The man who fatally stabbed a beloved Brooklyn bodega worker Saturday “went crazy” because the victim thought he might be a cop and didn’t want to illegally sell him a “loosie,’’ witnesses told The Post.
The fugitive killer was wearing dark shades and a blue-and-white-striped long-sleeve button-down when he strolled into the East New York store and tossed a dollar on the counter, according to bystanders Sunday and a photo taken moments before the deadly assault.
“He came in, he asked for a cigarette,” said the storeowner, who gave his name only as Omar, of the suspect.
“But the guy working the counter didn’t know him, so he didn’t want to sell him a cigarette. He wanted to be careful. He didn’t want to get a ticket, you know?
“After that, the [customer] starts getting mad,” Omar said. “He starts saying, ‘What do you think, I’m a cop? I’m not a cop!’… He was going crazy. He just went crazy, wouldn’t calm down. He wanted to fight.”
Selling “loosies,” or individual cigarettes, is a violation in the Big Apple.
Witnesses said the suspect, who has not been publicly identified, then hurled a credit-card machine at worker and dad-of-three Diego Sandoval Nava, threatened to kill him and stormed outside.
Nava followed him outside to try to calm him down, witnesses said.
“Diego came out and said, ‘What happened? Why are you mad? We gave you want you want,’ ” Omar said. “But the guy keeps saying, ‘Do I look like the cops? Why do you think I’m a cop?’ “
The two then got into a scuffle, with Nava stabbed and the suspect fleeing the scene. The accused killer is still in the wind.
Nava was rushed to Brookdale University Hospital Medical Center, where he died.
The victim’s friends and coworkers said he had worked at the Deli & Mini Market on the corner of Hegeman and Van Siclen avenues for at least six months, taking the bus to the store and making sandwiches.
“Diego was a great person who always helped out others, and sometimes, when kids didn’t have money to pay for the sandwiches, he paid for them because he trusted that people pay him back,” Nava’s friend, Nasser, 15, said at the deli. “He was always nice to everyone.”
A group of people at the scene, including several who identified themselves the suspect’s friends and family, maintained Sunday that deli workers spit on the killer and attacked him and that he acted in self-defense.
According to witnesses after the incident, the accused killer’s own mother screamed for her son to stop.
“His mom was outside shouting at him as he was going back,” a man said Saturday. ” ‘What the f–k are you doing? What the hell are you doing?’ “
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