A 19-year-old who is a possible suspect in a string of robberies in New York City has been charged with several counts of attempted murder of a police officer, assault, and other crimes in a shooting that left two NYPD officers wounded earlier this week.
Bernardo Raul Castro-Mata, a young migrant from Venezuela who is scheduled to be arraigned this Wednesday, was reportedly shot in the ankle after police returned fire. The two were investigating a robbery pattern involving mopeds and scooters in which Castro-Mata was suspected when they spotted a man on a moped going the wrong way in East Elmhurst around 1:30 a.m. on Monday, according to the NYPD.
The man, later identified as Castro-Mata, got off the moped and took off on foot. The two 26-year-old police officers gave chase, and allege that Castro-Mata shot at them during the pursuit. A firearm was recovered at the scene.
Law enforcement sources say Castro-Mata arrived in the U.S. in 2023 and had been staying at the migrant shelter on Ditmas Boulevard. Attorney information for him has not been made immediately available.
The 19-year-old has no prior arrests in the city but is a suspect in two violent robberies in Queens that occurred on May 21, as reported by investigators. In both cases, suspects of mopeds used force to rob victims of various items, including purses, phones, and debit cards, according to three senior law enforcement officials.
“The patterns that we’re looking at currently in Queens that he’s involved with — phone snatching, in one case a woman attacked [and] her debit card stolen, and eventually it was used at a smoke shop,” NYPD Chief Joseph Kenny said.
The officers he is accused of shooting, Richard Yarusso, who was shot in his bulletproof vest, and Christopher Abreu, who was hit in his upper leg, were treated and released from the hospital.
Mayor Adams visited the officers in the hospital on Monday and later called the shooting “senseless” in a statement.
Law enforcement says they’re investigating more than 80 robbery patterns involving scooters and mopeds, which is reportedly four times the number of cases they had in a similar time frame last year. According to police, there were no crime patterns like this in 2022.
One NYPD official said the department has seized more than 13,000 mopeds so far in 2024, and nearly 55,000 in total dating back to 2022.
