Facebook/In Loving Memory of Lesandro Junior Guzman Felix
The owner of a Bronx bodega where a 15-year-old boy was murdered by a gang of machete-wielding attackers last week says he tried to save the teen, despite social media rumors claiming he stood by and did nothing. Modesto Cruz, owner of the Cruz and Chiky Grocery, told the WABC-TV on Friday that the teen victim, Lesandro “Junior” Guzman-Feliz, had run into his store seeking shelter just moments before the fatal attack. “He told me, ‘They looking for me. They looking for me, they running for me.’ So I help him,” he said. “I remember his face. He was so scared and I tried to hold him down.” Cruz said he’d tried to hold Guzman-Feliz behind the store counter but the assailants literally pulled him out. They later stabbed him repeatedly, and he died after making his way to St. Barnabas Hospital. The incident sparked outrage throughout the Bronx, with many accusing Cruz and other store workers of doing nothing to stop the attack. Several City Council members have called for Cruz’s store to be shut down because “it is no longer worthy of doing business” in the city.