Cops grabbed a violent career criminal wanted for killing a man in Bronx after they recognized him as a regular at the chess tables in Washington Square Park, officials said Thursday.
Sheldon (Slim) Edmond, 34, is accused of fatally shooting 55-year-old Lionel Samuel and wounding a second man in a drive-by shooting in Bronx on May 27, 2016.
Cops took him into custody Wednesday when a police officer receiving training at the NYPD’s Virtual Crime Information Center saw a wanted poster for Edmond and recognized him as a homeless man that frequented the Greenwich Village park, police sources said.
The cop told his old partner at the Sixth Precinct, who spearheaded the gambit to take Edmund down.
Far from a grandmaster strategist, Edmond was found in the park on Wednesday morning and charged with criminal possession of marijuana, officials said.
Investigators believe he will be charged with murder and attempted murder as the investigation continues.
When he was in handcuffs, Edmond told police he was surprised cops did not get to him sooner, a police source said.
Two gunmen in a white car blasted Samuel and a 54-year-old man as the victims waited for a green light in a silver Honda Accord at Baychester and Schieffelin Avenues in Edenwald about 5:40 a.m., cops said.
The shot victims sped away from the gunfire but crashed into a tree at Bronx Boulevard and E. 226th Street.
Rescuers rushed the men to Jacobi Medical Center, where Samuel, who was shot in the chest, died. The surviving victim was shot in the leg.
The gunplay was part of a “drug-related dispute,” officials said at the time.
Police quickly identified the shooters as Edmond and Jonathan (Platinum) Jay, 32, officials said. Cops arrested Jay in June, charging him with Samuel’s murder.
Jay has seven arrests on his record and was sentenced to six years in prison for robbery in 2002, according to police sources and public records.
Edmond, who’s been arrested 19 times, was sentenced to two years in prison for felony assault in 2000.
