood alone than probably God knows where else,” he said. “It’s just so easy to get the access to the guns it’s not even funny.”
He said crime was “on and off” in the neighborhood and that there was another shooting in the area about two weeks ago.
The police said anyone with information is asked to call Crime Stoppers at 1-800-577-TIPS (8477). Calls are confidential. Tips can also be submitted online at nypdcrimestoppers.com or by text at 274637 with the code TIP577.
Reach reporter Karen Frantz by email at kfrantz@cnglocal.com or by phone at 718-260-4538.
