Authorities were called for reports of an assault in progress around 11:40 p.m. Wednesday at a bodega at East 183rd and Bathgate Avenue in the Tremont section.
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When they arrived, witnesses told them there had been a fight in front of the store that resulted in Lesandro Guzman-Feliz getting slashed in the neck with a machete.
Guzman-Feliz then ran to St. Barnabas Hospital, located just a block away, but authorities say he collapsed on the sidewalk. His dying words, investigators said, were that he needed some water.
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He reportedly lived one block from the bodega and was known in the neighborhood as Junior. Investigators say he told his mother he was heading downstairs to repay $5 to a friend, but instead he ended up involved in some type of dispute.
Relatives hugged and cried at the scene Thursday, desperate to understand how and why such a thing could happen. They described him as a good kid and a typical teenager.
"All I can say was that he was a good kid," sister Genesis Collado-Feliz said. "He just played Playstation. He played Fortnite. He played 2K, like every 15-year-old. He asked me for advice with girls."
She said her brother had recently started to hang out with a group of older kids, but she insisted he was not involved with any gang activity.
At least six people were involved in the attack, and surveillance video reportedly shows them fleeing in a white car. So far, there are no arrests.