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First arrest in NYC gang war killings that prompted gruesome murder of nail salon owner found in burning car
By Danielle Wallace
Published August 11, 2022
A teenage suspect was extradited from West Virginia back to New York City, where he’s been charged with the murder of a 21-year-old man whose brutal shooting death sparked a string of events that led to the gruesome gang slayings of a young nail salon owner and her ex-college basketball friend found in a burning car.
Nikki Huang, a 23-year-old nail salon owner, was allegedly pistol-whipped and robbed of her expensive Louis Vuitton bag in the Lower East Side in May.
She later complained to her friends in the Up the Hill gang about the incident, prompting a string of events that led to the murder of a rival gang chief’s brother.
And as an act of retaliation, the rival gang members allegedly kidnapped and killed Huang and her friend, Jesse Parrilla, 22, whose bodies were found burned beyond recognition in the Bronx.
Zymir Humphrey, 18, was extradited back to New York Tuesday from West Virginia.
Nikki Huang was shot and left to burn in a car in the Bronx. (Handout)
He was nabbed in Martinsburg, W. Va., on July 19 by U.S. Marshals. NYPD charged Humphrey Tuesday with murder and weapon possession in the fatal May 15 shooting of 21-year-old Brandon Atkinson.
The arrest marked the first in the case in a Lower East Side gang war involving a string of other shootings.
Murder victim Jesse Parrilla was a former college basketball player. (Genesee Community College)
Atkinson is not believed to have been involved in the robbery on Huang, but his brother is higher up in the Down the Hill gang, according to police sources speaking to N.Y. Daily News.
NYPD said two homicide victims were found in burning car. (FOX 5 NY)
Hours after Atkinson was shot and killed, furious members of the Down the Hill gang allegedly kidnapped Huang and Parrilla.
Their bodies were later found shot and charred in a burned-out car at the Pelham Split Rock Golf Course in the Bronx.
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Last month, NYPD announced that two suspects, Jahmel Sanders, 30, and Steven Santiago, 34, were wanted for questioning in connection to the murders of Huang and Parrilla.
https://www.foxnews.com/us/first-arrest-nyc-gang-war-killings-prompted-gruesome-murder-nail-salon-owner-found-burning-car